Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: ZmaN on September 13, 2005, 04:32:06 pm
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I'm sorry im being so annoying about this not-even-out-yet technology, but is crossfire ever gunna support Nvidia Nforce 4 Chipsets? I juss read an article today sayin that Intel has struck a deal with Nvidia and Ati, that the Intel 975X will support Crossfire and SLI technology. Theres also suttin i read sayin that the 955X Chipset supports crossfire, but still, is crossfire on an Nforce4 chipset motherboard EVER gunna be possible????
(sorry bout the details)
All these articles are on //www.techreport.com
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Most likely in the next generation, and same the other way (SLI on ATI chipsets). This generation? I doubt it.
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Originally posted by Grey Wolf
Most likely in the next generation, and same the other way (SLI on ATI chipsets). This generation? I doubt it.
What do u mean "next generation"?
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Originally posted by ZmaN
What do u mean "next generation"?
like the current top of the line cards are "this generation" the next top of the line cards would be next gen, and so on, so it'd be the for ati, the radeon x900-x950, and so on.
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I was actually thinking nForce 5 (not the old theoretical NF5, which was rumoured to be the Intel chipset, but that's also NF4).
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It's theoretically possible, yes. I wouldn't hold my breath though.
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Earlier today I was given information regarding ATI’s upcoming Crossfire technology that, at first, I passed off as so ridiculous it couldn’t possibly be true. However, after having the information verified from several very reputable sources I’ve decided it would be a disservice to keep this information private
As many are aware by now, ATI’s Crossfire technology uses an external link to connect the Master and Slave cards together (it's sort of like a 3-headed dongle with DVI connectors at the ends). What’s not generally known is that the backbone for this setup is a Silicon Image SiL 1161 chip which is installed on the X8-series Master cards. The SiL 1161 is there to receive output passed over the external link from the Slave card in the Crossfire setup and pass it on to the Master card.
Sounds decent on paper and everything, but if you check out the specs for the 1161 on this page you will see that it is limited to single-link TMDS @ 165MHz. This means that the max 3D resolution for any X8-series Crossfire setup is 1600x1200 @ 60Hz. That means no high-res Crossfire gaming beyond 1600x1200, no 1600x1200 at a flicker free refresh rate, and no widescreen 1920x1200.
How can a technology so clearly aimed at enthusiast gamers have a limitation like this? High-resolution flicker free gaming is one of the primary benefits a multi-graphics setup like Crossfire should offer entusiasts but, somehow, ATI managed to mess that up completely.
http://www.rage3d.com/index.php?cat=75#newsid33828812
Wow. I mean, jeeze, if this is true....well, that's pretty much kinda making the entire crossfire concept kind of pointless.
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Ouch. That is an absolutely ridiculous oversight by ATI's engineers if true. 60hz is basically unuseable on CRTs, so the effective max resolution there would be 1024x768 or 1280x960. This limitation means that a single card would effectively be better than two of them; at least you can use some decent resolutions in older games. This seems too crazy too be true, but Rage3D is after all an ATI fansite, so I don't know what to make of it.
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unfortunatly, its not juss rage3d, the inquirer also has that same information, i got the link from legionhardware.com....
heres the link Crossfire Limited to 1600x1200@60Hz (http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=26198)
This really sucks, i wanted to go crossfire, but now when i see this, im not too sure about ati anymore......
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I don't honestly expect anything good from ATi until the R580s start coming out. They're going through the equivalent of nVidia's FX period.
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And here we see why I'm buying a GeForce 7 card this year: ATI have become complacent, believing that because games don't require X there's no market for X.
Bull****. People buy high-end graphics cards to show off. Or to just be secure in knowing they have an uber system. Either way, there's always a market for the latest tech.
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Well, I don't know about ATIs plans for future cards, but nVidias plans - as outlined by one of the architects responsible for the 6800 and 7800 series, who's from my university and is frequently around on our Computer Graphics Group activities - is to improve functionality relatively slowly, since they consider that for actual graphics most of the needs are already implemented (most of the proposed changes on future GPUs would be for general purpose use of GPUs, an area that's growing fast), but to scale the hell out of the architecture.
He said that their latest chip architecture setup (the 7800) is built in such a way that they can upscale it (by adding more vertex and fragment shaders inside it) with virtually no limits - it may end up needing a ridiculous silicon area, but the performance gain is guaranteed. Their internal policy is to double the performance every 18 months, and from what he says, their performance gain seems to be guaranteed for the next few cycles at least. It's a very stable architecture too, so ATI will have quite a run for its money to keep on par, I think.
