Quad-GPU Performance Review NVIDIA vs. AMD @ [H]

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FrgMstr

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Quad-GPU Performance Review NVIDIA vs. AMD - How does NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 590 SLI Quad-GPU compare to AMD's Radeon HD 6990 CrossFireX Quad-GPU? We will find out if these "if-money-didn't-matter dream video card setups" will deliver the gameplay experience we all expect.
 
Wow... Just wow! Not to nitpick, but whenever Nvidia decides to launch the 'new' GTX590 (hopefully this one will have 3GB per GPU), will there be a retest at 5760 or no?
 
Wow. Very surprised at the troubles you had. Especially with the lack of troubles with the triple GPU tests you did. I would have thought mixing cards would give you troubles, not two of the same.
 
I honestly expected to see more issues on the ati side during this test. Great review [H]!
 
What amazed (and scared) me was the headroom the Dual 6990's had in BF:BC2... The fact that there was performance left to go from 25x16 to 57x12 at the same settings! :eek:
 
Chameleoki said:
Wow. Very surprised at the troubles you had. Especially with the lack of troubles with the triple GPU tests you did. I would have thought mixing cards would give you troubles, not two of the same.
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3-Way SLI has generally been fairly solid in my experience. Quad-SLI pretty much always blows for one reason or another. Believe me, I've had plenty of both types of setups.
 
I'm a little bit disappointed to see GTX590s tested instead of 4x GTX580s. I don't know why anyone would ever buy a GTX590, the performance blows, they don't overclock well, just a waste of money unless you absolutely cannot fit 2x discrete video cards.

That said, I understand that testing 4x GTX580s would be cost prohibitive, so it is what it is.

The 6990 is the clear dual-GPU winner this round.
 
Also very surprised at the troubles you had with 4 GPUs.

I'm using a 6990+6970+6970 Quad-GPUs set-up in Eyefinity with 3X30'' LCD, and every games I play are running fine, glitch free.
 
Great article. ATI is just on a roll. I don't expect the 7000 series to be any different.
 
AMD just needs to stop making terrible driver packages and get their OpenCL support out there. Their 6xxx series are definite winners, but their software side is really really lacking.
 
Crest said:
AMD just needs to stop making terrible driver packages and get their OpenCL support out there. Their 6xxx series are definite winners, but their software side is really really lacking.
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huh?

What are you smoking about their driver package? Have you ever use them before? :confused:

If you talking about 2-3 years ago, I agree... But there isn't anything wrong so far beside the mouse lag at top right corner, which can be fix by turning off the mouse shadow.
 
Rizen said:
I'm a little bit disappointed to see GTX590s tested instead of 4x GTX580s. I don't know why anyone would ever buy a GTX590, the performance blows, they don't overclock well, just a waste of money unless you absolutely cannot fit 2x discrete video cards.

That said, I understand that testing 4x GTX580s would be cost prohibitive, so it is what it is.

The 6990 is the clear dual-GPU winner this round.
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You did read the article right? he mentions why they did not use the 580 gtx's LOL
 
Crest said:
AMD just needs to stop making terrible driver packages and get their OpenCL support out there. Their 6xxx series are definite winners, but their software side is really really lacking.
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I think both companies have equally horrible drivers.
 
Rizen said:
I'm a little bit disappointed to see GTX590s tested instead of 4x GTX580s. I don't know why anyone would ever buy a GTX590, the performance blows, they don't overclock well, just a waste of money unless you absolutely cannot fit 2x discrete video cards.

That said, I understand that testing 4x GTX580s would be cost prohibitive, so it is what it is.

The 6990 is the clear dual-GPU winner this round.
Click to expand...

Cheapest 1.5GB 580 at the egg is $509.99. Four of those will push you over $2k and the dual 6990 will run ~$1400. I it will depend where your price/performance threshold is.
 
Thanks for a good review to start off my Thursday. The 6990 really looks to have been done right; also this test was done running with the BIOS switch in the default mode, so there is an easy (albeit small) performance boost on top of these results. Although with BC2 I'm not sure what else you want to do at that point. Run some porn videos in the in-game browser at the same time and still get 60 FPS with Vsync? :D
 
DASHlT said:
You did read the article right? he mentions why they did not use the 580 gtx's LOL
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I skimmed most of it and looked at the graphs TBH because of the problems that they encountered. It's an interesting read none-the-less.

