Crossfire review pops up:

Wow. I hope they get some bugs ironed out. The performance is pretty dismal compared to a single card from the other brand.....

Firing Squad said:
Even going with a best-case scenario where an XPRESS 200 CrossFire motherboard would cost you about $100, you’d still need to buy the second RADEON X800 XL card for another $300, setting you back $400 total. As an alternative, for $400 you could instead invest in a GeForce 7800 GT, which would give good performance, plus the ability to play at widescreen and super hi-res resolutions such as 2048x1536.

That’s right, the rumors you’ve been hearing about CrossFire being limited to 1600x1200 max resolution at a headache-inducing 60Hz are unfortunately true. How ATI’s engineers could have overlooked this limitation when developing CrossFire – a product which doesn’t really shine until you crank up the screen resolutions – is pretty baffling. To add insult to injury, we couldn’t get DOOM 3’s timedemo mode to work properly with CrossFire.
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Hopefully the XI800 will show a tremendous amount of performance over the X850XT in CrossFire. And I hope they get that refresh rate limit fixed.
 
So basically two X850XT in Crossfire is the same speed as a single 7800GTX, except in FEAR where the single 7800GTX is twice as fast. That is gonna be a tough sell.
 
tranCendenZ said:
So basically two X850XT in Crossfire is the same speed as a single 7800GTX, except in FEAR where the single 7800GTX is twice as fast. That is gonna be a tough sell.
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QFT. Too little too late. The thing to watch for: crossfire master cards probably won't sell very well at all, and ATi will have to unload that inventory somehow....so watch for falling prices if you already own a PCIe x800-850 card.

The FEAR benchmarks were screwy though....1 x850 beat crossfire? I didn't put much merit into those numbers.
 
jebo_4jc said:
The FEAR benchmarks were screwy though....1 x850 beat crossfire? I didn't put much merit into those numbers.
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Why not? Crossfire mode probably didn't work with that game, hence you get a lower score from the overhead.
 
Thus is the danager from reading just one review:

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1862932,00.asp

This seems to paint the xfire in a more postive light as did the B3D. Its not saying xfire has some issues to work out. One bummer was to hear how hard the Super AA modes pefromace was impacted (however a fix for that is supposed to be on its way in the next cats). But for the most part its does a pretty good job and does not seem to have the issues that SLI had when it was first launched.

Also given the fact that R520 luanch is with in 10 days, doesn't it make some sense to compare the 850 to the 6800U as they are same gen of cards? However since ATI does not have the R520 out I suppose it the only right to compare high end to high end just keep in mind we will have to come back and vist this issue in 10 days when the R520 ships...
 
Jbirney said:
Also given the fact that R520 luanch is with in 10 days, doesn't it make some sense to compare the 850 to the 6800U
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No, it makes no sense, because a single 7800GT or 7800GTX costs less than two of either of those cards. You compare based on price, not based on architecture.
 
Jbirney said:
Also given the fact that R520 luanch is with in 10 days, doesn't it make some sense to compare the 850 to the 6800U as they are same gen of cards?
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That would be a fair point but timing is the real issue here. How can we make that comparison when the 6800U is already at EOL ? Most owners of a 6800U today are going to buy a next generation part - not another 6800U.

I think ATi launched X850 Crossfire just to keep a promise and as a proof-of-concept. There aren't going to be too many master card sales IMO, with the G70 out and R520 hitting next week.
 
tranCendenZ said:
Why not? Crossfire mode probably didn't work with that game, hence you get a lower score from the overhead.
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That's not the only issue. At 16x12 the 7800GT beat the 7800GTX by 4 fps.
 
Is it me, or did they paper launch this? I found nothing at ATI or Newegg to suggest you can buy a motherboard and mastercard.
 
tranCendenZ said:
No, it makes no sense, because a single 7800GT or 7800GTX costs less than two of either of those cards. You compare based on price, not based on architecture.
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Tran,
your looking at last gen tech in xfire and comparing that to newer tech. While I siad it was a fair comparison, it also is not the be-all end all word of xfire as the R520 is less than 10 days away..wouldn't it make more sense to look at those reviews and then declair a winner???? The 850vrs6800 show us that xfire has some things going for it...again I agreed it does not make much sense today...but tomorrow it may :)
 
Jbirney said:
again I agreed it does not make much sense today...but tomorrow it may :)
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You mean next week....

biggrin.gif
 
PRIME1 said:
Is it me, or did they paper launch this? I found nothing at ATI or Newegg to suggest you can buy a motherboard and mastercard.
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Who cares if it's a paper launch? With these numbers I can't see anyone but the most rabid, e-penis driven ATi fan purchasing a CrossFire set.
 
