Thinking of going crossfire

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bang9

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Hey there first post to ask for help plz bare with me....
i am currently thinking of going duel card but dont understand fully...what improvments i will see or if my system is ample for adding a second card . i have googled it but not getting the right info.
so system specs

amd t1100@ x6 stock
8GB coarse air vengence ram
asus m5 a99x evo mb( 16x pci cxf 8x8x)
his 6950 2gb (none reference cooler)
coarse air 650 tx psu (i am upgrading that to 850 same brand)

my questions are...
1. are my specs going to bottle neck my extra card.
2. what sort of gain will i see as an extra £360 is alot to spend if not much gain


Edit....
i am going to be running 3 monitors to (just need to buy them )

thank you in advanced
 
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bang9

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i have a friend that could oc my cpu as i have water cooling (self contianed) he said he cooled pos clock it to 3.8/4ghz would that give me the overhead i need with out stuttering or would i have to sacrifice a monitor or two....
p.s thanks for quick reply :)
 
jjb8675309

jjb8675309

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Bang9-

No problem and Its your lucky day as I am in an information giving mood.... feel free to pm any time with questions

I hope this digression will shed some light on the situation but ultimatley its up to you...

I had my p2 955 oc'ed to 4.2ghz and it made no difference (mind you that your extra cores will make no difference in gaming and in fact the deneb chips are faster for gaming in many cases) plus oc'ing the 1100t over or around 3.8ghz brings a seriously diminishing return. Meaning beyond that point you will be jamming voltage into the thing to get minimal if any performance gains. Water-cooling is way overkill for a situation like this I accomplished my aforementioned oc with a 30 dollar aircooler (that is with plenty of heat envelope to spare)

you can give it a shot but I fear that you may be returning the second 6950 before you know it... so its either trial and error or get a more suitable platform for a high end cfx rig such as p-67/z-68

I was in your shoes not too long ago and I decided to go z68 instead of going the 990fx route and migrating my 955 to that mobo to run gtx 560ti sli, although I don't know what the results of the former solution would have been, the latter has been excellent and again when I ran 955 @ 4.2 ghz and cfx 6870s the performance was crap

Its hard to tell but all I can say is that if you go for the intel platform you will not be disappointed...

as far as oc'ing and watercooling is concerned, imo it is totally not worth it since most inexpensive aircoolers (CM hyper 212+) perform well beyond their monetary value and honestly ~4ghz on an 1100t is not hard to achieve nor is it that extreme of an oc these days...

as far as the am3 platform I think that it perfectly ample of a cpu to handle the strongest of strong single cards but its ability to keep up with high end cfx is questionable I think...

personally Id stick to 1 display and a single strong gpu or buy a second 6950 and upgrade your cpu/mobo--- heck you can still get good money for selling your used 110t and mobo (I did with my old am3 setup and it allowed me to buy new parts)! :)

sorry that there is a bit of gray area but I speak from experience and I really feel that the stronger cpu helps and in fact my rig (in my sig) has been an absolute dream to game on so there is my 2 cents
 
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bang9

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i have being swaying towards intel for quite some time as being a amd from start of my gaming life amd as not failed me price/proformance is good i shall look at now pos, going that way i have had my rig for (currnet) 2 months and happy with it but want more, my sons rig need up grade bad so will give him my heart of pc and go intel.
could you rec mb ram and cpu (will oc read u on them as want decent system to go duel cards.

by sacrifice monitor i mean use only 1 or 2 as heard using to monitors use more vram in the hope i can compensate fps and quality
:)
 
omega21xx

omega21xx

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I have to agree with jjb, i've switched to an intel build to alleviate the cpu bottleneck. If you are in the upgrade mood, then my two suggestions are:
1. If you plan to stay on AMD sell the 6950 and get a 7950/7970. You'll see better minimum/max frame rates with the 7970 than with the two 6950's due to the cpu bottleneck.
2. If you are willing to switch to intel sell the cpu and mobo to someone and use the cash to get an i5 2400/2500k and mobo. If you can sell the cpu and mobo (~$250) you should be able to switch to an intel build (~$350) for around ~$100 or less
 
jjb8675309

jjb8675309

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if you want a recommendation for mobo/cpu then look in my signature below and plug into newegg or what have you good luck and have fun... also your son will be thrilled to rock your old pc guts
 
omega21xx

omega21xx

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Yep, felt i should keep that there in memory of how my old cpu and board served me haha
 
jjb8675309

jjb8675309

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yeah buddy I was right there with you feeling really good when I made the jump, and I think the OP will too, you gonna spring for an Ivy Bridge chip if prices and performance are promising? IMO theres no need but everyone loves overkill for gaming!!
 
omega21xx

omega21xx

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With how I've been getting a constant upgrade itch, probably after I get a 7950 :)
 
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bang9

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thank you guys i will look in to doing the rebuild build shame tho as i like my current system ..will look on new egg or oc for new part thanks guys
 
alrobichaud

alrobichaud

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Does it really cost that much to buy a 6950 overseas? Ignoring any system bottleneck, 6950's scale really well and you can expect to see nearly double the framerates on games that make use of crossfire. That being said, you can always just get another 6950 and if you find that you are not happy with the level of improvement then you can always take everyone elses suggestion and upgrade your motherboard/processor. Also, if you plan on 3 monitors, one 6950 will have a hard time keeping up with modern games in eyefinity resolutions unless you plan on playing in low graphic settings.
 
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bang9

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That 360 is with a PSU to and my mate having same card as me so we going too use his PSU and new card to test it out if it saves me buying 1 so if I see good improvement I will get it if not I haven't lost any thing. :)
 
xerxces

xerxces

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Not sure what the guy with the 955 is talking about. I have a 955 at normal clocks and two 6870's. The processor keeps up just fine. I get no stuttering, except in BO which is expect since it was coded by monkeys. I can play metro on exteremely high and BF3 on Ultra. BF3 does have some jumps but that is a very demaning game.
 
jjb8675309

jjb8675309

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I guess im more anal then most, and I like to play with vsync +triple buffering, for me the performance was absolute ***!

and furthermore the micro-stuttering that is an inherent problem with the 6870s and is well documented:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-geforce-stutter-crossfire,2995-4.html

so just bc you do not notice it does not mean that it does not exist bc it clearly does

for me i wouldn't go anything lower then 6950s for a cfx rig and Im glad you have found sucess with your 6870s but personally I

did not

Im not saying that its necessarily the 955 either, rather an inherent problem with the gpus (6870s) in the end the problem is difficult to attribute

In terms of raw power you cant beat it for the price but imo the overall experience was crap and Im much happier with what I got now, see sig>>>
 
xerxces

xerxces

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Yeah, for future reasons I would also go with the 6950's. I am also very picky and am constanly running tests and FRAPS to check averages and ect. Computer parts always seem to be individually based, lol. What works for one person completely fails for another!
 
jjb8675309

jjb8675309

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yeah I hear you but in that article there is indisputable evidence that the 6870s have larger margins of frame variances

personally I wouldn't want to send anyone down that road however im glad that you enjoy yours
 
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