Hello ATI Gurus, I have just about decided to switch back to ATI after running Nvidia cards for many years. Since I have a shiny new 120Hz monitor I'm looking for a graphics solution that lets me run >120fps at 1920*1080 in as many games as possible. Unfortunately that doesn't seem to be possible with a single GPU solution without sacrificing image quality (and yes, not even possible with CF in many games, but the goal still stands.) Since I have never ran any kind of CF rig, or SLI rig for that matter, before I have a couple of questions that I hope someone can answer for me. * The benchmarks I find are pretty much from when the cards were released and drivers have matured a lot since then. My question is therefore, is the relative performance between the cards as shown in the launch reviews still pretty much the same? Or have drivers made the 5870CF solution increase its lead? Or the other way around? * Micro stuttering. What exactly is this and how does it show? Is it such a big problem as many seems to think or is it a minor annoyance, or even a non issue? Are all the solutions mentioned above equally affected by it or is it worse for some combinations? As prices are at the moment I could get the two 5850s for around 5400sek the 5970 for about 5600sek and the two 5870 would total ~7400sek. If the relative performance from launch day still stands the 5870s do not seem to be worth that extra money. The 5970 would require me to muck around a bit in my case to fit it in so unless it's a lot smoother than the 5850s the latter looks like the best pick at the moment. If the 5870s however are pulling ahead now and showing a substantial improvement over the other two combinations I could get one of those now and another one later on. So, what would you recommend?
At stock conditions a 5970 is the same as 2x5850s. 2x5870s are about 10% faster in every situation. For pure power 2x5870s is the way....
CF 5850 would not disappoint you. If you were going to spend the money, I would recommend the 5870CF as you would see a longer life out of it. Despite looking and performing similarly to the 5850, they are higher quality products in many aspects. 5850CF is still an excellent choice, and for this new generation it also happens to be on the best price/performance values for the high end category. Microstutter (if you notice it) will be there in any situation involving more than 1 gpu. 5850CF for the Value. 5870CF if you want premium. FERMI SLI if you want premium and can take the heat... hehe.
The idle clocks while in 2d has pretty much put me off the new Nvidia cards as I run a 120Hz monitor. Having the card at 68 degrees with the fan at ~65% while in idle is not an option. The 5970 is looking more and more tempting the more I think about it. Either that or the 5850s. Decisions, decisions....
5970 is faster than 5850 in crossfire, because 5850 have less shaders. Besides, 5970 have two handpicked 5870 chips that can clock to 5870 values with less voltage than a 5870 normal chip. The reason 5970 have less clock speeds is because ATI don't want to exceed the 300w tdp.
I would choose the 5970 because it has better cooling, it uses a cooler similar to the vapor x 5870s and they can clock to 850 core easily
Another vote for 5970, cheaper than two 5870's. OC's to 5870 clocks without issue. Also only takes up one slot vs two. If you plan to water cool in the future, it will also be cheaper to buy only one water block vs two for 5xxx cards. Make sure you have a good power supply though.
personally id go two 5850s or two 5870s as long as its using a different cooler than the oem cooler. sure, a 5970 may perform better, but most 5970s with the oem vapor chamber setup seem to have issues keeping the vrms cooled properly, and they often hit 120 degrees C. of course if you watercool or get aftermarket cooling, this wont be an issue. if you're looking at the original benchmarks upon release of these gpus, add about 25-40% fps to some of them to match the improvements in 10.3a vs 9.11. however, performance relative to each other is still the same. as for microstutter, it normally manifests itself as screen tearing. best fix is to turn on vsync, or crank up the settings to bring it down as close to 60fps as possible (best solution for shooters as vsync can introduce about 100ms ish input lag).
The only reason why people say the 5970 is equal to two 5850s is be cause in its stock state it is, overclock it to what it should have been out of the factory to the 5870s clocks and it will match two 5870s, ATI also hasn't done anything to improve the 5970s bad scaling problem on some games seems to make the 5970 look slower than it really is, ATI has eglected the 5970 since launch, barley any improvements over the 5870s and 5850s, ATI better get on the ball!
Thanks for the information. The 5850s seems more and more like a good choice. They should last me almost as long as a 5970 and by then there should hopefully be a good single GPU solution to switch over to. I think I might be willing to trade the extra performance of the 5970 for the hopefully lower noise levels of the 5850s. I can get two PowerColor 5850 PCS+ for slightly less than the cheapest 5970.
On the other hand the 5970 could be paired off with yet another card later on if need be... Is there anyone here who runs either a dual monitor setup or a 120Hz monitor with a 5970 who can tell me about the idle clocks, temperatures and fan speeds?
I dunno man, I have both a GTX 295, and a new 5970. I tried AVP on the 5970, and didn`t notice any better visuals than my GTX 295. Infact, kinda bumbed that I can`t set the refresh rate to 120 for AVP with the 5970. So it runs only at 60 hz. And even turning on Tesselation, I noticed nothing better visualswise either.
The VRM temp problem only happens in unrealistic scenarios like using Furmark. Not a single game even Crysis takes it anywhere near 120c on the VRM's and that is at 980 core with 1.25 volts.
What do you mean you can't set refresh rate to 120Hz? Is this a problem for this specific game or something common with the 5970/ATI cards?
