ATi 4870 X2 (R700) previews thread

[Soubriquet]

The points have been made, but I just want to focus on the choices and add my voice about the 4870x2 Achilles heel(s) which need AMD/ATIs attention.

As a 3870x2 user I can vouch that there is no 3rd party air cooling solution for these yet and doesn't look like anyone is interested either, no reply from Arctic Cooling. Cooling this card has been risky due to fan control issues and the stock HSF makes a noise whatever software you have to run the fan. If 4870x2 is anything like that I am steering clear of ATI X2 for the foreseeable, it has not got an acceptable standard of support for cooling IMHO, its the bare minimum and its not good enough.

The only cooler option for 3870x2 is a water block but water blocks are very expensive if you have an air cooling rig (X-Clio Twin Engine case) and so need pump and radiatorsas well. Considering the 3870x2 performance is patchy @x2 it doesn't warrant that level of investment. Apart from the fact that most bench applications like 3D Mark etc see it as 512Mb when it is 512Mb x2 (ie software support not there), according to recent reviews certain games I like run at frame rates equivalent to a single 3870 eg ETQW and Bioshock, which are market leading titles.

I paid a fair bit more for the x2 card and I am not very happy about that so my choice has to be to avoid the X2 period. Either a 4870 which mostly beats the 3870x2 anyway or a 280 but not 4870x2. IMHO it is a half assed solution and I am an ATI fanboy.

 

[nyker96]

This coolest thing about this X2 is that you practically get AA for free with a pair of them. Looks like a winner to me!!

 

[Sylvanas]

Sampsa's review is out and is the first indication that the 'microstutter' is indeed fixed. Here is the translation as I understand it, he notes that each frame is rendered at 21.6-22.1ms intervals in Crysis opposed to 49.5 on the 3870X2, and a noticeable difference.

 

[ginfest]

Originally posted by: OneOfTheseDays
Like I said before at the same or similar pricepoint there is NO reason to get a GTX280 over a 4870x2. It's a shame this forum is inundated with Nvidia fanboys and Nvidia payed trollsters, so the average person can't really see the truth.

This is an outright bunch of BS. In fact, if you take the time to read each post here, and qualify the posters, you will see a decided AMD/ATI bent since the current gen arrived

Are you running both the new NV GTX 2xx line and or the ATI 48xx? So you have done a direct comparison and you are sure about that "truth"? Or is your truth limited to what you have read here and at other sites?
And for that matter, what is the "truth". There is not as big a discrepancy between them as some folks would have you believe.

 

[Janooo]

Originally posted by: BFG10K

Originally posted by: AmberClad

LegitReviews has another. So how many left unaccounted for is that?

There were three left: Rage3D had one, HardOCP had another (since they had two) and now we've found Legit Reviews. That's all of 'em.

Now we should be allowed into ATi?s chocolate factory.

You forgot about Sampsa. He had one.
Actually AMD sent a card to a site. They had it for a few days and then they shipped it back to AMD or another site. We can see more than ten previews.

 

[Janooo]

Originally posted by: Cookie Monster
With GTX280s going for $449 officially with the X2 at $549 it puts quite abit of pressure on the X2 card. Some did argue about reviewers using OCed nVIDIA cards, but i dont see anything wrong in this. Loads of nVIDIA partners sell OCed cards at the same price levels as stock ones. Some of nVIDIA's partners support OCing and even 3rd party cooling so i dont see all this fuss about OCed cards being used.

In some instances GTX280 is at X2 level performance due to scaling. Since only a selected few out of a handful of games have been used for the preview, we will see just how well crossfire actually scales across a variety of titles.

On a side note im not surprised by the fact that the bridge chip wasn't something special though. Shared memory pool will probably be achieved at another time, somewhere in the near future. People were expecting too much imho.

Still expensive. Stock 280 shouldn't be more than 20% of stock 4870.

 

[chizow]

Originally posted by: ginfest

Originally posted by: OneOfTheseDays
Like I said before at the same or similar pricepoint there is NO reason to get a GTX280 over a 4870x2. It's a shame this forum is inundated with Nvidia fanboys and Nvidia payed trollsters, so the average person can't really see the truth.

