6950 vs 6770 xfire ?

[Pgooch]

I stumbled upon this for 100$ I have two 6770 1 gb in xfire this 2gb 6950 would blow these away right? This just seems to be too good of a deal will perform many test upon buying and hide it from old lady =/ Currently using catalyst 12.1 i could just throw it in without the need of driver change correct?

 

[fil1p]

Hey,

yes a single hd6950 would be better. With crossfire you risk having driver issues, problems with scaling in certain games, and microstutter. All in all single hd6950 would perform just as good as the two hd6770's if not better. Also you could always get an additional hd6950 in the future. Not to mention some of the hd6950's can have their BIOS flashed to that of a hd6970, effectively giving you a nice performance boost. However if you do decide to go with the crossfire setup, then just download and install the latest drivers of the AMD page, but you should be fine with your current drivers.

Hope this helps!

 

[DarkSable]

Yes, a 6950 is a good upgrade, but why not go with a 7k series? Or, better, wait for a few months and upgrade to the 8k series - they're going to begin being rolled out very soon.

 

[Pgooch]

i talked him down to $80 and i can test if it works i think i can get $50 a piece for 6770 so id just be trading sort of no out of pocket money

 

[fil1p]

I would not get the second hd6770, a single hd6950 or a newer card is the way to go.

 

[Pgooch]

I currently have two 6770, thinking about picking this up for $80. .. Selling the two 6770 for 40-50 bucks a piece... Come out in the end with 6950 instead

 

[fil1p]

Ok, i was a bit confused with your earlier posts. Thats not bad. A hd6950 is a nice card, its not the latest out there but its good. For that price its a nice upgrade.

 

[Pgooch]

Got the 6950 works great and got it for a steal at $80 and he brought it to me saving hour round trip.. Thank you for all the help, Can you send me a link on info on flashing 6950 bios ?

 

[Pgooch]

I found a tut on tech power up how safe is doing this process?

 

[fil1p]

Hey,

$80 for a hd6950 thats a very nice deal considering that a new or refurbished hd6870 costs close to $110 or $120, with hd6950 costing quite a bit more. There have been rumors that it does not work on all cards, and of course if the card has a dual BIOS it is a safer. If your card is one of the earlier 2GB hd6950's there is a good chance that it will work. However there is always a risk that you completely brick the card. So IF you decide to flash it make sure to make a backup of the original BIOS which in some, not all emergencies can help you recover your card if something goes wrong.

I nor Tomshardware take NO responsibility if you damage your card, so PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK! And obviously this will void your warranty, if the card still has one.

An alternative to flashing the BIOS if you dont want to take that risk is to simply overclock the card, but that obviously does not unlock the shaders.


Good luck!

 

[Pgooch]

I actually flashed the card and bricked it no post. Fixed it then tried the msi twin frozr 3 bios that unlocks the shaders found here

http://www.vortez.net/articles_pages/msi_r6950_twin_froz_iii_power_edition_unlocking,1.html

Then i flashed it to that bios and it boosted my core and memory clock up but didnt unlock the shaders. You have any suggestions? You definitely have best answer, If you dont know then ill pick best answer and open new thread pertaining to this

 

[Pgooch]

And it is actually a 2gb card without dual bios switch

 

[Pgooch]

Best answer selected by pgooch.