5870 Trifire vs 5970 Quadfire Performance vs Noise

[Mpyra]

I have a very simple problem, i would like the most maximally performing graphics cards that produces as little noise as possible, so i have decided on the ATI 5000 series, but i do not know which of these two configurations would perform the best, what games i play are only crysis right now, and later this year crysis 2, but that is all for me, i just need the graphics cards to be as much performing as possible, but not being very loud.

So which of these would be of the best? and i do not wish to watercool, or overclock if it does make too much more noise, if it is happening that by overclocking the 5870's they are beating the 5970's on stock clocks, but are quieter then this would be good, but there cards are closely matched.

There is also to consider which cards do have the most attuned driver support for playing crysis and crysis warhead, i have never found any benchmarks for crysis with 5970 quadfire where the thrid and fourth gpus would be active, if anyone does have such benchmarks at the resolution of 1920x1080, i would be much pleased to utilise them.

now here i concluded with a chart whcih may be of some use in determining the noise levels of the cards that it is we are questioning, here:

[scaryjim]

According to this Hexus test Crysis Warhead runs better with 2x5870 than with 3, as do a number of other games. This is due to the overhead of splitting up the rendering tasks.

So personally I'd go for 2x 5870s, although even they'll struggle to render Crysis smoothly at ultra high resolutions and settings...

[jim]

Don't get cards with daft coolers that don't expel heat out of the back of the case... bad idea for Crossfire/SLI.

My personal rule is always: as few cards as possible. So I'd go for two 5970s. Less heat, less power, more space in the case, so on. We're talking about very fast setups here, so I think you'd be happy with whatever you bought!

Interestingly, a lot of the early reviews imply that there's very little benefit from 5970 --> dual 5970, but I don't know whether drivers have improved the situation since then.

[Mpyra]

According to this Hexus test Crysis Warhead runs better with 2x5870 than with 3, as do a number of other games. This is due to the overhead of splitting up the rendering tasks.

So personally I'd go for 2x 5870s, although even they'll struggle to render Crysis smoothly at ultra high resolutions and settings...

This is at the incorrect resolution for me, i have seen benchmarks from many people that trifire 5870's acheive over 100 fps average enthusiast at 1080p on crysis warhead, i have seen 130 fps average benchmarks acheived with quadfire 5870's on an evag 4-way motherboard.

I have not seen benchmarks for 5970 quadfire however, i wsih that i could find soem it may make this choice easier.

I thank you.

[nibbler]

100fps at crysis warhead at enthusiast...

yeah, if you look at a wall for the whole time maybe...

You're dreaming mate.

[Mpyra]

Don't get cards with daft coolers that don't expel heat out of the back of the case... bad idea for Crossfire/SLI.

My personal rule is always: as few cards as possible. So I'd go for two 5970s. Less heat, less power, more space in the case, so on. We're talking about very fast setups here, so I think you'd be happy with whatever you bought!

Interestingly, a lot of the early reviews imply that there's very little benefit from 5970 --> dual 5970, but I don't know whether drivers have improved the situation since then.

Yes i think this was a techpowerup review, it showed no benefit at al which i thought was quite odd, i know that i have experienced this problem with my 4870x2's and this is part of the reason i wish to rid myself of them, i am somewhat nervous of thi same problem occuring with 2x5970's.

Is it so certain that these cards would produce less heat for performance, i know that when you look at single cards, the 5970's have the greatest performance for power consumption of anycard, but i have not been sure that this remained true when you began to crossfire single cards such as the 5870 and began to compare then to the 5970's crossfired, here:



So what are your thoughts?

I thank you.

[Mpyra]

100fps at crysis warhead at enthusiast...

yeah, if you look at a wall for the whole time maybe...

You're dreaming mate.

My 4870x2's crossfired produce 72 fps avg and 45 min on enthusiast on ambush benchmark (this i believe is the most difficult one).

I do not think that it is unreasonable to expext such performance from this next generation of cards, such performance should infact be expected, based on the progression of single card performances.

As i have said, i have seen the benchmarks, i can post link to them if you like.

[Terbinator]

I haven't seen any set ups breaking 100FPS on Crysis/WH, were you running any AA ?

[Mpyra]

I haven't seen any set ups breaking 100FPS on Crysis/WH, were you running any AA ?

Crysis Warhead 1920x1080 benchmarking results with avrying amounts of aa on varying benchmarking maps.

A little way down you can see Bodars quadfire 5870 setup and benchmarking results acheiving 138 fps avg 60 min:

http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread....warhead&page=8

Here you can see Bodars trifire 5870 benchmarking result breaking 100fps avg 60 min:

http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread....warhead&page=6

Here you can see Jimpsars 5870 crossfire benchmarking results achieving 75 fps avg 37 min:

http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread....warhead&page=2

About half way down you cann see Jcazzs 5870 trifire benchmarking results acheiving 85 fps avg 47 min:

http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread....warhead&page=3

Here you can see in the low half another run by Jimpsar achieving 90fps avg 49 min:

http://forums.guru3d.com/showthread....warhead&page=4

Here is a thread full of benchmakring results for an overclocked 5970+5850 trifire getting 100 avg 60 min consistently:

http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=142678

[Jay]

is crysis just badly optimised?

[kalniel]

What is your CPU?

Crysis is quite CPU heavy, mutli-GPU solutions add to the CPU load, so before even considering something as crazy as 4x 5970s (8 GPUs) you need to look at CPU, and if it's not a mutli-CPU set up or at least a 980X EE then forget it.

[Mpyra]

What is your CPU?

Crysis is quite CPU heavy, mutli-GPU solutions add to the CPU load, so before even considering something as crazy as 4x 5970s (8 GPUs) you need to look at CPU, and if it's not a mutli-CPU set up or at least a 980X EE then forget it.

2x5970 (4 gpus quadfire) not 4x5970 (8 gpu octofire!

I am using a i920 Oced to 4 GHz

[Terbinator]

I'm not going to trawl through a battery of links to forums with users posting up legitimate or otherwise results looking for proof of Crysis benchmarking results. I'll stick with my original comment/thoughts.

[kalniel]

2x5970 (4 gpus quadfire) not 4x5970 (8 gpu octofire!

I am using a i920 Oced to 4 GHz

Then I'd stick to 3x5870 at most.

[Mpyra]

Then I'd stick to 3x5870 at most.

Well, i have already decided i am going to buy a 5970 and a 5870, try both of them out maybe trifire them, if i like them keep, maybe upgrade to qaudfire 5970.

I can always overclock the processor further, i just choose 4 GHz as a nice round figure.

So you think 5970 quadfire would outperform 5870 trifire even when overclocked, keeping the noise levels the same?

[kalniel]

Well, i have already decided i am going to buy a 5970 and a 5870, try both of them out maybe trifire them, if i like them keep, maybe upgrade to qaudfire 5970.

If Crysis is the aim then I'd avoid the 5970, it doesn't seem to do as well as full-fat 5870s. While crossfire can cope with mixed performance I still think it's better to keep to all of the same, so either go for three 5870s or make sure your 5970 is the special 4gb version that actually packs 2x 5870 GPUs in there.

So you think 5970 quadfire would outperform 5870 trifire even when overclocked, keeping the noise levels the same?

You mean 2x 5970s? With a 920, no.