[H] 6990+6970 CF vs GTX580 SLI triple monitor

[SirPauly]

I certainly like the the ability to tri-sli with the HD 6990; that's a nice ability. However, don't like the blanket nature based on costs, when one can tri-sli a GTX 570.

 

[flopper]

3x570 costs here around 900 euro.
3x6950 at 600euro.
3x6970 around 800euro.
So, if one do eyefinity etc..and thinks price/performance, 3x6950 is a no brainer.
That is what I would do hands down.
You get a better performance than a 6990 and at a similar price.
depending on card 1gb/2gb ram, its either the same or cost a tad more.

however, its up to the consumer to state its worth it.

 

[SirPauly]

For those who had recommended Tri SLI 570s.. its really a bad idea. It just does not have enough VRAM to handle multi monitor res and in some games it already tanks at 2560 with 8xAA.

So the only option for ~$1000 from NV is SLI 580s.

Compare that to Quad CF 6950s for a similar price, it wouldn't even be a close contest. The decision to go with 2gb vram makes the 69xx series a winner for multicard high res setups.

@Lonyo: Eyeinfinity isn't expensive. But i meant that only enthusiasts and an even smaller niche uses it. To power eyeinfinity/surround you need these beefy multi GPUs otherwise its overkill for single monitors.

Of course it does; it easily handles those resolutions! One doesn't have to use x8aa and could use CSAA; that's why it was invented.

 

[Silverforce11]

One shouldn't have to compromise on AA quality when one pays $1000 for GPU setups. Its already tanking on single monitor res, has no chance at multi res with AA. No to tri 570s.

 

[Grooveriding]

Of course it does; it easily handles those resolutions! One doesn't have to use x8aa and could use CSAA; that's why it was invented.

1.2GB is not enough for Crysis or Metro maxed with AA at 2560x1600, it's not going to be enough for eyefinity/surround. Many benches show this.

 

[MrK6]

6950 Tri-CF is an incredible deal right now for those who want multi-GPU. There's little reason to consider other setups atm, especially on the price/performance basis.

 

[SirPauly]

1.2GB is not enough for Crysis or Metro maxed with AA at 2560x1600, it's not going to be enough for eyefinity/surround. Many benches show this.

In Tri-Sli? Of course you can. One wouldn't be able to max out AA though.

 

[SirPauly]

One shouldn't have to compromise on AA quality when one pays $1000 for GPU setups. Its already tanking on single monitor res, has no chance at multi res with AA. No to tri 570s.

Why should ones compromises stop at just x8 AA? Of course one could enjoy AA with Tri-570's.

 

[Elfear]

Why should ones compromises stop at just x8 AA? Of course one could enjoy AA with Tri-570's.

The vram really does limit the 570 at Eyefinity/Surround resolutions. Here are a few quotes from [H] when they compared the 6900 series to the 500 series. They only tested two cards but it wouldn't really matter if they had tried three because the cards would have tanked in the same manner with vram limitations.

Regarding F1 2010

"The most disappointing combination for this game was GeForce GTX 570 SLI. We tried playing at 5760x1200 8X MSAA, 4X AA and 2X AA as well as No AA, and just did not experience fast enough performance to enjoy the game. At 8X MSAA the game was a slide show, we are talking less than 10 FPS, typically around 5 FPS, and yes we have an apples-to-apples to show that. At 4X AA the chugging wasn’t as bad, but performance was still well under 30 FPS. Even at 2X AA and No AA, performance was not up to the level that we needed, averaging around 40 FPS for this game. We found we had to drop the game down to 5040x1050 with No AA in order to get acceptable performance. This is clearly a huge loss in visual quality compared to 5760x1200 with AA enabled."

"GeForce GTX 570 SLI is severely bottlenecked in this game, yes, we played it at 5 FPS to get you these results, it was painful. It proves a point though, memory capacity is important when running SLI or CrossFireX at high multiple display resolutions."

