What card for Eyefinity?

IMA UNICORN

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Aug 2, 2012
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Hi all,
I'm planning to replace my 550ti sli with something from ATI that can better support 3 monitors for gaming (mw3, bf3, ect) in an Eyefinity setup because the cheaper nvidia cards are useless at it. I'm trying to decide between dual HD 7850s or a HD7950 that I might in the future crossfire with a weaker card like an Hd7770 to give it some extra power.
So am I better off going with the 7850s or a single 7950.
I am most likely to get a card made by Gigabyte because they seem to have the best stock cooling and solid factory overclocks.
please if you send me a link to a card that i should be looking at could you please try using a New Zealand website because that is where I live and prefer buying local.

Thanks
 

azathoth

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Crossfire ONLY works with the same cards, you are unable to Crossfire a HD7950 with a HD7770.

If you are doing an Eyefinity setup for playing BF3, you are going to need to either turn down the graphics a lot, or get some serious firepower in there.

Two HD 7850's should provide enough graphical power to play the games you have listed, using the Gigabyte GHZ edition ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125418 ).

However the cost of those two cards nets you 2360 Stream processors for $540.
An HD 7970 will cost you $380 for 2048 Sream processors, 1GB more ram and you don't have to worry about the small performance reduction from crossfire, or microstuttering.

( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102982 )
 

IMA UNICORN

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Thank you for the amazingly quick reply's.
so how much extra power would the 7850s give me over the 7950?
and also would it be worth crossfiring 2 7870s, would i see much difference over the dual 7850s?

thanks
 

azathoth

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Two HD 7850's should give ~8-12% more performance, HOWEVER microstuttering can be a problem. Microstuttering can make it appear as if you get getting vastly less FPS then what is displayed.
 

jtenorj

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If you're thinking about a 28nm gpu(or 2), you should be thinking about overclock potential. If you go 7850, you
want to make sure they are the 2GB models and not 1GB(it already makes a big difference in some games now,
and it'll likely make a bigger difference after a relatively short while). 2GB cards cost more, so that OCed 7970 that
was linked will probably cost less than 2 7850s. 2 7870s would cost even more. Shader wise, 2 7850s have the
same number of shaders as a 7970, but run at lower clock speeds by default(860mhz vs 925mhz). I recommend
against 2 cards for a number of reasons. Compared to one card, they require more power, cooling, physical space,
a supporting mobo, games that support crossfire well, and you are more likely to encounter micro-stuttering with
2 cards than you are with one(more electronic waste, too). Get 1 custom cooled 7970(like the one linked) and
overclock the crap out of it. It should run games at eyefinity res pretty easily on high. Something like BF3 you may
have to use fxaa instead of 4xaa, ssao instead of hbao and turn off motion blur to play online(motion blur both
kills frame rate a little and hinders your ability to spot opponents). You can keep the rest of the settings at ultra.

Edit: oops. missed the NZ part of your op. let me take a look and get back to you in a few...
 

jtenorj

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Cheapest 7850 I found. HIS reference style(blower fan, rear vent) for 309.00 inc GST free shipping at pcforce:

http://www.pcforce.co.nz/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=26&products_id=2096&

cheapest 7870 is ASUS DC2 for 397.00 inc GST free shipping at computerlounge:

http://www.computerlounge.co.nz/components/componentview.asp?r=p&partid=16605

Cheapest 7950 is Gigabyte triple fan for 518.50 inc GST free shipping at computerlounge:

http://www.computerlounge.co.nz/components/componentview.asp?r=p&partid=16269

The cheapest 7970s are both at computerlounge. Both have 1ghz core clock but are not ghz ed.(6ghz gddr5).

Here is the asus dc2 for 649.00 inc GST free shipping(takes up 3 expansion slots) :

http://www.computerlounge.co.nz/components/componentview.asp?r=p&partid=16508

Here is a long gigabyte with 3 fans(like that 7950) for the same cost/GST/shipping:

http://www.computerlounge.co.nz/components/componentview.asp?r=p&partid=16504

I guess 2 7850s cost a little less than 1 7970 in this case. You can take a 7950 and OC it past 7970 levels.

http://hardocp.com/article/2011/12/22/amd_radeon_hd_7970_video_card_review/9

hardocp tested in single player with motion blur on. Turn it off for multi player (read why in my post above).

The normal 7950 and 7970 are better than 7950 with boost bios and 7970ghz ed. cuz u can tweak them
yourself and get better performance. I think spending a few more bucks on 1 7970 vs 2 7850s is worth it.