Eyefinity+crossfire setup - best advice

[anubis44]

Hi all out there on the HardOCP forums. I was just hoping for a little eyefinity/crossfire advice from some of you out there who may have experience with what I'm looking to do.

(I know there's a couple of other threads on here about eyefinity, but they're either older or they focus on one specific issue, eg. why doesn't this exact displayport-DVI connector work? Etc.

So here's my proposed setup: I'm about to pick up a third 22" 1680x1050 DVI monitor (I've already got a Samsung SyncMaster 2232BW and an LG Flatron W2242TQ) so I've decided to get a 2nd LG Flatron W2242TQ because it will match the I've already got (I'm going to put the 2 LG monitors on the right and left sides and the Samsung in the middle). I know that if I go with a third DVI monitor, I'll need an active displayport to DVI adapter (like this) but I'd rather spend only $165 to get the 2nd matching LG monitor, and cough up the $30 for the DP adapter. Does this make sense to you?

Second question is probably more pressing and hard to answer. I keep hearing conflicting reports about crossfire working/not working properly with eyefinity. From what I have read (have read quite a lot at this point) it is better to get the fastest single video card you can afford, preferably with 2Gb video ram, rather than two cheaper ones with only 1Gb video ram. That's too bad, as I was kind of drooling over the re-released 5850 Xtreme from Sapphire for $150 each. At that price, I could probably spring for two of them at once. However, I need advice on whether the 5000-series cards crossfire well enough with the latest AMD drivers to consider doing this (forget the lower tessellation performance-I'm aware of that).

So in the end, I'm asking what's the best video card setup for <$300 (possible to spend another $300 in the future for second 6950 2Gb) for a system running three 1680x1050 monitors powered by an overclocked AMD Phenom II (dual core 550BE with 4 cores running at 3.6GHz), 4Gigs of ram, a Gigabyte GA-MA790XT-UDP4 motherboard, a Corsair 750TX power supply? I'm leaning heavily towards AMD video cards because I could power three monitors with only one card, and NVidia can't do that. Perhaps HardOCP could even do an article with a complete run-through for all the video card options with a 3x1 eyefinity gaming setup.

All advice/anecdotes about your experiences are much appreciated!

 

[FLCLimax]

crossfire works with eyefinity. it had issues when the 5K series first came out, but it was quickly resolved.

i would go with a 6970 or 6950 for now.

 

[NorthernEurope]

this[/URL]) but I'd rather spend only $165 to get the 2nd matching LG monitor, and cough up the $30 for the DP adapter. Does this make sense to you?

...snip

I don't know anything about either eyefinity or Eyfinity/Cf, but I do know at up to and including 19x12, you only need a passive dp-->Dvi adapter. Should cost about $20?

There is a thread here somewhere about the subject, so I recomend you find it and can read more about it there.

Good luck with your buy, and to my knowledge,(not first hand) the cf/eyefinity issues were solve before the release of the 6xxx series, but as with both SLi and Cf, you can get issues sometimes regardless.

You could always try to pm or post to those with insane tri- and quad cf setups on the forums, there are a few active threads here right now.

 

[der_jackal]

I don't know anything about either eyefinity or Eyfinity/Cf, but I do know at up to and including 19x12, you only need a passive dp-->Dvi adapter. Should cost about $20?

I don't know where this contiues to come from, but that's wholly not true. It is required that you have an active adapter unless you are running a native DP monitor in the chain. The cards only have two clock generators on them and each DVI port takes one where as DP does not require a TMDS. If the DP adapter is not active, it is treated as a legacy (read - native) connection and a clock is assigned to it, regardless of the resolution the monitors are running at.

You cannot spawn three legacy connections from one card unless there is an active conversion from DP to that connection so the display head will see it as a DP.

From ATI/AMDs' own page;

http://support.amd.com/us/eyefinity/Pages/eyefinity-dongles.aspx

- A maximum of 2 legacy monitors (VGA, DVI or HDMI) can be enabled simultaneously, provided that each monitor is connected either directly or via a “passive” DisplayPort™ adapter/dongle. “Passive” adapters/dongles will NOT support more than 2 legacy monitors.