I just feel that if you are going to go balls to the wall and money isn't a concern...

What if money wasn't a concern? What if you wanted to plop down all the cash that is required to own the best possible performing video card configuration for gaming with no tweaking? There would only be two options right now that would give you the best possible performance, and that is a Quad-GPU configuration from NVIDIA or AMD...
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than the obvious solution from NVIDIA would be discrete 580s. I don't say this as an NVIDIA fan boy or anything, I just think the 590 is a terrible video card and I can't see anyone who can afford to spend $1500+ on GPUs owning one.
 
jarman said:
Cheapest 1.5GB 580 at the egg is $509.99. Four of those will push you over $2k and the dual 6990 will run ~$1400. I it will depend where your price/performance threshold is.
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Let's be real here, if you are buying a Quad GPU configuration you've already thrown price:performance arguments right out the window.
 
I am pretty surprised nobody has compared running 2 or 4 Nvidia 560's compared to these and see how it scales out. It is a much cheaper card, and some of them, you can find have 2GB of ram on board.
 
hasoos said:
I am pretty surprised nobody has compared running 2 or 4 Nvidia 560's compared to these and see how it scales out. It is a much cheaper card, and some of them, you can find have 2GB of ram on board.
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The GeForce 560Ti's only have a single SLi connector. You can not run 3-Way or 4-Way SLi configurations using those cards.
 
Both are impressive setups. It is easy to see where the 1.5GB of vRAM is hurting the GTX 590's though. Great review as always!
 
shansoft said:
huh?

What are you smoking about their driver package? Have you ever use them before? :confused:

If you talking about 2-3 years ago, I agree... But there isn't anything wrong so far beside the mouse lag at top right corner, which can be fix by turning off the mouse shadow.
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seriously, I hear this all the time from people who have NV cards. I've had problems on both sides, though more issues with NV lately than ATI. To pick a card based on a pre-conveived notion of how their driver packages are is absurd.

Very interesting review. Like others, I'm surprised at how many issues you guys had, but the performance when it worked must have been awesome... now where did I leave my spare $1500....
 
Kyle, had the bios switch been flipped, what do you believe the difference in the 6990's frame rate and power consumption would be? All things considered I doubt it would go much more than 3-4% do to scaling issues but would still consume at least 100-125 watts more power.

For the umpteenth +1 iteration of this ultra high-end graphics test, will you be running overclocked doubled dual GPU tests after Nvidia finishes revising the 590 to be more stable when overclocked?

To Jarman: You do realize that (shameless plug) the [H]'s front page clearly links to a deal going on at the 'egg where Galaxy 580's can be had for a penny under $430 after rebate; so it's only a "mere" $1,720 to get quad 580 power.
 
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Wow, excellent article, and amazing results. I love the thorough job you guys at [H] do and I enjoy the fact that you have such open communication to both the red and green side (is this terminology defunct now, now that they are both technically green? lol ).
At any rate, I am incredibly jealous of anyone packing this kind of firepower, be it 590's or 6990's.
GJ AMD anyway, really made some excellent cards/decisions with the 5xxx and now 6xxx series.
 
Very nice review. These might be cards for a “dream setup” today, but once there is a single GPU card that matches the performance of the 6990, people will start dumping their 6990s like crazy. I didn’t buy my 4870x2 cards when they were new and overpriced, but rather, right when the 5870 came out when I could get both 4870x2 cards for less than a single 5870 was going for at the time. It was an incredible bargain that continues to give me amazing performance to this day.

Similarly, I look forward to picking up a pair of 6990’s in a year or two :)
 
Rizen said:
I'm a little bit disappointed to see GTX590s tested instead of 4x GTX580s. I don't know why anyone would ever buy a GTX590, the performance blows, they don't overclock well, just a waste of money unless you absolutely cannot fit 2x discrete video cards.