Regarding Metro 2033

"Alternatively, we found that both the Radeon HD 6970 CrossFireX and Radeon HD 6950 CrossFireX and GeForce GTX 580 SLI were able to run at 5040x1050 "Very High" quality and 4X MSAA! These are the first combination of video cards that we have found that is able to play this game with the in-game 4X MSAA option enabled at "Very High". Granted, we had to drop to 5040x1050 in order to do this, but that is only one resolution below the standard resolution for our displays, and a viable playable option. The GeForce GTX 570 SLI could not obtain this, performance was very slow, under 10 FPS, indicating that it just didn’t have enough memory capacity at that setting"

Regarding BF:BC2

"Comparing performance at 8X MSAA you can see that GeForce GTX 580 SLI is around 40% faster than Radeon HD 6970 CrossFireX! You can see why we were able to turn on higher levels of AA. The GeForce GTX 570 SLI seems to have hit a memory capacity wall at 8X MSAA in this game. Performance remained below 30 FPS, only to shoot up at the end. The GTX 570 SLI is certainly being held back by its memory capacity at this resolution."

The 570's did perform well at 4xAA however, so it is only at higher levels of AA that the cards tank.

IMO the 580's have the minimum amount of vram you'd want at uber resolutions and even that is insufficient in some situations.

 

[notty22]

1.2gb is enough for 2560x1600 in the majority of scenarios. As many people go 3 way gpu for just that resolution or 3d as multi-monitor. Never heard so much negativity for anything less than 2gb until Cayman opted to make that standard. There are plenty of 5970+5870 rigs with 1gb horribly struggling in eyefinity/sarcasm.
Was the whole eyefinity concept flawed until now ?

Its overall good for the landscape that AMD made this move, It just doesn't obsolete every configuration before it.

 

[SirPauly]

Having 1.2 gigs of ram is going to limit some extremer tests in extremer resolutions and having more ram is certainly nice to have. But to say AA can't be enjoyed in Tri-Sli GTX 570 at 2560 x 1600 and surround gaming over-all is silly!

 

[Elfear]

1.2gb is enough for 2560x1600 in the majority of scenarios. As many people go 3 way gpu for just that resolution or 3d as multi-monitor. Never heard so much negativity for anything less than 2gb until Cayman opted to make that standard. There are plenty of 5970+5870 rigs with 1gb horribly struggling in eyefinity/sarcasm.
Was the whole eyefinity concept flawed until now ?

Its overall good for the landscape that AMD made this move, It just doesn't obsolete every configuration before it.

Eyefinity/Surround wasn't flawed until now, you just had to play at lower quality settings because of the memory limitation. A 5970+5870 (1GB models) combo would also be a bad solution for uber-res gaming. Same goes for the 1GB 6950's. I don't think the most recent cards with 1.5+GB of vram made other cards obsolete, I just think they highlighted their limitations in graphics intense situations.

 

[cusideabelincoln]

So many straw men.

1.2gb is enough for 2560x1600 in the majority of scenarios. As many people go 3 way gpu for just that resolution or 3d as multi-monitor. Never heard so much negativity for anything less than 2gb until Cayman opted to make that standard. There are plenty of 5970+5870 rigs with 1gb horribly struggling in eyefinity/sarcasm.
Was the whole eyefinity concept flawed until now ?

Its overall good for the landscape that AMD made this move, It just doesn't obsolete every configuration before it.

Actually, in a way it does obsolete it. There was no other (reasonable) choice with, using your example, a 5870 TriFire setup since it was the only thing on the market. When there is something on the market that eliminates the problem for you for a reasonable trade-off (e.g. cost), it doesn't make much sense to choose the inferior solution. When 2GB+ became available, that was obviously the solution to get for people demanding such performance. When Cayman offers 2GB for a similar/cheaper price than the 570 offers 1.2GB, then we get the current debate.