- To enable support for more than 2 monitors, “active” DisplayPort™ adapters/dongles are required (or monitors with direct DisplayPort).

mDP or DP to DVI / HDMI dongles that are in the 20 dollar range are almost all active.

 

[anubis44]

Thanks for all the replies so far. Some good info in there, but I'm still looking for some more info.

I guess I should have shortened my original post to be more clear.

My questions are:

1) Do I need 2Gb video cards to drive 3x1680x1050 (5040x1050) monitors in eyefinity properly, or will 1Gb video cards do fine?
2) Will crossfire scale properly driving a 3x1 eyefinity setup (i.e. as well as crossfire runs on single monitor)
3) Given the answers to questions 1 & 2, what would be the best solution for somebody who can spend no more than $300 on the video card(s) right now - to crossfire two cheaper cards (like 2x6850 or 2xGTX460 1Gb) or go with one 6950 reference that can unlock to 6970 specs, and grab another 6950 later and crossfire.

Thanks!

 

[der_jackal]

Thanks for all the replies so far. Some good info in there, but I'm still looking for some more info.

I guess I should have shortened my original post to be more clear.

My questions are:

1) Do I need 2Gb video cards to drive 3x1680x1050 (5040x1050) monitors in eyefinity properly, or will 1Gb video cards do fine?

1GB is borderline, but at those resolutions, with "eyecandy" (AA / AF) turned down, you should be fine.

2) Will crossfire scale properly driving a 3x1 eyefinity setup (i.e. as well as crossfire runs on single monitor)

Crossfire scaling is more about the application profile for the game than much of anything else. If the game has a solid Crossfire Application Profile (CAP), and does good multiscreen resolution rendering, you'll see good performance. But you still have to remember you are rendering frames that are 3x as wide as a single monitor.

3) Given the answers to questions 1 & 2, what would be the best solution for somebody who can spend no more than $300 on the video card(s) right now - to crossfire two cheaper cards (like 2x6850 or 2xGTX460 1Gb) or go with one 6950 reference that can unlock to 6970 specs, and grab another 6950 later and crossfire.

Thanks!

Personally, I like buying a 2GB 6950 and unlocking. IMO it would be a better first step. You can get pretty good balance in Eyefinity performance with that card.

 

[Matrices]

Issues were not "quickly resolved" - they were never resolved. Avoid AMD 5xxx for Eyefinity+CF at all costs.

 

[-Sn1PeR-]

1GB is fine so long as you are ok with 4x AA or less in most games. Once you jump to 8x you will probably run out of vram.

 

[anubis44]

Hey thanks for all the replies. I really appreciate the advice.

So I've decided to go with a 2Gb 6950. Now the only issue is whether to go with a reference card, like an XFX for about $260, or a nicely cooled MSI R6950 TwinFrozer III for about $290.

The reference card will likely unlock to a 6970, but will run hoter and make more noise (although it will vent more hot air out of the case), and the MSI has the better heat-sink and will run quieter, but won't unlock.

Decisions, decisions!

 

[Spree]

Issues were not "quickly resolved" - they were never resolved. Avoid AMD 5xxx for Eyefinity+CF at all costs.

Agree with this completely. My experience with 5XXX and 6XXX series in crossfire with eyefinity has been a complete nightmare. From what I've read there are many that don't report any issues but there are also many who report issues particularly with stuttering.

OP - good choice going with a single 6950 2Gb. The card runs 5760x1200 and 6048x1080 very well in my experience. Some of the games I play (dirt 2, nfs shift) can be maxed out with AA enabled! It also runs BC2 all high (HBAO off) quite well too.

Make sure you do your research before pulling the trigger on a non reference card. I recently purchased an Asus 6950 direct cu 2 card (has a mean 3 slot cooler). However because it is non reference I can't increase the voltage with MSI Afterburner (best ocing app imo). I can only use Asus Smartdoctor which is useless as it doesn't save voltage settings on reboot.

Not sure if the MSI TwinFrozer will have similar issues but it will pay to check that out if you plan to go for a decent overclock.

 

[Michael Turbo]

5800 series was problematic for Xfire / Eyefinity.6900 series is absolutely not. Triple 6970/6950 is the sweet spot for fluditiy, frame-rates & image quality.