FragMonsteR

Within the next 2 month i decided i was gonna go with watercooling instead of Air, and i decided to upgrade my graphics card aswell.

My current build:

MO: Asus CrossHair IV ROG
CPU: Phenom II X6 1090T
GFX: XFX Radeon 5870 1GB DDR5
HDD: WD Caviar Black 640GB
SSD: 64GB Corsair Performance. x 2
RAM: 2x2GB OZD black edition 1600 Mhz
CPU Cooler: Corsair H70
PSU: COOLERMASTER Silent Pro M1000
Cabinet: Coolermaster CM 690 II Advanced.

My thoughts are would a crossfire'ed 5870 be better then to upgrade to 1 of the new generations of graphics cards, if so which ?

OldBuzzard

If I were in your shoes, I'd go with crossfired 5870s.

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Takaharu

5870 hands-down.

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blibbax

Upgrading to 5870 crossfire would give you better performance than any graphics card currently available, and all of the features of the latest ATI cards, at a cheaper price.

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Tyrsonswood

What they said ^^^^^

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FragMonsteR

Well crossfire it is then, does it require to be the same brand ?

My current card is a XFX, but i have found i pretty cheap Sapphire, could i crossfire those 2 or does it need to be the same brand in order to work ?

blibbax

No need for same brand. Just needs to be the same GPU.

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FragMonsteR

Awesome thanks guys =D

isaak

Nice decision

You gonna WC the graphics cards too or just the CPU?

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FragMonsteR

Well it depends if i can fit the tubes in the cabinet, a guy on a danish OC forum is doing a build atm im following closely, to see if it is possible to do so.

If possible i most certainly will

OldBuzzard

If they are both reference design cards, this Koolance WB will work.

The are currently on special with $30.00 off.

VID-AR587 (Radeon HD 5870/5850), Rev.2.0 [no nozzles] - Water cooling systems, pc liquid cooling kit, cpu, video card, hard drive

I've WCed my CPU and a 3870 X2 in an original CM 690 case, and had plenty of room for tubing.

I just built a system for #2 son using a 690 II and have a 690II Advanced sitting here waiting for the last few components for my new build. They have even more room inside than the original. Fitting the tubing should be a non-issue.

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Judas

personally... i'd likely stick with what you got and wait for the newer card.... i'm sure it'll arrive sometime between april or june

Just saying that a 5870 is pretty damn good by itself

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FragMonsteR

They really worth it ?

I know that the 6990 is beast, but im betting that the price altso will be sky high ><"

@Buzzard
Any chance you could upload some pictures id love to see how you did it ?

Judas

honestly ... considering how very similare the 5 and 6 serioues of ati gpus are.....just like the 3 was the former and the 4 series was a refresh and enhancement of the 3 series.. 5 and 6 are also hand in hand essentialy.

Come april-june.. i'm fairly positive... specially with AMDs finicial situation showing positive grounds now.... that 7xxx series will show up with a completely reworked gpu

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OldBuzzard

I never took any pics, but it's rairly easy to explain.

I use a Koolance EXOS, ran the tubes in thru the holes in the 690.

Top hole was in flow going to the CPU, then to the vid card and then out the bottom hole.

I used the Swivel Angled Nozzles on the vid card so it made routing the tubing a bit easier.

Nozzle Pair, Swivel Angled [For ID: 06mm (1/4"), OD: 10mm (3/8")] - Water cooling systems, pc liquid cooling kit, cpu, video card, hard drive

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synthesis204

The 6XXX series is essentially a more efficient, effective, cooler version of the 5XXX series. A 5870 is still very high up there for performance in terms of what's on the market from AMD.

If you were at this moment going to get an upgrade, a 5870 crossfire would probably see you the most benefit right now.

If you were going to wait a month or two, the 6990/7XXX would probably be a better bet.

My 2c.

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iPlayer

This generation isn't a huge upgrade over the last, which is what usually happens without process shrinkage. Although the 6xxx do have better crossfire scaling.

blibbax

The 6990 isn't going to have much over 5870 crossfire in performance, except at very high resolutions with AA.

Even when the 7*** comes out (and nobody knows for sure when) I'd be amazed if a single GPU was substansially faster than 5870 crossfire.

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Judas

Generally it isn't going to be substantially faster then it's previous generation crossfired.. out the door..

but it does generally clock for clock.... outperform it significantly enough that the newer generation single gpu solution is much more perferred over an older dual gpu setup...

One of the reasons i'm not using a HD6xxx series card today is the fact that there is no REAL big advantage over the 5xxx i've already got.. specially with triple crossfire.... sure the heat/power usage would be a little lower.. but meh... it's just not worth it/meaningful to change out, and to expensive with litterly little to no benefits.

However with what is saposed to show up in the 7xxx, would be as much of a shift in difference as the 5xxx was to the 3xxx/4xxx lineup.. and as much as the 3xxx was to the hd2xxx

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blibbax

Sure, but even so...

I wouldn't buy a single 5870 today if I already had 4870 crossfire, or a single 4870 if I already had 3870 crossfire, to use your examples.

Of course, if the additional performance is going to be wasted between now and then, and you think that a 7970 in 8 months will be cheaper than a single 5870 now, then it doesn't make sense to upgrade. That seems somehwhat optimistic though.

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Judas

Well the thing is.... that after all the dual gpu's i've come across.. the single gpu's are preferred.... everyone will do whatever they want... doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be logically the best method depending on viewpoint.

I've HAD the top of the line stuff.... and the lowest end.. and i've found that the happy medium generally does the best....

The premium paid for top of the line usually could have gotten you something in the medium range which outperforms the top of the line anyways.... also has better resale value too.

In the case of how AMD has recently been launching things for the past few years..... the near highend of the teir is released launch day.. with a small brother .. and not more then a month later or sometimes around the same time.. the best bang for the buck solution.... lets take the 5770.... it's even today a stellar gpu... cheap, easy as hell to crossfire.... works great and scales beautifully even on an 8x pci-ex 2.x bus.

So lets say that AMD launch the 7870 come may/june, the 7770 launches june/july, the price of the 7770 is half that of the 7870 and the performance is about 3/4 too...

Being that the 7xxx will be an all new chip in itself instead of the 6xxx which is just a refresh of the 5xxx..... it'll have features and advantages.

Now provided with whatever this person wants to end up doing, knowing all the options is always nice to have..... so stick with the gpu and go crossfire.. tollerate the already pretty good speed of the current gpu... upgrade to a 6xxx gpu/dual gpu solution now.... so on and so forth.

I actually stuck with a 3870 in crossfire.... until i won myself a 4870x2 through driverheaven. at which point i made the move.. but under other situations.. i wouldn't have done anything.... woulda stuck.... come the 5xxx .. i made the near emediate move to it due to it's advantage.. specially considering that a 5770 in crossfire was clearly outperforming the 4870x2, both in overall performance and the sudden MASSIVE drop in power consumption... but the major factor being new features too which is a highlight of it all.

And i'll stick to my triple crossfire 5770's until the 7xxx at which point i'll likely grab the 7770's.... maybe one at first.... 2 or 3 down the road.. who knows.. maybe 4...

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