LOL @ negativity. It isn't negativity. It's acknowledging the alternative. There's a testable limitation with 570 setup, so that has to be a consideration for some games as well as future games which could very well eat up that framebuffer.

 

[SirPauly]

1.2gb is enough for 2560x1600 in the majority of scenarios. As many people go 3 way gpu for just that resolution or 3d as multi-monitor. Never heard so much negativity for anything less than 2gb until Cayman opted to make that standard. There are plenty of 5970+5870 rigs with 1gb horribly struggling in eyefinity/sarcasm.
Was the whole eyefinity concept flawed until now ?

Its overall good for the landscape that AMD made this move, It just doesn't obsolete every configuration before it.

IT's wonderful to see 2 gigs of ram for the extremer tests and the titles that this may help. It was the same reasoning why it was good to see 1.2 and 1.5 more ram over the 5XXX series from AMD. More ram is better! It adds value! It's great to see. This doesn't translate into not enjoying AA on the 5XXX series from AMD or the 5XX series from nVidia -- just that AMD offers a nice strength that may be compelling to some, which is great to see, with the 6XXX series.

 

[Elfear]

Having 1.2 gigs of ram is going to limit some extremer tests in extremer resolutions and having more ram is certainly nice to have. But to say AA can't be enjoyed in Tri-Sli GTX 570 at 2560 x 1600 and surround gaming over-all is silly!

I don't think anyone is saying you can't enjoy Tri-SLI GTX 570s at 2560x1600. The majority of games would play great at that res. I just know I'd be a little pissed if I forked over $900 for GPUs and had to turn down settings for smooth gameplay, not because I didn't have the horsepower but because of memory limitations. This becomes even more apparent at Surround resolutions.

 

[Red Storm]

5760x1200 > 2560x1600. This review was on the former (multi-monitor setups), not the latter (single monitor setup). Just FYI for people who keep bringing up performance at lower resolutions.

 

[SirPauly]

I don't think anyone is saying you can't enjoy Tri-SLI GTX 570s at 2560x1600. The majority of games would play great at that res. I just know I'd be a little pissed if I forked over $900 for GPUs and had to turn down settings for smooth gameplay, not because I didn't have the horsepower but because of memory limitations. This becomes even more apparent at Surround resolutions.

Same case can be made with every product that had more ram. It's always great to see more ram and offers more value and future proof aspects for ones purchase; it's an advantage and strength for AMD.

 

[happy medium]

Lets say I'm a "real enthusiast" and I have a $1100 invested in 3, 24 inch IPS monitors, a 400$ quad sli/x-fire motherboard, 16gb memory, 1500 watt psu, ect. ect. ect.

WHat gpu's do I buy? Do i worry about a couple hundred more to make my system the fastest it can be or do I suddenly start to become cost conscious and settle for second best.

That review is bogus.
What if made the same review uping the budget to $2000? Then people would complain that AMd has nothing in that price range to match Nvidia performance.
I would take 3 EVGA gtx580 3gb cards or Zotac AMp 2's overclocked at 900 core (1,800$) over any AMD setup you can buy.

It a made for AMD budget review. AMD budget gpu's and second best , just like thier cpu's ,face facts and stop cheering for the second place underdog.

I'm so tired of hearing "but they cost less" excuse.


Thread-crapping is not acceptable. Notice how much thread-derail transpired here after your inflammatory thread-crap. This is a problem.

Please stop thread-crapping and derailing threads.

Idontcare
Super Mod

 

[GaiaHunter]

Lets say I'm a "real enthusiast" and I have a $1100 invested in 3, 24 inch IPS monitors, a 400$ quad sli/x-fire motherboard, 16gb memory, 1500 watt psu, ect. ect. ect.

WHat gpu's do I buy? Do i worry about a couple hundred more to make my system the fastest it can be or do I suddenly start to become cost conscious and settle for second best.

It is more like a $1000+ more though.