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There are more reports of this starting to filter out now.
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=26228
What on earth were they thinking? They will lose out on half their target market due to this limitation.
Oh well, I was never really a potential buyer for this tech anyway.
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Crossfire and SLI are ultimately a waste of money anyway, so it doesn't really matter that much. I always favored VIA boards, myself, and those are incompatible with both techs.
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well, ive decided to buy an ATI in the near future. despite the fact that their multi gpu solution is lame, im going with them because of these reasons. 1) for my price range, ATI is putting out better cards than nvidia in the price range (150-200 bucks), 2) Im not planning on going crossfire or sli, since its just tooo expensive. Crossfire's cheapest setup is gunna cost, well id say about $320 (An X800GT and a master card), and sli's cheapest setup is about $300 bucks (two 6600GT's). For the performence gain, its not that worth it. Your better off goin out and buying one card instead of 2 for an sli setup, since any multi gpu solution is gunna suck up twice the power (about 60-90 watts per card, times 2 equals 120-180 watts) thats a LOT of extra power, you also need a good power supply to handle all of it so buying a really sweet card is more worth it, since its cost you more money in other areas of the pc..... any opinions?
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Capitalization and punctuation your friends.
Other than that, intelligent move ignoring the multiple card setups. Given the cards you're looking at, make sure you have a PSU with a decent +12v rail and at least 350W total, preferably closer to 400W or more. As for the ATi vs. nVidia thing, performance-wise they're basically identical. The only difference is nVidia is doing a bit better in standards compliance. Personally, I prefer nVidia, but that's really your choice, and go for what you're comfortable with.
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I think SLI might have been worth it if you got at least 80% extra performance in every game, but that's rarely the case even at GPU limited settings. And there are still some games like Far Cry that could really use more performance but don't benefit from SLI at all.
That being said, I have an SLI setup. Guess what cards it uses. :D
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Well, the thing is that the driver is solely responsible for the whole task allocation between the GPUs, so it follows that in some cases you won't have nearly the performance gain that's expected. When they give control to the programmer, and gamehouses start to churn out games with direct SLI support, you can expect dramatic increases in performance.
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yea.... my speculations are that the performence gain you see on crossfire and sli setups are, well....... Those results come under perfect conditions, which is impossible for the average consumer. Oh and can sum1 give me some help? I need to know the good power supply brands.... I am looking at aspire cases on newegg, and the power supplies seem decent enough.... They're all set at at LEAST 450 watt, and i am thinking about maybe a 500 wat O(is that worth it or not?). Anyway, help on that topic would be nice. thanks guys, l8r.... ZmaN
P.S. oh hbey cp, what cards does ur sli setup use anyway?
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Antec, Cooler Master, Fortron Power Soruce, etc.
Use brand-name PSUs.
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Seasonic makes very efficient PSUs. PC Power and cooling always seems to be getting good reviews as well.
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oh guess what!?! heres the deal, According to some sites i saw, Crossfire, well it wasnt meant for performance..... its meant to improve image quality, and with it, theres some performance gain...
heres the link: Crossfire review (http://www.hexus.net/content/reviews/review.php?dXJsX3Jldmlld19JRD0xNjUxJnVybF9wYWdlPTE=)
EDIT: And according to the review above, crossfire can TECHNICALLY work with alot of chipsets, including...well... read the link already!!!
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and wait!! theres more, it turns out that the Radeon X800GTO is FASTER than the X800XL..... I check 3 benchmarks and compared the results with the GTO review i found, and its faster.... think about it: a $189 card is faster than a $279 card.... pretty amazing.... I also read that ATI is trying to get rid of the rest of the X800 Series and heres the new line up: ATI X1800, X1600, X1300, GTO, GTO2? Confused? Not us! (http://www.hexus.net/content/beanz/beanz.php?dXJsX3Jldmlld19JRD0xNTY4)
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Hexus is good. Your typing is not.
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Originally posted by Grey Wolf
Hexus is good. Your typing is not.
Oh really?? What don't you like about my typing? that I might type this way in a campaign? oh please give it ip already about my typing.... jeeeeeze!
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Crossfire is a piece of trash right now. That 1600x1200@60hz thing is indeed true, which is a joke considering its target market. They're actually calling it misfire on many hardware forums now. :D Hopefully the X1800 version will correct this.
