I think i down graded video card's! this is what i had intel QX9650 at 3.6Gig ddr3 cl7 @ 1800 with an ati Hd2900xt 512bit 512mb graphic's card 3dmark 06 15353 there about's then i got a HD3870 256bit 512 mb expecting more but 3dmark 06 says 14625 wtf did i waste my money? or is there sumthing else going on i know that both card's are gddr3 and the first gives 106Gb/s the other 64Gb/s but according to z-gpu its 12Tbit/S vs 13Tbit/s the 2900xt is in peg 2 and still kick's 3870 ass? any idea's?
You side graded really, the cards are basically the same. The 3870 is coming out a little ahead in games but behind in 3dmark, at least that's what the charts show. I'd get my money back, or sell one of them.
I got curios about this so i googled: http://futuremark.yougamers.com/forum/showthread.php?t=70537 They're equivalent in performance. Sometimes the 2900xt is faster, sometimes the 3870 is. But the 3870 is cheaper, consumes less and makes less noise. It just suffers from a smaller memory bus (256bit vs 512bit), so it can read/write less data from the VRAM in 1 cycle.
thats what ive have noticed sum games are faster, sum slower dame waste of money should have saved for hd3870x2 x2 i beleave its amd fault! grrr ok sure the hd2900xt is a power hungry bitch but with 850w's on tap no problem as for noise my qx9650 is making more noise with its large stock fan! the 2900xt only realy get's noisy when i oc it to 888mhz then the fan goes to 100% mosly its happy at 33% while playing ut3 at stock clock so what to do! do u think that getting another hd3870x2 and x-fire with the 3870 would be good or just getting an 3870 x2 without the x-fire? or do i wait 4 the 4870? or get another hd2900xt that might blow the 3870x2 away?
you can have crossfire with a 3870 and a 3870 X2 and it actually shows a good performance jump when supported. I'd probably just hold on a month since the new cards are coming out soon and they will be pretty fast.
I honestly dont think the 3870 single or duel gpu are much cop at all. Many games suffer fps drops and only a few see an increase, these forums are full of people complaining about performace issues with the 38xx series. Apart from the 2900 being a horse of a card, but using more power than the rest of your house, and making so much noise (the only two downsides) I agree with the rest of the posts thus far, as to say you have gone nowhere fast. Its gonna be a while for me to replace my current cards if ati have nothing good to offer.
but i find my hd2900xt is not that noisey like i said my cpu fan makes more noise! and 4 such an old card its a bit of a winner less the power consumption but its only power and im not into saving a cent here or there! besides with 6.2 Amp's max at 240volts for the psu its still only 1500W and i wont be using that sort of juice all the time! just noticed sumting silly psu is 850w, 1000w max that dont match to 6.2amp's more like 4.1amps according to the psu specs that would mean the psu is useing 2.1 amp's at 1000w meh!
So you bought the 3870 without looking at any benches, no spec sheets, no reviews? More for you I reckon.