That is a next generation tri-fire upgrade and then the guy will grab a 7990 + 7970 and laugh at the GTX580 tri-sli.

 

[Skurge]

Lets say I'm a "real enthusiast" and I have a $1100 invested in 3, 24 inch IPS monitors, a 400$ quad sli/x-fire motherboard, 16gb memory, 1500 watt psu, ect. ect. ect.

WHat gpu's do I buy? Do i worry about a couple hundred more to make my system the fastest it can be or do I suddenly start to become cost conscious and settle for second best.

That review is bogus.
What if made the same review uping the budget to $2000? Then people would complain that AMd has nothing in that price range to match Nvidia performance.
I would take 3 EVGA gtx580 3gb cards or Zotac AMp 2's overclocked at 900 core (1,800$) over any AMD setup you can buy.

It a made for AMD budget review. AMD budget gpu's and second best , just like thier cpu's ,face facts and stop cheering for the second place underdog.

I'm so tired of hearing "but they cost less" excuse.

Then why don't you have those 3GB 580s and not a 460?

Also, this thread was going well long before your rant, go start another thread about $2000 GPU setups. This one is about $1000 GPU setups.

 

[Skurge]

It is more like a $1000+ more though.

That is a next generation tri-fire upgrade and then the guy will grab a 7990 + 7970 and laugh at the GTX580 tri-sli.

Also, why would he only get 24inch monitors for $1k, but get $2K worth of GPU? Strange.

 

[Lonyo]

Lets say I'm a "real enthusiast" and I have a $1100 invested in 3, 24 inch IPS monitors, a 400$ quad sli/x-fire motherboard, 16gb memory, 1500 watt psu, ect. ect. ect.

WHat gpu's do I buy? Do i worry about a couple hundred more to make my system the fastest it can be or do I suddenly start to become cost conscious and settle for second best.

That review is bogus.
What if made the same review uping the budget to $2000? Then people would complain that AMd has nothing in that price range to match Nvidia performance.
I would take 3 EVGA gtx580 3gb cards or Zotac AMp 2's overclocked at 900 core (1,800$) over any AMD setup you can buy.

It a made for AMD budget review. AMD budget gpu's and second best , just like thier cpu's ,face facts and stop cheering for the second place underdog.

I'm so tired of hearing "but they cost less" excuse.

Your suggestion is also bogus.
If I have a $400 motherboard, 16GB RAM, 1500w PSU etc, I don't want to be spending $1100 on triple IPS monitors.
I would be buying FIVE monitors for surround gaming. And then I would buy AMD because that's the only thing supporting 5 monitors at any price, because I'm a real enthusiast.

Rather than raising my GPU budget to $2000, I'm raising my monitor count to 5, and people would complain NV has nothing in that region which can compete.
Why would I want to settle for second best and use only 3 monitors when I could be using 5?


AKA your post is inappropriate and foolish because you can one-up in various ways to the point where any comparison is "bogus" as you put it, because it doesn't push one or the other thing to its absolute limits.

 

[Skurge]

Your suggestion is also bogus.
If I have a $400 motherboard, 16GB RAM, 1500w PSU etc, I don't want to be spending $1100 on triple IPS monitors.
I would be buying FIVE monitors for surround gaming. And then I would buy AMD because that's the only thing supporting 5 monitors at any price, because I'm a real enthusiast.

Rather than raising my GPU budget to $2000, I'm raising my monitor count to 5, and people would complain NV has nothing in that region which can compete.
Why would I want to settle for second best and use only 3 monitors when I could be using 5?

The part in bold was brilliant.

 

[formulav8]

I'm so tired of hearing "but they cost less" excuse.

This thread was going so well, until... :thumbsdown:


Anyways, the review majorly shows what is the best value for these types of setups.

 

[SlowSpyder]

$1000 in AMD GPU's is faster than $1000 worth of Nvidia GPU's at Eyefinity resolutions. I don't know what there is to even argue about here?