PRIME1 said:
Is it me, or did they paper launch this? I found nothing at ATI or Newegg to suggest you can buy a motherboard and mastercard.
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You do know Crossfire was launched back in May right?
 
Yeah I'm not exactly sure what was "released" today.....cards to the reveiwers? Big deal.

I've heard Kyle ranting about [H]'s "once we can buy it, we will reveiw it" policy...but I didn't see any commentary about availability of the cards in their review.

http://www.hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1028027270&postcount=28
http://www.hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1028027250&postcount=26
(More in the thread also)

Only thing I saw was their comment about SLI being paper launched 5 months before it was available, too.

I think the whole R4xx Crossfire launch is merely to get the technology out before the R5xx launch.
 
I just don't know what people expect. Both SLi and Crossfire are an expensive gimmick but you can't expect Crossfire to be automatically stable and have the most efficient drivers, look how long SLI has been out and even that isn't totally perfect..
 
trinibwoy said:
You do know Crossfire was launched back in May right?
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That's right, ATi paper-launched Crossfire 4 months ago. Heh, it still says this in the Crossfire FAQ.....

4. When will CrossFire graphics cards be available?

A. Radeon X850 and Radeon X800 CrossFire Edition cards will be available mid-August.
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Ummm, I guess they mean '06. ;)
 
jebo_4jc said:
Yeah I'm not exactly sure what was "released" today.....cards to the reveiwers? Big deal.

I've heard Kyle ranting about [H]'s "once we can buy it, we will reveiw it" policy...but I didn't see any commentary about availability of the cards in their review.

http://www.hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1028027270&postcount=28
http://www.hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1028027250&postcount=26
(More in the thread also)

Only thing I saw was their comment about SLI being paper launched 5 months before it was available, too.

I think the whole R4xx Crossfire launch is merely to get the technology out before the R5xx launch.
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The master cards and mobos are supposed to be in stock at retialers today, thus your suppose to be able to buy them today....and hence the reviews..
 
Jbirney said:
The master cards and mobos are supposed to be in stock at retialers today, thus your suppose to be able to buy them today....and hence the reviews..
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I hope you are right, but I sure don't see any.
 
Jbirney said:
And you have a honestly care to get one??? Or are you fishing to fry ATI :)
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Heh I'm not hoping to get one, no....I don't even have pci-e.

Honestly, I hope they are available simply to reduce the flame war that's bound to happen.
 
jebo_4jc said:
Heh I'm not hoping to get one, no....I don't even have pci-e.

Honestly, I hope they are available simply to reduce the flame war that's bound to happen.
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Ahh ok. I honestly don't think that in its current form xfire is a good opion for most users. I am sure there are some bizzaro cases where it actually might work as I have not thought of every possible combination. But for now a single 7800gt card seems to fit the bill nicely. However xfire did work pretty well for the x800 class (nasty refresh/res limit aside) so with the R520 due out soon, its too early to say if its a dead tech or not..
 
Jbirney said:
Tran,
your looking at last gen tech in xfire and comparing that to newer tech. While I siad it was a fair comparison, it also is not the be-all end all word of xfire as the R520 is less than 10 days away..wouldn't it make more sense to look at those reviews and then declair a winner???? The 850vrs6800 show us that xfire has some things going for it...again I agreed it does not make much sense today...but tomorrow it may :)
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*puts on master of the universe hat*
I proclaim that NO ONE BUY A VIDEO CARD UNTIL THE X1k is RELEASED. If you wanted to buy one today or tomorrow or early next week, you are forbidden from doing so- until we have benches from the X1k generation cards in crossfire.
That will be all :rolleyes:
 
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