So who's going to do the Quad 3850/3870s?

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PSYKOMANTIS

[H]ard|Gawd
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I've been waiting for the Spider platform motherboards and for my chance to upgrade from my current dual x1900 platform.
I figure I'm going to step to a Phenom quad core Black (I'm not an intel fan), and that MSI 790FX board.

Who else is going to spend the coin for a quad setup?
I'm curious about how the crossfire 3870s preform.
I could not imagine how a 3way or quad works out considering the impressive scaling we've seen in benchmark reviews.

Sadly to say I'm going to finally going to bench farm my 939 4800+ X2 system for something more powerful.
 
While kind of intriguing, I can't really see myself doing something like this. Call me a single card kind of guy. Crossfire's looking better every day, but I don't think it's quite there yet.
 
Will the RV680 cards also support Quad/Tri Crossfire??
 
If I had the money I'd do quad. But since I already have a 3870 in the future I'll probably do crossfire or tri crossfire.
 
APOLLO said:
Will the RV680 cards also support Quad/Tri Crossfire??
Click to expand...

Yes they will. But not 8x Crossfire like some had hoped for. (2 cards with 2 gpus each max, they each only have 1 bridge connector.)
 
I just built a system and had 2 3870's on order with dell. they kept getting back ordered so I canceled. Gonna wait a few weeks and grab 2 HD3870x2's when they release for some nice quad-fire.
 
I've already got two 3870's, and I'm picking up a Phenom 9500 on sale for $189, and an Asus M3A32-MVP Deluxe to go with it, day after tomorrow.

It'll give me something to play with over the holiday, I'm off until the 7th.

When they flip the switch on CrossfireX next year, I'll grab two Sapphire 512mb 3850's (single slot cards) to go in the bottom two PCIe slots, and clock 'em as high as they can stand. That or find a good single slot solution and pick up a couple more 3870's.

I'm just an Asus fanboi, and that board won't support 4x dual-slot cards.

It's that, or stick with the X38 board and Q6600 B3 I already have, throw out the two 3870's, and add two 3870 X2's. Works out about the same either way, cost wise.
 
Well it's looking like I'm going to do a Phenom setup with quad 3870s.

I'm just waiting for the MSI board to come back into stock and from there my TAX RETURN will pretty much decide the fate of my main gaming machine.

Alot of my friends are saying "GO GO 8800GT" but I've stuck with ATi systems for PERFECT color matched rendered Illustrator and Photoshop creations.

For some reason my Nvidia setups never seem to print out right.
Not to mention ATi Crossfire gaming seems to get better and better every day.
Feel free to call me crazy, but I think that 4 video cards, 4 CPU cores, and 4GB of RAM seems mega sexy to me.

4X4X4 mmmmm
 
I will eventually - going to twin 3870s from twin X1900s in the new year, easiest upgrade option without swapping my board and CPU. When I do the upgrade after that it'll be to a Spider platform, adding another two 3870s.
 
Now here's my condendrum...

I WANT to do QUAD 3870s.

I'm split between doing a tri-3870 card with an intel proc...
(because of the motherboard choices)
Although I've heard rumors that the X38 mobos are junk.

Then I see the Quad 790FX mobos have dual slot X4 design from MSI.
From there I'm faced with a buggy L3 Phenom.
Now don't get me wrong, I don't overclock. I could care less that I get 2-10 FPS less then a Nvidia/intel solution.

From what I'm hearing there's a new group of Phenom cores coming out without this said "BUG" that requires a 10% preformance hit using a software fix.

All in all, I'm probably going to have my quad system about mid Jan for benchmarks (that is hoping ATi releases the unlocked CFX4 spider driver.

It's a hard decision... Goddamnit.
 
PSYKOMANTIS said:
From what I'm hearing there's a new group of Phenom cores coming out without this said "BUG" that requires a 10% preformance hit using a software fix.
Click to expand...
Everything I read indicates that new Phenoms will have the fix incorporated into the architecture, no need for any additional fixes on top of that. These will be the B3 stepping processors but last I heard they were delayed until Q2. It is the current crop of Phenoms that 'require' the fix. Keep in mind, though, unless you are using virtualization software (VMWare) you don't need it. It is required for servers using virtualization. Are you running VMWare??
 
APOLLO said:
Everything I read indicates that new Phenoms will have the fix incorporated into the architecture, no need for any additional fixes on top of that. These will be the B3 stepping processors but last I heard they were delayed until Q2. It is the current crop of Phenoms that 'require' the fix. Keep in mind, though, unless you are using virtualization software (VMWare) you don't need it. It is required for servers using virtualization. Are you running VMWare??
Click to expand...

No I'm not using any VMWare but I've always been curious to exactly what this bug is about.

Thanks for the clarification.
 
PSYKOMANTIS said:
Now here's my condendrum...

I WANT to do QUAD 3870s.

I'm split between doing a tri-3870 card with an intel proc...
(because of the motherboard choices)
Although I've heard rumors that the X38 mobos are junk.

Then I see the Quad 790FX mobos have dual slot X4 design from MSI.
From there I'm faced with a buggy L3 Phenom.
Now don't get me wrong, I don't overclock. I could care less that I get 2-10 FPS less then a Nvidia/intel solution.

From what I'm hearing there's a new group of Phenom cores coming out without this said "BUG" that requires a 10% preformance hit using a software fix.

All in all, I'm probably going to have my quad system about mid Jan for benchmarks (that is hoping ATi releases the unlocked CFX4 spider driver.

It's a hard decision... Goddamnit.
Click to expand...

well your rumours that x38 are junk is false.

but it's pretty well known that phenom/spider is a flop and that's not going to change is it.

i don't know why ppl continue to be anti this or anti that ..get the best product around at the time ..which is intel by a country mile.

amd have never made a killer chipset, and nothing has changed ....4 3870's under spider ..ugh i could think of better things to waste money on.
 
Why would you spend all that money on a set up for video then go around and gimp yourself with the AMD processor?

Not a fanboy but AMD processors are not up to par for the course right now!!
 
JSpecGC8 said:
Why would you spend all that money on a set up for video then go around and gimp yourself with the AMD processor?

Not a fanboy but AMD processors are not up to par for the course right now!!
Click to expand...
The fastest processor from Intel won't net him a huge increase in FPS with most games because they are not CPU limited. A lot has been said about this matter lately. With the current crop of games, one's money is best invested in the highest performing video hardware one can afford. Everything else is secondary.
 
If AMD allows HD2900XT Crossfire owners to slap in two HD3870 to get Quad Xfire then I'll jump on board, If not I will sit out until the R700.
 
If AMD allows HD2900XT Crossfire owners to slap in two HD3870 to get Quad Xfire then I'll jump on board, If not I will sit out until the R700.
__________________
Click to expand...
It should work, since you can Crossfire a 38xx and a 2900 right now.
 
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