First 4870X2 review.

[Fornowagain]

Heads up first ATI R700 Preview

http://www.driverheaven.net/reviews....d=588&pageid=1








SOME MORE

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/...2325444,00.asp
http://techreport.com/articles.x/15105
http://translate.google.fr/translate...hl=fr&ie=UTF-8
http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/articl...50aHVzaWFzdA==
http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=14178
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3354
http://www.pcper.com/article.php?typ...&aid=590&pid=2
http://www.legitreviews.com/article/745/1/

[Zsev]

holy cow ! If those benches are valid, X2 is one helluva beast !

[DR]

Thanks for this!

Ironically we posted before them - http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=14178

[The Asgard]

Looks a great card. Scaling in Crysis still sucks.

10/10 for the black looks. Just bought a 4870 I might be tempted if the idle power consumption is reasonable.

Hey Forno havn't I seen you somewhere before??

[BUFF]

Anandtech & [H]ardOCP also have previews (& no doubt loads of others).

[this_is_gav]

10/10 for the black looks. Just bought a 4870 I might be tempted if the idle power consumption is reasonable.

It won't be. Idle power for the HD48x0 range in general isn't as good as it should be. It's still much better than things used to be, but somehow they've messed it up a bit since the HD38x0s.

If you're buying any £350 graphics card though, is power consumption really something you will be considering? Value for money goes out of the window with any of the cards in this bracket. It always has.

[The Asgard]

It won't be. Idle power for the HD48x0 range in general isn't as good as it should be. It's still much better than things used to be, but somehow they've messed it up a bit since the HD38x0s.

If you're buying any £350 graphics card though, is power consumption really something you will be considering? Value for money goes out of the window with any of the cards in this bracket. It always has.

Power consumption should be fixed with either a Bios / Driver upgrade. Powerplay is broken on the 48xx range.

Power consumption is a big thing for me. When I buy the latest tech I try if possible to do my bit for the planet. Hence why I went from a Q6600 - Q9450.

Idle on the GTX 280 is very good.

[ezri]

Those are some really superb results! Although with it being 2x 4870, should it be equal to 4870 Crossfire rather than ahead of it?

[The Asgard]

Those are some really superb results! Although with it being 2x 4870, should it be equal to 4870 Crossfire rather than ahead of it?

Not 100% but I think they have tweaked the bus speed between the 2 chips which is supposed to be about 10% faster the standard Xfire.

[this_is_gav]

It's never going to be 10%, and in any case it was only going to be an issue on PCIe 1.1 boards with 2xHD4870s (and I doubt even they would saturate a PCIe 1.1 bus). 1-2% tops I'd guess. In most games there's no difference at all - it swings each way, well within the boundaries of benchmarking.

PowerPlay isn't broken on the HD4000 series, as can be witnessed by loading up certain old DirectX 7 games in XP, which perform awfully (like 10fps) as half the 3D features have been turned off (and the clock speed lowered, though this is less evident). Load them in Vista (which has some 3D featured enabled for the desktop rendering) and they work better but still poorly (up to around 40fps), indicating the clock speed isn't ramping up as it should do.

PowerPlay may not be working as well as it should, and it's fair to say it's not been as aggressively tweaked as the HD3000 series, but it's certainly not broken.

[The Asgard]

PowerPlay isn't broken on the HD4000 series, as can be witnessed by loading up certain old DirectX 7 games in XP, which perform awfully (like 10fps) as half the 3D features have been turned off (and the clock speed lowered, though this is less evident). Load them in Vista (which has some 3D featured enabled for the desktop rendering) and they work better but still poorly (up to around 40fps), indicating the clock speed isn't ramping up as it should do.

PowerPlay may not be working as well as it should, and it's fair to say it's not been as aggressively tweaked as the HD3000 series, but it's certainly not broken.

Pretty sure you will find it is broken and ATI have said that it will be fixed shortly.

[this_is_gav]

As far as I'm aware it's only broken on these preview X2s doing the rounds.

I know for certain that's it's working in XP to the extent that 3D features aren't being enabled in some DirectX 7 games. In that sense it's certainly enabled to some degree.

[shaithis]

The Crysis numbers are a tad underwhelming....especially when compared to other games.

As things currently stand, a GTX280GX2 would get my money if released/announced in the next month.

What did they do to the Crysis engine to make it scale so badly with crossfire?

[AdamAnubis]

As things currently stand, a GTX280GX2 would get my money if released/announced in the next month.

Indeed, I would love to see that. For the price, ATI are great, but for pure power, GTX280 ftw And 2 of them on the same card would be <3

[2Cold Scorpio]

Looks like a great card, but what about those games where SLI/Crossfire doesn't do so well? Until CF/SLI gets a bit better, I think I'll stick to my motto of one wicked card rather than trying to pair two lesser cards, even if the two outperform.

Still, though, those kinds of benchmarks are awfully enticing...it might be the one thing to sway me away from that GTX 280 I want... We'll have to see. Even with an extra 100 fps, seeing as I use VSync (because I can't stand tearing), it won't make me much difference. However, being able to push Crysis even further (and turn up the AA on some other more recent titles) does. So we'll see...

[alexp999]

I so cant wait for this card . I even have a pic of it set as my background (so sad I know, lol!) Only thing which does kinda suck is that before the 4870X2 has even been released, they are already talking about the r800's. Which means you will only have about 6months of the best card. i wont be able to replace the card for a good 12months ( knowing me thats bullcrap anyway, lol). Oh well, I'm still gonna enjoy it. It should beat the hell out my single 3870. Cant wait to do a comparison between my current setup and new setup including the 4870X2.

I know its a bit off topic, but I'm knew to Hexus (if you hadnt noticed ), I've been on TPU a while (same username), but how do I create a sig? Do i have to wait a while? or am I looking in the wrong place?

Cheers!