Thinking of giving crossfire another go....

[jhatfie]

I am currently gaming on my OC'd 7950. Purchased it shortly after launch and have loved it. However, I game on a 2560x1600 monitor so there are times that I do wish I had some more power as I enjoy and prefer max detail and AA, so I have been debating giving crossfire another try since it looks like it will be November at best for any new non specialty gpu's to come out.

I had 6870's in crossfire and was impressed at times and annoyed at others when there was heavy stuttering. Also had 6950's in crossfire and was overall very pleased outside the heat that they generated, but performance overall was great. So I would say say my experience has been mixed overall, but enough good that I would consider testing the waters a third time.

I currently have been sitting on a $100 NewEgg gift card for many months and I do not want to spend a ton. So I figure I have 3 viable options.

1) Keep my current 7950 and just turn down settings as needed and save the GC for another day.
2) Pick up another 7950, sell the bundled games and use my gift card to offset costs. Total out of pocket around $120-ish.
3) Sell my 7950 and pick up two Sapphire 7870 XT's or PowerColor 7870 Myst's, sell 2 sets of bundled games, use gift card. Total out of pocket $40-ish.

What do you guys think?

 

[Cowboy420]

If you don't care about eye candy, just turn the damn settings down. C'mon man, make a grown up decision.

 

[EquaLiZr]

Grab another 7950 and oc them

 

[MrC4]

I would not downgrade to the 7870s because if you dislike crossfire, your stuck with a single card below your current performance. Add another 7950 and if crossfire gives you problems, sell the card and games and you should break even on the transaction.

 

[raghu78]

OP a HD 7950 overclocked to 1.15 - 1.2 ghz can handle most games at 2560 x 1600 at max settings with MSAA 2x or MSAA off. whats the clocks on your HD 7950 ? just run at lower AA and enjoy the performance. if you want to go CF wait till the new memory manager driver from AMD is released. look at the quality of CF driver support in the latest titles like Crysis 3, Bioshock Infinite and Tomb raider and then decide. incidentally these are GAMING EVOLVED titles. if AMD does not have robust CF driver support then its well understood that sticking with single GPU is the best option.

 

[jhatfie]

OP a HD 7950 overclocked to 1.15 - 1.2 ghz can handle most games at 2560 x 1600 at max settings with MSAA 2x or MSAA off. whats the clocks on your HD 7950 ? just run at lower AA and enjoy the performance. if you want to go CF wait till the new memory manager driver from AMD is released. look at the quality of CF driver support in the latest titles like Crysis 3, Bioshock Infinite and Tomb raider and then decide. incidentally these are GAMING EVOLVED titles. if AMD does not have robust CF driver support then its well understood that sticking with single GPU is the best option.

Running my 7950 at 1150/7000 @ 1.17v these days. I think you are right though, I can wait for now. Most games the 7950 cruises through, there are just a couple games that really tax the card at max detail, but the frame rates are still playable. I'll review again once Crysis 3 and the next batch of games are released. Go from there.