7850 CF vs 680 (or something else)

[shockre]

Hello!
I have MSI R7850OC now, it's a good card for the money, but I want MOAR power now so I was thinking about buying another one for CrossFire.
But then again, I can sell this one and buy 680.
I game on a single 1080p monitor and that won't change anytime soon (like when 1440p 27" get about $500-600 here).
680 option is about $90 more then 7850 CF. I won't be adding one more 680 later, that's for sure. Cooling in case is done good. Don't care about looks.
Never had CrossFire before so I don't know what to expect from it, was reading about some stuttering issues but didn't really get it whats the deal with it. All I want for now is to run Battlefield 3 on Ultra silky smooth.

What do you think?

btw if I would get the 680, I would wait for non-reference models with better cooling.

Thanks!

 

[hammerforged]

Go to a single 680. Crossfire is not worth the hassle. I'll be going back to a single GPU once something more powerful comes out. I havent had many issues with my xfire setup but there are issues none the less and having 900+ tide up in video cards you expect them to work every time all the time but that is not the case at all.

 

[MavericK]

Personally I would go for the 680, since even with another 7850, and assuming 90-100% scaling, you're not going to see much performance over a single 680.

 

[shockre]

Go to a single 680. Crossfire is not worth the hassle. I'll be going back to a single GPU once something more powerful comes out. I havent had many issues with my xfire setup but there are issues none the less and having 900+ tide up in video cards you expect them to work every time all the time but that is not the case at all.

what exactly were/are the issues? and do/have you experience that micro stuttering?

btw thanks for the reply guys!

 

[hammerforged]

Some of the issues I've had were with Alan Wake loading but freezing as soon as I try to play it and right now I am having some issues with both of my cards running at the same speeds. I did have some micro stuttering with the very first drivers but that is all gone now. Everyones setups work differently and some people will have no issue at all where other may have issues with every driver update. BF3 has always run amazingly though. Like MavericK96 said though even if you are getting 90-100 gpu usage/scaling in xfire its going to put you very close to a 680 in games I would think. Cant find any benchmarks.

You have already spent the money on 1 7850 so I can see how it would be temping to get another. Crossfire is great when it works and a pain when it doesnt ha. If you can sell your 7850 for a good price and not take a big loss on it then Id say do it. But if you cant sell it just pick up another and work around some of the issues.

 

[cageymaru]

Here's a thread about a nice 2560X1440 monitor that you would probably like to go with the 2nd 7850 or 680. It is $325. If I wasn't addicted to 120Hz monitors I'd get one.

 

[ZoNe]

Not a fan a dual cards but it's always a better value due to nature of video cards diminishing returns as you increase in price. Any set of $250 cards beat any $500 card.

However there are issues. Power, noise, driver issues, micro stutter you may want to look into.

 

[Final8ty]

Go to a single 680. Crossfire is not worth the hassle. I'll be going back to a single GPU once something more powerful comes out. I havent had many issues with my xfire setup but there are issues none the less and having 900+ tide up in video cards you expect them to work every time all the time but that is not the case at all.

Whether its worth it or not is down to the individual as the same can be said about the hassle side of PC gaming in comparison to Consoles and the same reasons apply as to why we choose to PC game in spite of the potential added hassle.
But if a single card is available to do the job then its the most sensible option as its still less hassle.