how much would another vid card jack up gaming?

KTrenholm · December 6th, 2007

I'm currently running on one of these
ATI RADEON™ X1950 XT - 256MB
because it lets me have that awesome x1950xt chipset without the hefty price. The fan is loud and it runs pretty warm, but it runs nearly everything on MAX other than a select few games. (Crysis on High settings with no AA looks like it runs bout 30 FPS and dips with alot on screen. Also Gears of War has some choppiness although I think it should run fine)
anyway, how much would another one of these on crossfire kick my gaming up?

other specs:
2.6 GHz ATHLON64X2 (Windsor, socket AM2 if it matters)
2GB RAM (2x1GB, DDR2 800 I think)

StriderVM · December 7th, 2007

I think Crossfire is a risky idea. It's because buying another same video doesn't necessarily mean the FPS will double. The best you should expect is a maximum of 40%.

Not to mention certain games actually slow down with Crossfire.

Squall-Leonhart · December 7th, 2007

the FPS doesn't double anyway

SLI is usually an 80-85% increase.
CrossFire is usually 65-70% increase.

ViperXtreme · December 7th, 2007

the PSU might also be considered hehe...

KTrenholm · December 7th, 2007

oh right, my PSU is a 650W BFG.

makotech222 · December 7th, 2007

nah dont bother. one step up wont make much of a difference. wait for another gen to come into play before upgrading. something like the geforce 9xxx series.

PCXL-Fan · December 7th, 2007

The increase depends on how GPU intensive your settings and the game your using are. If the game you are using is cpu bound like pcsx2/ supreme commander adding another videocard won't increase performance. Likewise if you play at low resolution with medium settings which don't stress the gpu. Most of the improvements people notice are from high resolutions 1920x1200 and higher and with anti-aliasing/anistropic filtering enabled.
If you own a 17inch monitor with 1280x1024 native resolution your not going to be seeing any improvements in fps except if your into AA.

ian209 · December 15th, 2007

Quote:

Originally Posted by Squall-Leonhart

the FPS doesn't double anyway

SLI is usually an 80-85% increase.
CrossFire is usually 65-70% increase.

hmmm, last time i heard, Crossfire was more scalable than SLi...

Squall-Leonhart · December 15th, 2007

Quote:

Originally Posted by ian209

hmmm, last time i heard, Crossfire was more scalable than SLi...

all the benches seem to say otherwise
not to mention the fact you have to wait for a new driver just to get Crossfire working for a new game where with SLI you can usually make a profile for it.

Cid Highwind · December 15th, 2007

If I were you I'd make sure that adding another X1950XT would not be a waste of money. In other words: Be patient and get a new videocard in due time. There's a good chance a single HD3870 is faster by itself, without having to deal with Crossfire related issues.

December 6th, 2007	#1 (permalink)
KTrenholm Registered User Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: WNEC Posts: 7	how much would another vid card jack up gaming? I'm currently running on one of these ATI RADEON™ X1950 XT - 256MB because it lets me have that awesome x1950xt chipset without the hefty price. The fan is loud and it runs pretty warm, but it runs nearly everything on MAX other than a select few games. (Crysis on High settings with no AA looks like it runs bout 30 FPS and dips with alot on screen. Also Gears of War has some choppiness although I think it should run fine) anyway, how much would another one of these on crossfire kick my gaming up? other specs: 2.6 GHz ATHLON64X2 (Windsor, socket AM2 if it matters) 2GB RAM (2x1GB, DDR2 800 I think) __________________ RED SOX WORLD CHAMPS 2007

December 7th, 2007	#2 (permalink)
StriderVM Registered User Join Date: Nov 2006 Location: Philippines Posts: 1,657	I think Crossfire is a risky idea. It's because buying another same video doesn't necessarily mean the FPS will double. The best you should expect is a maximum of 40%. Not to mention certain games actually slow down with Crossfire. __________________ Current PC specs : Emaxx EMX-MCP61P-AVL (RIP : MSI K9VGM-V 07/26/2008) AMD Athlon64 X2 5600 OCed @ 3055Mhz (235x13) GeCube Radeon 3850 256MB gDDR3 OCed @ 740/1000 2x1024MB DDR2 667Mhz RAM (One PQI one Kingston.... O_o)

December 7th, 2007	#3 (permalink)
Squall-Leonhart VBA-M Team Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: Australia Posts: 5,009	the FPS doesn't double anyway SLI is usually an 80-85% increase. CrossFire is usually 65-70% increase. __________________ TechZone3K \| NGOHQ \| Post Impact Productions READ THE NGEmu/EmuForums Rules of Conduct

December 7th, 2007	#4 (permalink)
ViperXtreme Irregular User Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: Manila, Philippines Posts: 987	the PSU might also be considered hehe... __________________ System Specs? what "system specs?" are those edible? My Deviantart: http://viperxtreme.deviantart.com

December 7th, 2007	#5 (permalink)
KTrenholm Registered User Join Date: Dec 2007 Location: WNEC Posts: 7	oh right, my PSU is a 650W BFG. __________________ RED SOX WORLD CHAMPS 2007

December 7th, 2007	#6 (permalink)
makotech222 Chi-city's finest. Join Date: Apr 2004 Location: Illinois Posts: 1,169	nah dont bother. one step up wont make much of a difference. wait for another gen to come into play before upgrading. something like the geforce 9xxx series. __________________ [Windows Vista Ultimate x64][Intel E8400@3.8ghz] [DDR2 4gb] [Nvidia EVGA Gtx 260] [Creative Soundblaster] [Corsair 550w]

December 7th, 2007	#7 (permalink)
PCXL-Fan Man with the Masterplan Join Date: Oct 2007 Location: Canada ──────────────────── PC Accelerator (aka PCXL) was a Computer gaming magazine published from 1997 until 2000 Posts: 2,610	The increase depends on how GPU intensive your settings and the game your using are. If the game you are using is cpu bound like pcsx2/ supreme commander adding another videocard won't increase performance. Likewise if you play at low resolution with medium settings which don't stress the gpu. Most of the improvements people notice are from high resolutions 1920x1200 and higher and with anti-aliasing/anistropic filtering enabled. If you own a 17inch monitor with 1280x1024 native resolution your not going to be seeing any improvements in fps except if your into AA. __________________ E6600 Core 2 Duo, Geforce 8800GTX @ Stock Speed. 1x 2.1GB HDD, 1x 1.4GB HDD Windows XP Pro Sp2. \| Flexing my penticeps for tri-mammaried ladies across the world \| gamersat678's Bug Reporter \|\|\| cottonvibe's pcsx2 guide for noobs \|\|\| GSdx plugin DirectX End-User Runtime Web Installer

December 15th, 2007	#10 (permalink)
Cid Highwind Ramma Gay Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: Somwhere out in space? The Land of the Free? Heaven or Hell? Posts: 11,493	If I were you I'd make sure that adding another X1950XT would not be a waste of money. In other words: Be patient and get a new videocard in due time. There's a good chance a single HD3870 is faster by itself, without having to deal with Crossfire related issues. __________________ Geometry Wars: 198.400 Lumines: 523.879 Rip: Cid's Bleemcast 28-08-2007 X360/Wii/PS3 belong to the current generation, update your mindset FFS

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