4850 crossfire or 4890

[trance247]

i have 4850 i bought really cheap and about to build amd rig (kuma 2.8, 4gb 1066) ill be gaming at 1920 x 1080 so should i grab crossfire mobo and add another 4850 or resell mine and get one 4890 instead with option of adding another one in the future or is this overkill?

 

[Jacen]

at that resolution you probably don't need more card than a 4850 unless you like to run everything maxed. At that processor speed as well, another card or a 4890 may be a bit much.

 

[Insomniator]

4890 unless that 4850 you have happens to be a 1GB variant.

 

[way2fast91]

Check out the specs in my sig, basically same cpu/mem you are contemplating. I am able to game at 1080p/max in L4D and Oblivion, and play Fallout 3 at High settings with an overclocked 4830 512 mb. I will admit though, I am getting the itch to pickup a 4890 myself with some to be found under $200. I'm sure when the next game comes out that I want, I will need more than the 4830 provides.

 

[Sylvanas]

If you have a 4850 1GB then it would be worth Xfiring it with another, but if not, resell it and get a single 4890.

 

[BFG10K]

Single 4890.

 

[bigsnyder]

I would love to see some comparative benches. Thinking about selling my HD4850 crossfire setup for a single 4890.

 

[Fox5]

Crossfire 4850 should beat a 4890 in most things...
But the things it doesn't are probably the ones that will have the worst performance. More so from a lack of VRAM than a lack of gpu or memory performacne though, the performance diff between a 1GB card and not is pretty big in games that can use over 512MB of vram, and crossfire only makes the situation worse since both cards are fighting for system/pci express bandwidth.

That said, if I already owned a 4850, I'd go for a 2nd one rather than the hassle of selling one and spending 2.5x what I sold it for to buy a 4890 when a 4850 could be had for another ~$100-$120.