This is an outright bunch of BS. In fact, if you take the time to read each post here, and qualify the posters, you will see a decided AMD/ATI bent since the current gen arrived

Are you running both the new NV GTX 2xx line and or the ATI 48xx? So you have done a direct comparison and you are sure about that "truth"? Or is your truth limited to what you have read here and at other sites?
And for that matter, what is the "truth". There is not as big a discrepancy between them as some folks would have you believe.

I'm quite sure like many others who blindly recommend multi-GPU or dismiss its problems, that person has no experience with CF/SLI. There's few who actually used or tried multi-GPU who openly recommend it over a single-GPU solution. Even in the X2 reviews the authors cover many of the problems with multi-GPU, they just don't show up in pretty graphs.

Looks good on the microstutter issue, I'll wait for AT's multi-GPU article to confirm or deny as Derek has promised an in-depth look at microstutter. Has anyone bothered to test microstutter with 4870CF?

Right now it looks like there's virtually no difference between the X2 and 4870CF in actual performance. Maybe once reviews are out with faster CPUs we'll see some distinction, but its pretty clear that the 3.0 to 3.2GHz CPUs used in the reviews weren't enough to distinguish any of the design differences and trumped up features of the X2.

 

[Elfear]

Originally posted by: chizow

Right now it looks like there's virtually no difference between the X2 and 4870CF in actual performance.

For the most part that is true but when high resolutions and and lots of AA are used the x2 card seems to pull ahead in some games that are limited by the 512MB of ram on each 4870 card in CF. Anandtech's tests show quite a dramatic delta between the 4870CF and the 4870x2 in GRID. We'll have to wait for more tests to see if that holds true in a wider selection of games.

 

[Nemesis 1]

Interesting thread. From what I get from all the replies is this. Your view on x2 is souly dependent on which team wins in performance. Because here at ATF we can go back in time and read what the same posters said when the shoe was on the other foot.
All vary amusing.

Because I am famous for it I thought I would add this into to fire . I am interested ! How about YOU! Will this change minds it should.

http://www.engadget.com/2008/0...gpus-for-powerful-mat/

 

[SSChevy2001]

@Nemesis 1 Do you really see the hydra engine becoming reality? If it does works it will have some big limitations, and a lot of bugs. I wouldn't touch it with a 100ft nic cable.

 

[Akabeth]

Dear nRollo,
I have a little question for you from my standpoint as a consumer. If it's been asked so many times before then you can just give a short, sincere answer.

Why did nVidia bothered to lower their GTX260 and 280 so much within 4 weeks!!! of launch?
I can't remember the last time a gfx card had $200 price-cut within a month of it's release.

~a

 

[chizow]

Originally posted by: Elfear

Originally posted by: chizow

Right now it looks like there's virtually no difference between the X2 and 4870CF in actual performance.

For the most part that is true but when high resolutions and and lots of AA are used the x2 card seems to pull ahead in some games that are limited by the 512MB of ram on each 4870 card in CF. Anandtech's tests show quite a dramatic delta between the 4870CF and the 4870x2 in GRID. We'll have to wait for more tests to see if that holds true in a wider selection of games.

Yeah 2560 in AT's GRID testing definitely showed a huge lead for the X2, but overall AT was the only site that didn't show the X2 trailing the CF rig. I'd say there is probably a little bit of bottlenecking with the x16 slot or PLX switch and some gain with 1GB at higher resolutions or with high AA levels.

Originally posted by: Akabeth
Dear nRollo,
I have a little question for you from my standpoint as a consumer. If it's been asked so many times before then you can just give a short, sincere answer.

Why did nVidia bothered to lower their GTX260 and 280 so much within 4 weeks!!! of launch?
I can't remember the last time a gfx card had $200 price-cut within a month of it's release.

~a

R600? Was that a trick question or a joke?

 

[Blake86]

What about this board?
It seems like an ATI's revenge...however after all this time deserve this...
Ho hallo guis! I'm new, and i'm italian...this mean--->sorry for my pitifull english!!!

 

[nitromullet]

Originally posted by: Akabeth
Dear nRollo,
I have a little question for you from my standpoint as a consumer. If it's been asked so many times before then you can just give a short, sincere answer.

Why did nVidia bothered to lower their GTX260 and 280 so much within 4 weeks!!! of launch?
I can't remember the last time a gfx card had $200 price-cut within a month of it's release.

