AMD CrossFire Vs. Nvidia SLI Scaling Analysis
Table of contents
- 1. It’s That Time Again
- 2. Test System And Benchmarks
- 3. Benchmark Results: Crysis
- 4. Benchmark Results: Just Cause 2
- 5. Benchmark Results: Far Cry 2
We’ve seen impressive performance from Nvidia's GeForce GTX 460 when it's matched up with a second card in SLI mode. But how does the entire high-end GeForce GTX 400 line compare to Radeon HD 5000-series cards? We test them all in several popular games.
The new GeForce GTX 460 made us sit up and take notice, particularly when we paired them up in a dual-card SLI configuration. As our own Thomas Soderstrom showed, two GeForce GTX 460s in SLI can even outperform Nvidia's GeForce GTX 480 flagship.
Nvidia recently began a bit of a price war with AMD. Retail prices for graphics cards like the GeForce GTX 470 and 480 are plummeting, bringing the fight to AMD’s doorstep. GeForce GTX 470s are selling for as little as $279; GeForce GTX 480s are going for $450 on Newegg.
With a one-year head start and plenty of margin in its pocket, AMD isn't too proud to engage in a bit of a brawl. Radeon HD 5850s are $260 all day long on Newegg, and rebates are taking these cards as low as $210.
This news forces us to challenge preconceived notions of relative value. It lets us know that it’s time for a thorough Radeon HD 5000- vs. GeForce GTX 400-series performance analysis. Today we're testing the Radeon HD 5830, 5850, and 5870, along with the GeForce GTX 460, 470, and 480 to provide a thorough understanding of how these cards perform relative to one another in both single- and dual-card configurations.
There’s not much else to say. Let’s get ready to rumble!
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Really good article. But why 10.7 Beta on the Radeons?
Where is the 5970?
Where is the 5970?
++
The 5970 should have been crossfired as well!
Why there is always someone not happy with the articles, it has not been based on the best cards of the world, this is a SLI and Xfire test with powerfull cards.
Seems to be the fashion nowdays damian, if it doesnt agree the their opinion/hardware identically they will rant and shoot people down in flames, fanboismuch? ^^
What they seem to miss is that these are all single chip cards, and the 5970 is a dual chip (effectively allready crossfired card) ...so i guess they either dont get what hardware they are using, or are ranting due to feeling "left out" ... poor things *gets a mini violin for them*
Good article, allthough a little late for me as i won't purchase another card for some time yet.
Would have been nice to see the 280 sli and the 4890 crossfire, just to see the improvements.
Good reads tho.
Just a question about page 4:
"At 2560x1600, the GeForce cards in SLI fare a little better. It may be the extra video RAM on the GeForce GTX 470 and GeForce GTX 480 that is helping out here." Please explain to me how the GTX 470 is being helped when it is outperformed by the HD 5850 in both single and multi-card setups. I think that your wording was incorrect at best or intentionally misleading at worst.
It's like watching a football referee making an obviously bad call that leaves you scratching your head.
Just a question about page 4:"At 2560x1600, the GeForce cards in SLI fare a little better. It may be the extra video RAM on the GeForce GTX 470 and GeForce GTX 480 that is helping out here." Please explain to me how the GTX 470 is being helped when it is outperformed by the HD 5850 in both single and multi-card setups. I think that your wording was incorrect at best or intentionally misleading at worst.It's like watching a football referee making an obviously bad call that leaves you scratching your head.
I think it's that both the 470 sli & 480 sli were getting outperformed by a 5-6% margin at 1920x1080, then that margin dropped to 1.5% for the 470 to the 5850, and the 480 overtook the 5870 at 2560x1600.
You would expect a card that is faster at a lower resolution to still be faster at a higher resolution, well the 5850 was but it's lead had dropped significantly.
The author is attempting to explain why this happened, and illustrates this further in later benchmarks where this effect is exagerated even more. In the conclusion he sums up by saying if you're only going to play with a single screen at 1920x1080, this isn't an issue. If you plan to game with triple screen eyefinity or Nvidia surround, you will see that same drop off in performance with ATI as it's 1GB memory becomes a bottleneck in the cards performance when it tries to render 5760x1080.
At David_t
The reason they din't compare the 5970 is because it's a dual GPU. the point of this article is to compare 2 video cards in Sli or Crossfire. When Nvidia launches a dual-gpu card then we'll see some Quad-Sli to quad Crossfire setups, which should be interesting. If they can fix the temperature and high voltage issues. All in all good article
I'd love to see a Quad-SLI vs. Quad-CrossfireX setup. Although you'd have to use a special board for SLI. Personally, I love my Radeon HD 4870 Quad-CrossfireX setup. It's a space heater for the winter and an absolute powerhouse for gaming.
At David_tThe reason they din't compare the 5970 is because it's a dual GPU. the point of this article is to compare 2 video cards in Sli or Crossfire. When Nvidia launches a dual-gpu card then we'll see some Quad-Sli to quad Crossfire setups, which should be interesting. If they can fix the temperature and high voltage issues. All in all good article
Ah that makes sense. Thanks for clearing that up. I hadn't looked at it that way. Being imperfect sucks.
I'm new to this but can someone please explain why I cannot find an AM£ 890FX motherboard that can handle SLI. Seems only Intel bbased boards can handle it so if I want to use AMD Cpu I'm forced to go AMD graphics? Want to build a new desktop using AMD but looks like this will force me to use Intel!