"ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 - Fastest yet"...

... is the title of an RSS feed entry from Tom's Hardware, with the summary reading:

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AMD has taken back the crown for the most powerful graphics card. Read on to see how the company did it and how the HD 3879 X2 performs on a variety of benchmarks.

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The link in the RSS goes to a 404 error, so looks like this one has slipped out a little early ;) How long till the 9800GX2 takes back the performance crown though I wonder?

Also just noticed that this isn't in the main feed from TH, but is in the iGoogle feed for TH (linked from their website).

I didn't doubt it would be the fastest card to date but how much is it?

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Originally Posted by staffsMike

I didn't doubt it would be the fastest card to date but how much is it?

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Radeon HD 3870 X2 tips up in China - The INQUIRER

$550 in china according to theinq. soo.. anyone want to (know how to) do an estimate from that?

not really lol..

You can never really guess until they hit out shores. Genereally if it was $500 usd, it should be about £250 but more often than not things will be closer to £400 so it's not going to be cheap. 3870's in crossfire might be a better solution..

Yeah, it's expected to be around £250-270.

What's most interesting to me is that apparently the OS sees it as a single card, and not a Crossfire solution. If that's true then the problems inherent with Crossfire and SLi should be gone. Wonder if the 9800GX2 will be the same?

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Originally Posted by Mblaster

The link in the RSS goes to a 404 error, so looks like this one has slipped out a little early ;)

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THe links in Toms RSS are always ****ed up.

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Originally Posted by this_is_gav

Yeah, it's expected to be around £250-270.

What's most interesting to me is that apparently the OS sees it as a single card, and not a Crossfire solution. If that's true then the problems inherent with Crossfire and SLi should be gone. Wonder if the 9800GX2 will be the same?

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Since a GPU is massively parallel anyway, maybe they have found a way of getting them to talk to each other properly and use the RAM properly aswell so the GPU's share the RAM between each other aswell. If thats teh case then they might just be like doubling the number of shaders etc on a single chip solution.

We can but hope!

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Originally Posted by badass

Since a GPU is massively parallel anyway, maybe they have found a way of getting them to talk to each other properly and use the RAM properly aswell so the GPU's share the RAM between each other aswell. If thats teh case then they might just be like doubling the number of shaders etc on a single chip solution.

We can but hope!

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AFAIK they don't share RAM. It's more like a dual processor PC than a dual core PC :)

When are they expected here

If you look at hexus.news you will see the anouncement of the 34xx and the 36xx cards in that it says about the moving back of the NDA of another card which by my best guess and from what I have read elsewhere would be the 3870 X2. So nobody really knows when it will appear but it was meant to be announced yesterday so I guess it should be quite soon!

Early (and probably leaked) reviews aren't exactly glowing, but then if you look at the results they look massively limited by drivers at the moment. Perhaps indicating the card itself isn't showing itself as 1, but the drivers, and ATi aren't there yet.

ATi have a Ultra-beater on their hands when it cracks (presumably after reviews which have already been written) but nV will just answer it with the 9800GX2, and we'll be back to where we are at the moment. ATi viable, consuming less power (I'm massively impressed with idle figures in particular), quieter on the whole and with better multimedia capabilities, with nV being nicely ahead in 3D benchmarks and leap years ahead in OSes other than Windows.

What this says to me is that the nVidia 98**'s are being held back until the release of this card.
Once it is, nVidia will release theirs and the balance of power will be restored.

Also, i REALLY doubt that either card will be available at under £300. Flagship cards always carry a hefty premium.

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Originally Posted by Blitzen

What this says to me is that the nVidia 98**'s are being held back until the release of this card.
Once it is, nVidia will release theirs and the balance of power will be restored.

Also, i REALLY doubt that either card will be available at under £300. Flagship cards always carry a hefty premium.

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Well it's priced at 399 euros (the X2) so I somehow doubt it will be over £300

I prefer ATI's approach of single card though - the 9800GX2 is two card bolted together which is slightly less elegant. I'm not sure how they differe electronically, but the ATI version might have better (more transparent) integration.

Interesting.

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Originally Posted by 306maxi

Well it's priced at 399 euros (the X2) so I somehow doubt it will be over £300

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399 Euros is already £298. Add your typical UK 'bonus', I'd be surprised if it goes for under £300.

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Originally Posted by TooNice

399 Euros is already £298. Add your typical UK 'bonus', I'd be surprised if it goes for under £300.

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I was thinking USD. Don't listen to me :p