~a

http://economics.blog.co.in/fi...08/03/equilibirium.JPG

Originally posted by: Janooo
Still expensive. Stock 280 shouldn't be more than 20% of stock 4870.

Based on...? refer to my above link... It will sell at what it will sell at...

At the proposed $360 for a GTX 280, I don't imagine that NV could produce them fast enough to keep them in stock.

...back on topic with the 4870X2...

I'm not sure if everyone here has read many of the conclusions from the reviews posted in the OP of this thread, but the conclusions were a little surprising IMO. When the 4850 and 4870 were reviewed, the review sites loved them - no doubt about it. The conclusions for the X2 are a little 'luke warm' by comparison for the most part. I know they are only previews, and no one really said anything bad, but I just didn't get them impression that most sites were quite as wowed by the X2 as they were its single gpu counterparts. Tough to read between the lines with this type of thing.

The card does look interesting, but I'm a little soured by the 3870X2 I had a few months back so I'm cautious. The 3870X2 was supposed to be this 8800GTX killer, and it sort of was on paper, but not in reality. We'll see I guess.

 

[dadach]

Originally posted by: ginfest

Originally posted by: OneOfTheseDays
Like I said before at the same or similar pricepoint there is NO reason to get a GTX280 over a 4870x2. It's a shame this forum is inundated with Nvidia fanboys and Nvidia payed trollsters, so the average person can't really see the truth.

This is an outright bunch of BS. In fact, if you take the time to read each post here, and qualify the posters, you will see a decided AMD/ATI bent since the current gen arrived

Are you running both the new NV GTX 2xx line and or the ATI 48xx? So you have done a direct comparison and you are sure about that "truth"? Or is your truth limited to what you have read here and at other sites?
And for that matter, what is the "truth". There is not as big a discrepancy between them as some folks would have you believe.

ok we get it...you want free hardware as a nvidia focus group member...now shoo

microsttuter is fixed, so only people that will buy nvidia over ati, and claim that they made better choice are blind fanboys...if they bought it at release they might not be so blind, but they sure did get screwed over by nvidia

 

[woolfe9999]

Originally posted by: chizow
Yeah 2560 in AT's GRID testing definitely showed a huge lead for the X2, but overall AT was the only site that didn't show the X2 trailing the CF rig. I'd say there is probably a little bit of bottlenecking with the x16 slot or PLX switch and some gain with 1GB at higher resolutions or with high AA levels.

It's something more than a "little bit of bottlenecking." Both the AT and Techreport numbers for GRID show 4870CF and the X2 neck and neck at 1920. AT's review then shows 4870CF taking a 70% performance loss at 2560 and tanking below a single 4870. Sounds like a driver issue, game specific issue, or human testing error to me.

In general, I think the reviews are showing CF and X2 are pretty much neck and neck. One is slightly ahead of the other in most tests, and CF might have the majority of slight leads, but really the difference is hardly significant.

- woolfe

 

[uclaLabrat]

Originally posted by: woolfe9999

Originally posted by: chizow
Yeah 2560 in AT's GRID testing definitely showed a huge lead for the X2, but overall AT was the only site that didn't show the X2 trailing the CF rig. I'd say there is probably a little bit of bottlenecking with the x16 slot or PLX switch and some gain with 1GB at higher resolutions or with high AA levels.

It's something more than a "little bit of bottlenecking." Both the AT and Techreport numbers for GRID show 4870CF and the X2 neck and neck at 1920. AT's review then shows 4870CF taking a 70% performance loss at 2560 and tanking below a single 4870. Sounds like a driver issue, game specific issue, or human testing error to me.

In general, I think the reviews are showing CF and X2 are pretty much neck and neck. One is slightly ahead of the other in most tests, and CF might have the majority of slight leads, but really the difference is hardly significant.

- woolfe

Sounds more like a memory difference...the CF solution is 2x512, the X2 is 2X1G. Won't be apples to apples until the 1G 4870 comes out, I imagine.

 

[thilanliyan]

Originally posted by: nitromullet
At the proposed $360 for a GTX 280, I don't imagine that NV could produce them fast enough to keep them in stock.

