Question Regarding Micro-Stutter

mhenley

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jul 21, 2001
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I have always used a single card for all my gaming needs, and until now have always leaned heavily towards single GPU cards. I have read that SLI and Crossfire does cause micro-stutter which the keen eye can detect, and after looking at some videos I believe that I will continue to shy away from them. I am, however, willing to entertain multi-GPU cards.

My question: For the purposes of this question I'm going to pick a 6950. Since it's two GPUs on a single card, do the issues regarding micro-stutter still exist or is that moot because there is no external bridge. Will games that don't benefit from Crossfire benefit from a multi-GPU card or not?
 
A 6950 is not a two GPUs on a single card.

If there is no support for it, it will be the same as running a game in a xfire setup without support.

Micro-stutter is one of those things you won't be able to find a consensus on either way.
 
A 6950 is a single GPU card.

AMD currently only has two multi GPU cards:

6870x2 is 2 6870 GPUs on a single PCB.
6990 is 2 6970 GPUs on a single PCB, clocked slightly lower than a standard 6970.

In terms of Crossfire issues, basically these cards ARE connected by onboard crossfire bridge. Any micro-stuttering issues will also be present on these cards, just as they would be present on 2 separate cards connected by Crossfire. In addition, if games are not yet optimized for CF then you will not have terrific success with these cards.

Personally I haven't really noticed micro-stuttering on my CF setup, but you may.
 
Ahh, thank you for clearing up my confusion and answering the question. I thought all 69xx were dual GPU. Thanks again!
 
Why not just wait for 7xxx series and get a faster single GPU card? They should be on the market within the next 2 months or so.
 
-in BC2 I get strange slowdowns on certain maps looking at certain parts of the terrain. I can't explain why

-in TF2 depending on the image quality settings, I'll get stuttering, it'll be 250fps for 3-5s, then drop to 20fps for ~1s then go back up to 250fps for 3-5s. Also, like in bc2, occasionally, when I look at the sky I'll get slowdowns, can't explain why.

Neither of these are "microstutter", but something I feel worth mentioning.
 
Are you running most up to date drivers and Catalyst Application Profiles?
 
-in BC2 I get strange slowdowns on certain maps looking at certain parts of the terrain. I can't explain why

-in TF2 depending on the image quality settings, I'll get stuttering, it'll be 250fps for 3-5s, then drop to 20fps for ~1s then go back up to 250fps for 3-5s. Also, like in bc2, occasionally, when I look at the sky I'll get slowdowns, can't explain why.

Neither of these are "microstutter", but something I feel worth mentioning.


That is "ghost lag" my friend. It happens with ATi and nVidia. Probably a memory leak. Try disabling indexing and turning off the eye candy of your OS. See what happens. Maybe even try a clean boot. I was able to get rid of it one time a few years ago. (haven't seen it since)


This is an old, old, old website...but give it a try. http://www.blackviper.com/
 
I personally would rather run a conventional SLI setup, multi gpu cards have way more issues. Right now anyways, drivers still need to be evolved.
 
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