Moving from Single 5870 to X-Fire

codyw9524

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I'm rather impatiently awaiting my 2nd Sapphire 2gb 5870 to crossfire with my identical card. I've never crossfired cards before. I'm thinking that I just need to uninstall drivers, boot into safe mode, run driver sweeper, shut down. Install the new card and 2 crossfire bridges (rumor is that is better?) then fire it up, reinstall drivers, activate crossfire in Catalyst and I'm up and running. Is this correct? I know the answer to this question is almost always yes, but would i benefit more from doing reformatting and doing a clean install with the 2 cards installed?


My system specs (if it matters):

AMD Phenom X4 965 BE @ 3.8ghz
MSI 790FX-GD70 mobo
4gb OCZ AMD BE DDR3-1600
Sapphire 2gb 5870
OCZ Agility 2 SSD - 120gb
Some old 250gb Sata II HDD
750w Corsair PSU
 
Solution

Every time I install another AMD card in crossfire, I have to re-install the drivers. Otherwise, crossfire doesn't behave appropriately.

Just use the Catalyst 'Express Uninstall' option when you uninstall the drivers (control panel->programs->uninstall a program). If you use the express uninstall option, you usually don't have to use any Driver Sweeper software.

Then, install the latest drivers from the AMD website.

Earnie

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Nver use a registry cleaner,they can cause more harm than good.All you need to do is install the second card,only 1 bridge is required,start up and crossfire should already be enabled in ccc.

I have been running crossfire since the 3870's.I also find ,for my setup at least,that the 10.5ahotfix drivers work best with my Xfire 5870's.

good luck
 

nba_prophecy

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I think your cpu will seriously bottleneck the cards. You should get an x4 to feed those babies, they are rather cheap right now... And get the latest drivers 11.3 they work great.
 

codyw9524

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Woops that was a typo, I do have the quad. I've edited the original post. that shouldn't bottleneck my cards right? well I'm glad I just have to plug in and go that's easy.
 

Every time I install another AMD card in crossfire, I have to re-install the drivers. Otherwise, crossfire doesn't behave appropriately.

Just use the Catalyst 'Express Uninstall' option when you uninstall the drivers (control panel->programs->uninstall a program). If you use the express uninstall option, you usually don't have to use any Driver Sweeper software.

Then, install the latest drivers from the AMD website.
 
Solution

codyw9524

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Sounds like I better reinstall drivers to be on the safe side. Is Driver Sweeper a registry editor? Also on a side note this motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-P67A-UD7-B3 LGA 1155 Intel P67. I know Intel likes Nvidia, but would my 2 5870's perform well on that board?
 

phendric

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May I ask what monitor resolution your system is at? Unless you're driving multiple monitors in Eyefinity, even a single 2 GB 5870 is probably overkill...

P
 

codyw9524

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I've got a 42' LG Plasma at 1920x1080 and I wish a single card was overkill. It runs every game, most on max settings (not Metro, though that one's impossible), but not always holding at that magic 60 fps number. With 2 i can go eyefinity later if I want (its just so appealing) and i think I've future proofed a little.
 
Make sure you get the newest driver sweeper version. There's a glitch in older versions where it would accidentally delete 3 files windows needs (when using ATI cards), although the issue only crept up when Win 7 SP1 came out. lol.

Anyway, I don't see the issue with registry cleaners either, I use Cclean all the time.

And yeah, CF 5870s should rock. I'm using CF 5850s and can max games out at 1080p.

Although I have to say I'd hate being on a 42" TV (I hope you meant inch, not foot lol). I plugged into my 40" 1080p Samsung TV before and I can't see text at all. It's so much sharper on my 24" monitor.
 

codyw9524

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haha yeah i meant 42 inch. A lot of the time I just keep the desktop at 720p. I sit pretty close to it and Mozilla has a great extension that auto zooms on web pages so the text is nice and big. Any real typing work (word docs for school or work) I do on my laptop. I dunno if I could go back to a small monitor; I've been spoiled by my tv! Unless of course that was three small monitors! :D