2 5970s or sell them and get something better?

[Icychill]

I have two brand new never used Radeon 5970s. I'm building a new gaming pc and I want it to be very good so here are my options

Keep both and crossfire them
Sell one and just use the other one
Sell both and get something better

What would be my best option? At this point I only have a graphics card and RAM, I still need to get everything else.

 

[joedjnpc]

I have two brand new never used Radeon 5970s. I'm building a new gaming pc and I want it to be very good so here are my options

Keep both and crossfire them
Sell one and just use the other one
Sell both and get something better

What would be my best option? At this point I only have a graphics card and RAM, I still need to get everything else.

The 5970 is still a really really powerful card, I would suggest keeping it if you have it. Crossfire has it's benefits and it's drawbacks though.

Here's a review I just google'd for your card if you're curious, the benchmarks are a little old though:

http://www.guru3d.com/article/radeon-hd-5970-review-test/28

I myself own a 5870 and it still kicks serious ass at 1920 x 1080

 

[joedjnpc]

Oh and crossfiring these cards should nearly eliminate microshuttering:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-geforce-stutter-crossfire,2995.html

(read that if you want to know why)

the only issue is driver support

 

[Icychill]

So if you had the choice of keeping them or getting a newer card, it would be best to keep them?

 

[monsta]

Keep them for now and have a look what happens with the new 7000 series cards , you got plenty of power there for now and you can see if the new cards are worth the upgrade and performance increase.

 

[reaxion]

can you get something better? lol, in battlefield 3 benchmarks the 5970 beats the gtx 590. i would keep them unless you plan on getting a 6990 or a 7990 because the 5970 vs even the 7970 id say will win, you heard it hear first, 5970 is a monster and still king of the hill other then 6990 but you have them in xfire and will wreck a 6990 with that.

 

[reaxion]

That article was about 560Ti SLi vs 6870 crossfire and has nothing to do with the 5xxx series which has poorer scaling.
The 5970 is clearly a very potent gpu still and would hold its own against 7xxx single gpu's.

true about the article, but i disagree, when the 5xxx series first came out the scaling was bad and for a significant amount of time following but most of that has been fixed, i run 2 5870's in cf and no issues at all. have had them for almost 2 years now and there have been dramatic improvements, 2 5970's will scale fine with the right drivers. they have had more then enough time to work out the kinks

 

[reaxion]

Never said the 5XXX was terrible in CFX, i was saying they scale worse than 6XXX

that you did and i stand corrected, and also i believe it will trash every 7 series gpu other then 7990, its already beaten the gtx 590

 

[reaxion]

and 2 5870 > 2 6870's and 2gb 5870 > 6950...the 1gb 5870 only performs less to a 2gb 6950 by about 4 fraps. 5970 > all of these but crossfire 5870

 

[toneekay]

Since you don't have the rest of your computer... I'd say sell one of the cards and BUILD your comp first.

 

[Icychill]

Ok thanks I guess I'll keep them

Now I have to figure out what's the best mobo, cpu, psu etc

 

[reaxion]

Good choice, when you buy your CPU and motherboard look at microcenter.com they kill newegg for prices on these particular items

 

[Icychill]

I've been reading mixed thoughts on crossfiring 2 5970. I read that it had scaling issues and has similar diminishing returns as quadfiring gpus since there's technically two gpus in one card. I mainly want to play BF3 on ultra settings but I don't know if one card is enough to play it smoothly.

 

[toneekay]

One card should be able to play BF3 smoothly at high settings; you're underestimating the power of that card. Like I said earlier, sell off one of the cards and put together your computer... You'll have headaches trying to quad-fire 2 of those.

 

[Icychill]

Ugh such a tough decision. Im probably going to have to think about this. If I don't keep both I'll have to upgrade sooner or later.

 

[toneekay]

But even if you do keep both, you'll still have headaches!

 

[KvotheYSL21]

Funny enough I've just bought 2 5970's and I couldn't be happier. The price / performance margin is incredible as these things outrun cards that cost almost twice as much. Yes... they may have some trouble dealing with multi-monitor setups due to their lack of onboard memory... however I haven't seen this. I have 12 gig of system memory as well. What I can absolutely attest to is that one 5970 can run BF3 on ultra settings with the HSAO disabled. I'm capped at 60fps but that's only because I have VSync enabled

 

[alanme123]

I could not find the HD 5970 Sapphire edition anywhere.. I have one of those in my system right now and I can for sure tell you that it runs fine on BF3 on high settings. I was thinking if I should just wait until the 7990 or just buy another one of the 5970.. Any suggestions?

Also, where would I find the 5970 if I wanted to buy it?