As for the supersampling AA, it's nice but it's been on all nvidia cards for a while now. I use it in some older games that are resolution limited like System Shock 2.
and wait!! theres more, it turns out that the Radeon X800GTO is FASTER than the X800XL..... I check 3 benchmarks and compared the results with the GTO review i found, and its faster.... think about it: a $189 card is faster than a $279 card.... pretty amazing....
:wtf: where? You can't compare game numbers across different sites since many use their own custom benchmarks. That GTO is a 12-pipe model and would have be clocked quite high to beat an XL.
P.S. oh hbey cp, what cards does ur sli setup use anyway?
Voodoo 2s. :D I got the first one for $300 in 1998 and the second for $20 or so off ebay a few years later. They're in my old game computer. I have some older games that only support Glide or work best on Glide.
Oh really?? What don't you like about my typing? that I might type this way in a campaign? oh please give it ip already about my typing.... jeeeeeze!
It's not like it takes a lot of effort to use proper sentences. :p This a forum after all, not a chat room.
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Well, from the general look of things the X800 series crossfire is a major dud. The higher antialiasing modes are supposedly better looking if you like that kind of thing....personally, I've never been much on AA so it's just kind of shrug to me. Ananadtech says those modes come with a ridiculous performance hit though. Then you tack on the absurd resolution limitations, and the need for a master card, and as of yet, a new mobo. The newer cards may produce a much more attractive result, but the older card....just doesn't seem to be a point.
The crossfire mobo's themselves look pretty good, judging from anand's review. But, you know, seeing it second from the top in so many catergories would've been a lot more impressive if the uli board wasn't in first in so many.
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I also generally don't use any AA, prefering to jack up the resolution instead, but there are a few games that are both old and resolution limited, not going any higher than something like 1024x768, so the 8x/10x or even 16x SSAA modes are useful there. They do cause a heavy performance hit, but it's not nearly as bad as what the Crossfire reviews are showing. According to AT, going from 6x MSAA to 10x SSAA causes HL2's framerate to fall from 130 or so to 40. I doubt the IQ really justifies that kind of hit.
The xpress 200 motherboard does look more promising though, although it's a bit behind the M1695 in some cases. It will be interesting to see what kind of retail boards come out with that chipset.
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Originally posted by CP5670
I also generally don't use any AA, prefering to jack up the resolution instead, but there are a few games that are both old and resolution limited, not going any higher than something like 1024x768, so the 8x/10x or even 16x SSAA modes are useful there. They do cause a heavy performance hit, but it's not nearly as bad as what the Crossfire reviews are showing. According to AT, going from 6x MSAA to 10x SSAA causes HL2's framerate to fall from 130 or so to 40. I doubt the IQ really justifies that kind of hit.
The xpress 200 motherboard does look more promising though, although it's a bit behind the M1695 in some cases. It will be interesting to see what kind of retail boards come out with that chipset.
yea the performeance definitly goes south when you turn on Anti Aliasing in Crossfire Mode...... yea 60hz refresh rate is wayy to low... retarted if u ask me... the x1800 may fix it, idk but it sounds good...
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Question: The X800GTO came out a few days ago. The X800GTO2 just came out from Sapphire this morning.... According to the mod I found on the internet here, X800 GTO² to X850 XT Mod (http://www.techpowerup.com/articles//overclocking/vidcard/127/1), theres alot of performance gain with the unlock of 4 more pipelines, due to an unlockable chip. One thing though; you need to overclock to get a significant performance gain.... here's the search results on NewEgg: Newegg.com, X800GT Search Results (http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?Submit=Go&DEPA=0&type=&description=x800gt&Category=0&minPrice=&maxPrice=&Go.x=0&Go.y=0) (dont worry, GTO's come up too).
Should I get the X800GTO2 for 10 bucks more or should I just get the X800GTO by Connect3d? Please I want to buy the card this week so i can get my PC back up.
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Once again. Proper English, and when posting something immediately after another post by yourself, edit it in.
I honestly don't recommend even thinking about modding the card. If successful, it lowers the life of the card. If a failure, the card is a paperweight.
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http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=326023
if you are planning on spending that kind of money, zman i would suggest this card. it outperforms pretty much anything on the market, is made by BFG and its at an excellent price for such new technology. it would be money better spent because you could always buy another one later when they are cheaper and put them in SLI mode. I just bought one myself and it has more than enough power to run the stuff i need. I got a 11k on 3dmark05 with this card and an X2 @ 2.8 GHZ so its not like the 7800 lacks performance....
