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ATI Launches Crossfire... Finally
Steve from Hexus writes "After a long wait, ATI's multi-GPU solution - CrossFire - is finally here. Hexus checks out Crossfire using an X850 Crossfire setup, which can be beaten in performance by a single GeForce 7800 GTX in some games. Too little too late, or will R520 based Crossfire prove more fruitful? Hexus also examines how Crossfire works, how easy it is to setup and what its limitations are with current hardware." Looks very interesting - I'd love to get one for review.
You guys trying to kill Hexus today or what?
--Remove chicken to e-mail
Happy "Abuse Hexus Day" everyone!
Max res of 1600x1200 at 60hz...how...disapointing.
You can tell I'm an aries because of my ram.
Great! Now we'll only have to wait about two years for mediocre linux support.
...for Jon Stewart. Folks say that man has been known to cease CrossFires that are just full of hot air. ATI had better deliver.
IGB: More fun than eating oatmeal!
Coral Cache
Why, why, why, can't the editors change the links to use coralcache ? It's retarded that every story on slashdot concerns an article that no one can read. Is it really any wonder that people post without RTFA?
Since when did operating systems become a religion?
http://www.beyond3d.com/reviews/ati/crossfire/r ossfire_detail/1.htmle viewxxx/e id=730&cid=2e /index.x?pg=1/ index.html
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2005/09/26/ati_c
http://www.driverheaven.net/reviews/crossfireatir
http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=ODE1
http://www.hothardware.com/viewarticle.cfm?articl
http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=168
http://www.tbreak.com/reviews/article.php?id=404
http://techreport.com/reviews/2005q3/ati-crossfir
http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20050926
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1862962 ,00.asp
Multiprocessing general-purpose apps on a GPU?
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make install -not war
NVidia currently has a couple SLI cards, which perform quite well. I recently picked up a 7800 GT, the low-end of the high-end cards, for around $350. The plan is to pick up a second one when the price drops to around $100. It's very reminiscent of my Voodoo 2 experience - the first cost $300 and the second cost $30.
Of course, Crossfire has the benefit of working with any other ATI card past a certain point. With NVidia's offerings, you have to match the card exactly (though supposedly the manufacturer doesn't matter). For my needs, it doesn't matter all that much, but it's something to consider.
Not that I'm a fanboy of either vendor. My last card was a Radeon 9800 Pro, which has worked great these last couple years. Now it seems that NVidia has the card that works best for my needs. Ain't competition grand?
I recently took the plunge and went back to ATI after hearing their drivers had much improved. After far too many VPU errors I ditched them again and went back to nVidia. Is it just me that has these problems? I wonder if the same driver issues will come up in the SLI cards.
It sounds like, even though Crossfire might not be the glorious thing everyone has been waiting for, that in the future it might prove better than SLI. I for one though, feel that it would be better to just wait for that one graphics card than to get two at the moment, considering how fast they become obsolete.
Anyways, from what I've read and been told, SLI requires special profiles to be taken advantage of in games, while crossfire simulates 1 graphics card and doesn't require anything but the default drivers to be taken advantage of.
$fortune
Tomorrow has been canceled due to lack of interest.
Page 2 :
"By definition, a single-link DVI connection only has enough bandwidth at its maximum clock rate to carry a 1600x1200 image at up to 60Hz, or a 1900x1200 image displayed at 54Hz. Therefore in terms of what the slave can send the master board for output via the compositing chip, it's limited to those resolutions."
Limited only if you read the original DVI spec. How does he think people run the HP and Apple 23" displays and the Dell 24" display over a single-link connection?
All card manufacturers, and 1920x1200 display manufacturers, allow you to run the channel with a reduced blanking interval, and so squeeze in the extra bandwidth needed for 1920x1200x60.
Bad start to the review - I'm not going to continue reading (even if I could after it has been slashdot'ed.
I feel that crossfire's biggest flaw is that there is a resolution limit at 1600x1200 @ 60Hz with crossfire enabld.
The customers who ATI developed this product for (the most rabid and devout hardware addicts with large budgets) most likely have either large CRTs (FW900) or high resolution widescreen LCD's (2405FPW, etc).
The failure to recognize that these customers would want to run games at their display's native resolution is unexcusable.
Seriously, why elso would someone drop $1000 to upgrade their graphics hardware if it wasn't so they could run the latest games at high resolution with full detail settings.
Looks very interesting - I'd love to get one for review.
Just one?
Two stories on here both from Hexus. Haha. What was the poster thinking?! He wanted hits but now the site is down!
Crossfire will never work because who would buy a slave card... If you're primary card fails, you're out 2 cards! Ain't that some stuff!
Oh, and I was an ATI man myself for years. Started before Radeon, now I have a 7800GT and I will never go back... unless they offer me some kind of deal, and buy SLI rights.
Who is that masked man?
Take a peek at high end nVidia cards, and it's a different story. Dual-link DVI with both ports combined you can push it to 3840x2400. I believe that to be at 60Hz, but don't quote me. We've got a FX3000 running at that at 15Hz.
jh
Who cares about this stuff other than the tiny portion of the population that will ever use it?
The whole point of this SLI stuff is marketing. It convinces people to buy a more expensive video card than they otherwise would have so that they can fool themselves into thinking they'll get a huge performance boost a few years down the line when they add a second card on the cheap.
In reality, when the second card comes down in price, the SLI configuration will be outclassed on the same order of magnitude as the single card alone by the latest stuff, and you'll just end up having to buy a whole new expensive card, or living with slow graphics.
So unless you've got a boatload of cash and are going to buy two top of the line cards *right now*, it really doesn't matter if either of these manufacturers SLI technology is any good. It's just a marketing gimmick.
Why would a Linux user need a 3D graphics card?
You do realise a significant proportion of high-end CAD and film animation is done using Linux workstations?
They've kind of pushed out the old SGI boxes in that they're (a) considerably cheaper, and (b) considerably faster. Have a random example from Google...
Tedious Bloggy Stuff - hooray?
There aren't any games that require a 7800 SLI configuration and probably won't be for some time. If NVIDIA wasn't worried about releasing a card to wipe out ATI in performance, they could of released the 7800 series in another year or two and everyone would of been happy as pigs in shh.
If Radeon can offer their SLI combination at an affordable price, there's nothing stopping me from saving a few hundred dollers and purchasing a card that generally is in the same era that games are currently in.
Sometimes it's not all about speed, nor price, but value.
Valkyrie is about to die! Wizard needs food -- badly!
Looks very interesting - I'd love to get one for review.
The point is to get TWO for review. =)
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"Extra Anus Kills Four-Legged Chick" -- Headline
No. LCD pixels aren't just "more persistent" than CRT pixels.
LCD pixels hold their current state until the input signal changes. There is no scan period on an LCD, the 60Hz signal is simply a convenient way to bridge the gap between raster scan displays and active-matrix displays.
So, if you send an LCD a set of successive white screens, after the initial white screen no pixels will change, ever. A CRT, on the other hand, will write a white pixel to every part of the screen once every 1/60th of a second...and while the beam is not concentrated on a particular pixel, its brightness will fade.
It has nothing to do with LCDs' slower reponse time, as you implied.
Man is the animal that laughs.
And occasionally whores for Karma.