Crossfire or new card?

[ashharun]

Hello,
This is my first time asking in here. Recently i upgrade my cpu, from athlon 7750 BE to core i5 3470 (i'm using Asrock z77 pro3). I think its a very great upgrade, everything is so fast and responsive with this new cpu. But now my graphic card cannot keep pace with my new cpu. I had HD4850, i bought it from 2009. I'm thinking to upgrade my graphic card. But hey, when i look at the 4850 price now, its very cheap, only $65-$70. If i buy a new card like 7850 or 7850, i cant afford it with my current budget (i'm student, and must saving to slowly upgrade my rig). SO, it is good choice to buy new 4850 card and crossfire it with my old card? Or should i save my money to buy new card in 2 or 3 months?

and, if i buy 4870 rather than 4850 to crossfire it, is there will be a noticeable performance increase?

Thank you very much for helping me here

 

[johnsonjohnson]

Hi. I don't think it's worth it to Crossfire the HD 4850 since I think the support for the HD 4xxx ended since Catalyst 12.4 or something? You're better off saving up for a new card maybe even the HD 8xxx.

 

[combine1237]

I second waiting for 8000 series.

 

[johnsonjohnson]

Edit: It's 12.6 not 12.4

 

[RatedFatal]

Save your money for sure. Even CFing 2 4850's won't get you the same performance as a single 7850 and above. With an already strict budget the 8xxx series is not recommended as the cheapest ones will probably be around $400 upon release. They would likely quickly go down, but I guess it depends on how long you want to wait.

 

[quilciri]

There's a couple of used 4850's on amazon for $42 right now. That's a solid buy. Two card configs work well now that microstutter has been pretty much solved (turn off v-sync).

A pair of 4850's is roughly equivalent to a 560 ti acc. tom's chart.

 

[ashharun]

So, i should saving rather than spending for new card right now.. Yep, i think i'll do that. It's not like i can't play anything new with this card, just want to use higher graphic setting .

So, when the 8xxx radeon series out? I can wait for another 1-2 months if it really beats the 7850 or 7870.

 

[johnsonjohnson]

The last I've heard it might be longer than that. You can expect better performance but of course they're not going to be cheap while current gen cards will continue to get cheaper. When you are ready to upgrade, you can then decide which path to take.

 

[ashharun]

Thank you all for the answer . I think i'll grab 7850 for the next month. Cheers!

 

[RatedFatal]

The Radeon 8xxx series was supposed to be out by the end of this year (2012) but I haven't seen them yet. I would expect to see them within the next 1-3 months. According to some information I've been reading, the 8xxx series should perform about 20% better than their 7xxx counterparts. However I can't give a solid price, I know when the 7xxx series first came out the cheapest 7850 was nearly $300 but very quickly dropped.

 

[ashharun]

Best answer selected by ashharun.