Crossfire on 4X

[burn-e86]

I've got a Gigabyte P55M-UD2 with an ATI 4650. I'm thinking about getting a 2nd 4650 rather then upgrade proper (I've decided to wait until Nvidia release there GTX 4 series and a hopeful price drop for ATI). I'm just wondering what kind of performance drop/rise I'm gonna get. I've looked around but can't seem to find anything.

[scaryjim]

given you're using lower end gfx cards, I doubt you'd see much penalty from running on an x4 slot, but tbh running 4650s in crossfire probably isn't going to be worth it unless you have very tight budget constraints. For comparison, here's Hexus's look at 4670s in Crossfire, but remember that the 4650 only has ~ 75% of the performance of the 4670, and adjust accordingly.

You'd be looking, at best, at roughly 9800GT / 4830 performance, possibly worse depending on how well the game scales with crossfire (some don't at all). I'd strongly recommend getting the best single card your budget can afford, but allow yourself an extra £15 or so and then sell your 4650 once you've upgraded (you should easily be able to get £15 - £20 for it: they make very nice HTPC cards ).

[shaithis]

The 4x won't hurt it much, if at all. You will also get anything from 0-100% speed increase depending on the game/app that you are running. Unfortunately, CrossFire and SLI performance is very dependant on how the app has been written.

I can only echo scaryjims sentiments.....replace your current card instead if that's an option.

[Ulti]

I've got a Gigabyte P55M-UD2 with an ATI 4650. I'm thinking about getting a 2nd 4650 rather then upgrade proper (I've decided to wait until Nvidia release there GTX 4 series and a hopeful price drop for ATI). I'm just wondering what kind of performance drop/rise I'm gonna get. I've looked around but can't seem to find anything.

If you're waiting for Nvidia to release the GTX 4 series then there's no point getting another 4650. It's not going to be that long of a wait from now I think, they did say they are definitely releasing it in March the last time I checked.

[burn-e86]

Cheers for all the responses, I'm planning on getting a 5770 though I have a feeling that when Nvidia do finally release their card, ATI are going to drop their price(s) a bit, so thats why I'm settling and waiting. hell this 4650 was only suppose to be a stopgap measure after my 7900GT died. nt gonna sell my current since my (media) server is using an old ass, Piece of crap, Nvidia Quattro thats loud as hell.

[DanceswithUnix]

Nvidia are only releasing at the very high end and sounds like they won't have much stock, so I don't see it having much influence on prices until well into the summer tbh. At that point they will be releasing mainstream cards and might even have sorted out the high end.

[shaithis]

Also, Apple have struck a deal with AMD and it looks like they will take most of the 5750 chips that are being produced, at least for a while, this shortage in retail may up the prices of the cards around it in the range.

[burn-e86]

well, I've got a dissertation to write in the short term so I dont think that I'm gonna be buying anything too distracting for at least 3 weeks.