Crossfire question

[Sevenofclubs]

Hi

I currently have a 7870 xt and was thinking of crossfiring it with the XFX one that scan currently has, my question is that my motherboard is the asus m5a97 R2.0, Will I experience any problems with this.

Thank you,

[scaryjim]

Well....

Your 7870 XT uses a cut down Tahiti GPU, whereas the XFX 7870 on Scan is a full Pitcairn GPU. So you'll have an assymetric crossfire set up. Also the second PCIe x16 slot on your motherboard is electrically only an x4 slot.

Neither of these will stop the combination working in crossfire, but it means you definitely won't be getting optimal scaling out of the combination. Also, what CPU and PSU do you have, and what resolution do you play games at? The 7870XT is a decent card still, so unless there are games where the GPU is definitely slowing you down I don't think I'd bother with crossfire...

[Sevenofclubs]

Hi thanks for your reply. I have the silver power sp-s750 80+ bronze PSU and an fx6300 at 4.4ghz oced. Also the xfx 7870 is the le version which I assume is the Tahiti. I get good frames as it is but have £140 to burn.

[scaryjim]

... the xfx 7870 is the le version which I assume is the Tahiti ...

Assuming you mean this 7870 on Scan, according to the spec list it's got 1280 shaders which is Pitcairn. The Tahiti version has 1536.

If you *must* spend it now, your £140 would (imnsho, anyway) be better spent on either an SSD, if you don't have one already, or upgrading to an FX 8350 (you could sell your 6300 to get some money back that way) as games are becoming increasingly well threaded. But personally I'd stick it in the bank and save it towards a 290/290X upgrade at a later date.

[KeyboardDemon]

Assuming you mean this 7870 on Scan, according to the spec list it's got 1280 shaders which is Pitcairn. The Tahiti version has 1536.

If you *must* spend it now, your £140 would (imnsho, anyway) be better spent on either an SSD, if you don't have one already, or upgrading to an FX 8350 (you could sell your 6300 to get some money back that way) as games are becoming increasingly well threaded. But personally I'd stick it in the bank and save it towards a 290/290X upgrade at a later date.

+1 on that. In the long term 1 of those 3 options would be a better way to spend your money. If it were me I'd do the CPU first.

[Sevenofclubs]

Assuming you mean, according to the spec list it's got 1280 shaders which is Pitcairn. The Tahiti version has 1536.

If you *must* spend it now, your £140 would (imnsho, anyway) be better spent on either an SSD, if you don't have one already, or upgrading to an FX 8350 (you could sell your 6300 to get some money back that way) as games are becoming increasingly well threaded. But personally I'd stick it in the bank and save it towards a 290/290X upgrade at a later date.

That is the one. If you look at the chipset it states is the HD 7870LE which aria has well. I thought the LE meant that it had the tahiti core. I will look into the fx 8350 or may just save the money.