Crossfire on ASRock 970 Extreme3

[dansbarking]

Alright, so I'm new to crossfire, always ran a single solid mid-range card.

Current setup:
CPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103727
MOBO: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157280
GPU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131374
PSU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139010

My friend has the same mobo and said it supported CrossFire on its own (without a bridge), and his rig just died so I came across this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150618&nm_mc=KNC-GoogleAdwords&cm_mmc=KNC-GoogleAdwords-_-pla-_-NA-_-NA for free

Now they're all plugged in and the monitor plugged into the xfx IS on and working but I can't enable crossfire.

From what I've read it'll only run x16/x4 on this setup, but thats better than no crossfire I guess?

I guess my questions are:
1) should i bother crossfiring these cards on this setup?
2) do i need to order a bridge?
3) if i cant crossfire at all, is the xfx better than the powercolor in any particular way?

 

[dudewitbow]

the 6850 requires a bridge. the only gpu that i can recall that does not require it is the 7750

 

[dansbarking]

assuming this mobo only runs x16/x4, would you say its worth it?

 

[dudewitbow]

Crossfire is pretty lenient on performance loss from 8x to 4x. you will lose at most like maybe 4-6% compared to an 8x/8x doing the same.

i will also note that you may experience microstuttering if your eyesight is very sharp on framerate reading.

edit2: when i say 4-6%, thats the most loss upper limit. its probably going to be less, as early gpus dont saturate the slot as much as like extremely high end ones.

 

[dansbarking]

Best answer selected by dansbarking.

 

[dansbarking]

alright, thanks! i'll see if best buy has one tomorrow, all the ones im finding online seem a bit too short