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Originally posted by MatthewPapa
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=326023
if you are planning on spending that kind of money, zman i would suggest this card. it outperforms pretty much anything on the market, is made by BFG and its at an excellent price for such new technology. it would be money better spent because you could always buy another one later when they are cheaper and put them in SLI mode. I just bought one myself and it has more than enough power to run the stuff i need. I got a 11k on 3dmark05 with this card and an X2 @ 2.8 GHZ so its not like the 7800 lacks performance....
I dont know..... 375 big ones.... big investment.... I only have a Pentium 4 520 @ 2.8 Ghz (not an athlon scaled processor) I wont get that, plus i have a crappy chipset, a 915P Pro, and my motherboard is lame. Ill never afford SLI (At least i dont think so)
*Racks brain about what to do next* HELP?!?!
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Never get SLI or Crossfire. If you want to spend enough money to get even a low-end version of either, get a high-end card from nVidia or ATi. Doesn't really matter which.
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Well, to be fair you could do a lot worse. SLI (high end cards only) is of course wildly expensive, but heck, it's far better to get two 7800 GTXs for gaming than wasting money on things like an FX57, high end memory, $300 cases, RAID0 Raptor setups and a host of other ripoffs out there. At least it offers 50-80% extra performance in the majority of games.
Crossfire on the other hand is something most enthusiasts aren't going to touch right now with that resolution limitation. The whole point of dual video cards is to play games in high resolutions and the people who have the money for two expensive video cards are also going to have good monitors.
Should I get the X800GTO2 for 10 bucks more or should I just get the X800GTO by Connect3d? Please I want to buy the card this week so i can get my PC back up.
I would get the GTO2. I don't think I have heard of even one case where unlocking the quad didn't work (sort of like the old X800 pro VIVO), so this is an amazing deal, and in any case it's done through software so you can easily undo the change if you want. The core frequency seems to usually get somewhere between XL and XT speeds using the stock cooler.
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Originally posted by CP5670
Well, to be fair you could do a lot worse. SLI (high end cards only) is of course wildly expensive, but heck, it's far better to get two 7800 GTXs for gaming than wasting money on things like an FX57, high end memory, $300 cases, RAID0 Raptor setups and a host of other ripoffs out there. At least it offers 50-80% extra performance in the majority of games.
Crossfire on the other hand is something most enthusiasts aren't going to touch right now with that resolution limitation. The whole point of dual video cards is to play games in high resolutions and the people who have the money for two expensive video cards are also going to have good monitors.
I would get the GTO2. I don't think I have heard of even one case where unlocking the quad didn't work (sort of like the old X800 pro VIVO), so this is an amazing deal, and in any case it's done through software so you can easily undo the change if you want. The core frequency seems to usually get somewhere between XL and XT speeds using the stock cooler.
But the core speed is 75 mhz downclocked from the connect3d one.... then again i could just overclock it to make up the 75mhz diference, considering they use the same core. I think ill do the X800GTO2.... Good point that it uses software instead of hardware changes, so its easily undone, i like that alot!!:p
Crossfire isnt really usable now, when the X1800's come out (which will be some time in december), the problem may be fixed, considering the new core.... and yea FX-57's are a rip-off.... too much speed, wayyy too much $$$...
EDIT: And another thing is that I KNOW that the Sapphire GTO2 uses the R480 core. However, I cannot find reviews for the Connect3D GTO so I dont know what core I'm getting.... Hey, better safe than sorry!! Sapphire X800GTO is the way to go!!! (for me anyway)
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huh? At least according to newegg, they are both 400mhz. The Sapphire card is apparently the only one with the R480 - the other brands all use the R423 one from the XL - and in fact it looks like it's a fully working R480 too.
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Interesting article about the ATI Crossfire reference motherboard including testing numbers and all that good stuff.
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2542&p=1
Seems like the reference ATI Crossfire AMD may be an excellent board to challenge the nForce enthusiast market in the AMD arena. This has me interested as I'm slowly considering what my next purchase will be and the nForce 2 and AMD setup was fantastic. This or nForce 4 or something that pops up in the next 6 months will probably be what I'm looking for...
What really interests me is that the Crossfire board doesn't have to have the dual GPU option. That seems counter-intuitive to me unless Crossfire is a new marketing scheme or something. Maybe I missed something there...
Frankly, I can't be arsed to buy two ultra expensive boards for any reason at all. Not when 3DFX did it, not when nVidia didi it, and not when ATI is doing it. It's mostly for bragging rights and all that sort of thing....and frankly who cares what the bloody refresh rate is at the ultra top resolution...I never run that resolution. I'm happy with a mix between 1024x768 and 1280x1024 (or whatever the LCD's are starting to do). I'm plotting to purchase an LCD screen soon and as long as the thing can deliver on the native resolution of a 17in LCD then I'm going to be pleased as punch.