That said, I understand that testing 4x GTX580s would be cost prohibitive, so it is what it is.

The 6990 is the clear dual-GPU winner this round.
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This comparison we made is logical in every way possible. 2x 590 vs. 2x 6990 is:
A) Price comparable (the most important)
B) Same number of GPUs comparable (4 GPUs) and
C) Same number of cards comparable (2 cards) and
D) The fastest single dual GPU card from NVIDIA vs. The fastest single dual GPU card from AMD comparable.

In every way, this adds up to a logical and 'right' comparison.
 
chanchan said:
*hugs his AMD products*
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I actually imagined some person cuddling AMD hardware in their hands. :p


I believe it is pointless to be crying about not using 580 GTXs. The 590 and 6990 are in direct competition and if you read the article they're working on a 6970 3/4 CFX versus 580 3/4 SLI that is for another article.
 
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Brent_Justice said:
This comparison we made is logical in every way possible. 2x 590 vs. 2x 6990 is:
A) Price comparable (the most important)
B) Same number of GPUs comparable (4 GPUs) and
C) Same number of cards comparable (2 cards) and
D) The fastest single dual GPU card from NVIDIA vs. The fastest single dual GPU card from AMD comparable.

In every way, this adds up to a logical and 'right' comparison.
Click to expand...

I couldn't agree more. An "absolute fastest setup money can buy" and "best high end bang for your buck setup" are totally different than the apples to apples test conducted here. 3-Way / 4-Way SLI GeForce GTX 580 3GB cards are probably the fastest setup on Earth right now. But that doesn't match up with what AMD is offering in a number of areas. Money, number of cards, etc.
 
i like the fact that you used an 1155 system.

what i really want to know is how much fun is it to have that much power in front of you?
 
Brent_Justice said:
This comparison we made is logical in every way possible. 2x 590 vs. 2x 6990 is:
A) Price comparable (the most important)
B) Same number of GPUs comparable (4 GPUs) and
C) Same number of cards comparable (2 cards) and
D) The fastest single dual GPU card from NVIDIA vs. The fastest single dual GPU card from AMD comparable.

In every way, this adds up to a logical and 'right' comparison.
Click to expand...
No, I agree, your comparison between the two cards makes the most logical sense, so I know why you did it the way you did. I didn't mean to criticize or imply that your article sucks, so I am sorry if it came off that way as that was not my intent.

However, if money was truly no object and someone really wanted the fastest system possible, I just can't see the 590 as being something they would settle on, as it's such a compromised product.
 
At first I was surprised, then I realized ya'll were using 2 590s not 4-580s. I'm actually surprised 2x-590s held up that well considering how neutered they are.
 
Rizen said:
I skimmed most of it and looked at the graphs TBH because of the problems that they encountered. It's an interesting read none-the-less.

I just feel that if you are going to go balls to the wall and money isn't a concern...



than the obvious solution from NVIDIA would be discrete 580s. I don't say this as an NVIDIA fan boy or anything, I just think the 590 is a terrible video card and I can't see anyone who can afford to spend $1500+ on GPUs owning one.
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and yet they would still run into the 1.5GB memory limitation, so why bother forking over 2 grand to pretty much show the same results with 1400 dollars worth of gtx 590's. honestly the only other option for tri/quad-sli is using the GTX 580 3GB's which they mentioned in the conclusion that it is something they want to test if they can get a hold of 3 or 4 of the cards.
 
So is this 1155 system going to be the main gaming test rig for a while or was this just for the current review?
 
Omegas said:
So is this 1155 system going to be the main gaming test rig for a while or was this just for the current review?
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yeah i believe they talked about it in the tri-sli/fire review that the 1155 system will be the test system from here on out..
 
Teenyman45 said:
To Jarman: You do realize that (shameless plug) the [H]'s front page clearly links to a deal going on at the 'egg where Galaxy 580's can be had for a penny under $430 after rebate; so it's only a "mere" $1,720 to get quad 580 power.
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Nevermind... Damn "See the price in your cart" BS! :mad:
 
4x gtx 580s with 3GB of ram will probably be the fastest on the block...

GREAT review guys thanks!
 
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