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Change to mATX Crossfire Build

E

exlink

Supreme [H]ardness
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I recently bought 2 Sapphire Radeon HD 5870 Eyefinity 6 2GB cards off of Newegg's Shellshocker deal. I have an Antec P180 Mini and P8P67-M Pro mATX build that I put the 2 cards with. The problem is, the cards run hot and loud because they're literally sandwiched together which also does not allow me to overclock them for more performance. So I have two options I was looking at to solve this problem:

Option 1:
Sell the 2 HD 5870 2GB Eyefinity6 graphics cards for roughly $425 for minimal loss.
Purchase HD 6990 4GB graphics card for roughly $730.
Total Cost: ~$300.00
Pros: Easier to make the switch and increased performance. Get to stay with my beloved P180 Mini.
Cons: Will cost about $200 more than option 2.

Option 2:
Sell Antec P180 Mini (if possible) for roughly $70.
Sell Asus P8P67-M Pro for $125.
Purchase Cooler Master CM 690 II for $80.
Purchase Gigabyte GA-P67A-UD4-B3 for $190.
Total Cost: ~$70-$140 depending on if case sells or not.
Pros: $200 or so cheaper
Cons: Slower than if upgraded to HD 6990 4GB. Bigger hassle to sell everything and put everything back together.

I'm going to be buying a new PSU regardless (850HX) so I didn't factor that into either one of the prices.

I generally only play Bad Company 2 and Battlefield 3 in the near future at 4320x900 Eyefinity resolution (basically 2560x1600). I do play Crysis and Metro 2033 from time to time as well.

Just need some advice on which you guys think would be a better upgrade choice.
 
It really depends on how much you love your Mini P180 case. Both options are sound decisions.

If I were in your shoes, I'd personally would've gone with Option 1. But that's because I prefer sticking with the mATX platform.
 
Tough choice. Ideally, if you are seriously wanting to run dual graphics ATX is always a easier build simply because those mobos have better space between the PCI-E slots. With mATX its harder to do CF or SLI because the mobos are smaller and have their PCI-E slots closer together. I guess it comes down to how bad you want to keep your beloved P180 Mini. Sometimes its easier to throw more money at a problem to solve it. Sometimes it not.
 
Just looking at case quality and cooling factor;

I went from a matx case (CM elite 341, shitty budget case) to a CM 690 II advanced and all my temps dropped quite a bit, the case is excellent for air cooling with alot of features. You wont be disappointed if you choose to go with option 2 for case/cooling. I only had a 6870 but with the old case things were cramped and hot.
 
Just looking at case quality and cooling factor;

I went from a matx case (CM elite 341, shitty budget case) to a CM 690 II advanced and all my temps dropped quite a bit, the case is excellent for air cooling with alot of features. You wont be disappointed if you choose to go with option 2 for case/cooling. I only had a 6870 but with the old case things were cramped and hot.
 
The Mini P180 is a good choice in terms of cooling capabilities, especially for a microATX case.

But the OP needs to decide whether he feels that it's enough for the HD 6990.

And from personal experience, the CM Elite 341 isn't shitty, as it's one of the few mATX cases that support more than two 120mm fans.
 
tiraides said:
The Mini P180 is a good choice in terms of cooling capabilities, especially for a microATX case.

But the OP needs to decide whether he feels that it's enough for the HD 6990.

And from personal experience, the CM Elite 341 isn't shitty, as it's one of the few mATX cases that support more than two 120mm fans.
Click to expand...

The P180 Mini should be more than enough to properly cool a HD 6990. The only reason that it doesn't work too well with dual cards (not the same as dual GPU) is that the cards don't really have any where to pull in cool air from (especially the top card). They're literally sandwiched on top of each other so a single card dual GPU solution like the HD 6990 would be no problem.
 
Big question time: Are you more willing to part with the case or the video card?
 
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