Now I don't know about some of you folks, but I don't care if SLI or Crossfire can do mega ultra super amazing FPS at super resolutions because I'm not going to be interested in that. I want a good resolution, top image quality, and good FPS. I'll probably tweak it so that I can get amazing image quality and then pair it down till its somewhere between 30-60fps. The rest is totally inconsiquential...to me anyways. I consider myself a mid-level poweruser so that puts me well above the very basic and average gamer.
To most of them, it won't be mattering no matter what...even if they can afford to buy these things. They won't know the bloody difference!
A fast, stable, capable chipset, CPU, and VPU combination will make me very happy. My current rig is that...in a years time I'm hoping to find the next best thing :)
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Of course nobody here is going to buy two video cards, but that doesn't make it any less of a crazy limitation. The people who are actually considering buying this sort of thing aren't going to be using 1280x1024 LCDs, so it makes no sense to say that most people wouldn't notice a difference.
Seriously, every card these days, even one of the absolute cheapest POSs, has 400mhz RAMDACs that max out at 2048x1536 at 85hz. My monitor does this nicely and SLI has no problem with it; 1600x1200 at 60hz is downright pathetic in comparison. Crossfire is actually a major downgrade over a single card because of this IMO, as big resolutions are still very viable in older games with a single card.
I would never buy a high end dual video card setup either (unless I win the lottery or something :D), but I can see how it would be appealing if it was cheaper.
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Originally posted by CP5670
Of course nobody here is going to buy two video cards, but that doesn't make it any less of a crazy limitation. The people who are actually considering buying this sort of thing aren't going to be using 1280x1024 LCDs, so it makes no sense to say that most people wouldn't notice a difference.
Seriously, every card these days, even one of the absolute cheapest POSs, has 400mhz RAMDACs that max out at 2048x1536 at 85hz. My monitor does this nicely and SLI has no problem with it; 1600x1200 at 60hz is downright pathetic in comparison. Crossfire is actually a major downgrade over a single card because of this IMO, as big resolutions are still very viable in older games with a single card.
I would never buy a high end dual video card setup either (unless I win the lottery or something :D), but I can see how it would be appealing if it was cheaper.
I suppose thats a fair point. I still see it as alot of chest beating on both sides of things.
If you've got an LCD monitor, then you want to run at ideal resolution regardless of anything else...so what should be important is top image quality. Yes resolution gives that to you but so does FSAA and AS and all that good stuff too...so its a point where you wonder how much extra you're really going to get.
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Yeah, the returns start diminishing after a point, but with an appropriate monitor I think there are still big differences at settings that single cards cannot handle smoothly. AA is nice but in my opinion it's no substitute for high resolutions for most games. 1600x1200 with 4xAA is generally slightly faster than "pure" 2048x1536 on anything but the 7800 cards, but I always choose the latter option whenever possible. (although either setting is only practical in FS2 open, Deus Ex and a few other old games for me)
Also, a good portion of the people for whom this sort of thing is targeted have that Dell 2405, which is a 1920x1200 (60hz) LCD, so they are out of luck with Crossfire too.
That being said, you're right that it is a bragging rights thing in some cases. I've seen quite a few people with overclocked 7800GTX SLI setups who post and argue on hardware forums pretty much all the time, so it makes you wonder if they ever actually play games with those cards. :p
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Originally posted by CP5670
Yeah, the returns start diminishing after a point, but with an appropriate monitor I think there are still big differences at settings that single cards cannot handle smoothly. AA is nice but in my opinion it's no substitute for high resolutions for most games. 1600x1200 with 4xAA is generally slightly faster than "pure" 2048x1536 on anything but the 7800 cards, but I always choose the latter option whenever possible. (although either setting is only practical in FS2 open, Deus Ex and a few other old games for me)
Also, a good portion of the people for whom this sort of thing is targeted have that Dell 2405, which is a 1920x1200 (60hz) LCD, so they are out of luck with Crossfire too.
That being said, you're right that it is a bragging rights thing in some cases. I've seen quite a few people with overclocked 7800GTX SLI setups who post and argue on hardware forums pretty much all the time, so it makes you wonder if they ever actually play games with those cards. :p
If I can borrow just one of those cards while they are busy arguing.... :D