Would NV make a profit selling it for that cheap?

 

[Tempered81]

Wow, ATi is really giving it to Nvidia this time. Looks like HD4870X2 has the performance crown. I can't believe AMD/ATi actually got back on top, wonder how long it will last before retaliation?

 

[Mem]

Originally posted by: jaredpace
Wow, ATi is really giving it to Nvidia this time. Looks like HD4870X2 has the performance crown. I can't believe AMD/ATi actually got back on top, wonder how long it will last before retaliation?

Why not ?...they did it with the 9700,nice to see AMD/ATi give not only excellent performance competition but also very competitive prices,I hate to think where we would be with no competition for Nvidia.

 

[Nemesis 1]

Originally posted by: SSChevy2001
@Nemesis 1 Do you really see the hydra engine becoming reality? If it does works it will have some big limitations, and a lot of bugs. I wouldn't touch it with a 100ft nic cable.

iF IT PERFORMS AS ADVERTIZED IT LOOKS .tO BE THE ANS TO ME . ati /nv WON'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT GAME PROFILING. Sorry about caps didn't see I had it locked.

http://www.lucidlogix.com/news/pr_2008_07_14.html

One standard for all cards. NV isn't happy I bet.

 

[nRollo]

Originally posted by: jaredpace
Wow, ATi is really giving it to Nvidia this time. Looks like HD4870X2 has the performance crown. I can't believe AMD/ATi actually got back on top, wonder how long it will last before retaliation?

Well sort of anyway.

Do they have the top performing anything today? No.

Will they have the top performing single GPU card in a month(?) when the 4870X2 launches? No.

Will they have the top performing AFR card in a month(?)? Looks that way.

Will two of their AFR cards beat three GTX280s? Tough to say.

So if your definition of "ATi got back on top" is "It looks like in a month they'll have the best performing AFR card", you are technically correct. (although we also have no idea what the market will look like next month)

 

[Stoneburner]

Originally posted by: nRollo

Originally posted by: jaredpace
Wow, ATi is really giving it to Nvidia this time. Looks like HD4870X2 has the performance crown. I can't believe AMD/ATi actually got back on top, wonder how long it will last before retaliation?

Well sort of anyway.

Do they have the top performing anything today? No.

Will they have the top performing single GPU card in a month(?) when the 4870X2 launches? No.

Will they have the top performing AFR card in a month(?)? Looks that way.

Will two of their AFR cards beat three GTX280s? Tough to say.

So if your definition of "ATi got back on top" is "It looks like in a month they'll have the best performing AFR card", you are technically correct. (although we also have no idea what the market will look like next month)

Do they own Nvidia in the price/performance race?

Yep.

Do you like the Rumsfeld method of asking questions and then answering them?

Apparently

Do you appear to be in damage control overtime?

Undoubtedly

Can Tri-Sli beat quad X-Fire?

Now you're just getting dirty.

 

[Tempered81]

Originally posted by: nRollo

Will they have the top performing AFR card in a month(?)? Looks that way.

Will two of their AFR cards beat three GTX280s? Tough to say.

well their single card is already faster than TWO 280's in sli in these AT benches:
http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3354&p=4
http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3354&p=7

If Ati's fastest card is faster than two of Nvidias fastest cards in sli, its got to faster than one. I'd say total performance crown.

 

[Ariste]

Originally posted by: nRollo

Originally posted by: jaredpace
Wow, ATi is really giving it to Nvidia this time. Looks like HD4870X2 has the performance crown. I can't believe AMD/ATi actually got back on top, wonder how long it will last before retaliation?

Well sort of anyway.

Do they have the top performing anything today? No.

Will they have the top performing single GPU card in a month(?) when the 4870X2 launches? No.

Will they have the top performing AFR card in a month(?)? Looks that way.

Will two of their AFR cards beat three GTX280s? Tough to say.

So if your definition of "ATi got back on top" is "It looks like in a month they'll have the best performing AFR card", you are technically correct. (although we also have no idea what the market will look like next month)

They have the best price/performance right now. The 4870X2 beats a single GTX280 in pretty much every benchmark, and sometimes even beats GTX280 SLI.

In other words, it costs an nVidia customer $1000 to consistently beat ATI's $500 card.

ATI wins this round. Period.