End of the 4850 X2?

[jim]

I noticed in a recent Hexus review that the 4850X2 walked all over the GTX 275 and 285 in CoD4, whilst being priced somewhere between the two.

Then when I had a look for them it seemed like they'd all but ceased to exist in the online shops. Have I missed some big piece of news about it becoming EOL, or is something else going on?

[staffsMike]

Release of the HD4890?

[jim]

Possibly, but according to the Hexus review the 4850 X2 beats the 4890 pretty thoroughly. Unless they're planning to bring the 4870 X2 price down and add a 4890 X2 into the mix, but I can't believe that the 4870 X2 will be brought down to approximately £260 any time soon.

[kalniel]

4750 X2 should be tasty.

[Netjock]

Think the problem is just like SLI scalability. The performance is not consistent and it depends on software implementation.

So why run the risk when you can pop a single GPU solution in.

[TooNice]

^ It's a calculated risk for those who want the poptential of more performance. Support for SLI/Crossfire have improved quite a bit, and based on what I've read, the 4870X2 and 4850X2 manage to further overcome some of the of the compatibility issues compared to running two separate cards.

Possibly, but according to the Hexus review the 4850 X2 beats the 4890 pretty thoroughly. Unless they're planning to bring the 4870 X2 price down and add a 4890 X2 into the mix, but I can't believe that the 4870 X2 will be brought down to approximately £260 any time soon.

Last time I looked up for any information about the 4890X2, I read that AMD has no plans for it. That's not to say that we'll never see one as I am sure manufacturer could come up with something if they see a market for it.

[Cus_de_Sparta65]

http://www.brightsideofnews.com/news...hd4890-x2.aspx

[jim]

Yeah, it just seems odd to create a void, when as far as I can see the 4850 X2 fills the gap between £200 and £300 very successfully, beating out the GTX 285 on a fair few benchmarks.

[scaryjim]

http://www.brightsideofnews.com/news...hd4890-x2.aspx

There is one ATI partner that actually plans such a design and wants to do dual-1GHz GPU clock, partnered with 2GB and 4GB of GDDR5 memory. We are going to leave to speculation what might be the identity of that partner...

Hmmm, I wonder...

[sammorris]

4GB HD4890X2 would be very nice, I'd probably drop my Quad crossfire system for just one of those. I wonder how well it'd fare up under aftermarket cooling though, 4870X2s are loud enough as it is...

[TooNice]

Every now and then, you get a card which has more memory than it can effectively use, in the sense that at the resolution/settings where the added memory is beneficial, the GPU will struggle keep up. I reckon that would be the case with a 4GB 4890x2 (even though it's no slouch).

[sammorris]

Overall you're right, but then again, there's always GTA4 players...

[matadorluis]

the 4850X2 1GB is now on offer at pixmania for less than £200!

[sammorris]

http://specialtech.co.uk/spshop/cust...productid=7330

The 2GB is still about, but questionable priced.

[matadorluis]

http://specialtech.co.uk/spshop/cust...productid=7330

The 2GB is still about, but questionable priced.

it is also at pixmania a bit cheaper than specialtech. However for a dual gpu configuration you need a fast system to get the most of it so not suitable for systems like my Athlon X2 at 2.8Ghz

[sammorris]

No, with a dual core, I'd strongly recommend a single GPU, such as the HD4890 or GTX275.