AMD R680 or HD 3870X2 benchmark results leaked on net

[JPB]

3870 X2 spotted in the wild

ATI IS STAKING its high-end reputation on its upcoming 3870 X2 card, which has two R670 chips on a single board. Details have been scarce, but not only has one turned up in a system at CES, but it's been benchmarked too.

The card is absolutely huge-mongous, with two GPUs, two sets of memory, two power connectors and a bridging chip sat between them - not to mention the Crossfire connector sat on the top.

There's 1GB of memory on board, and the GPUs are currently running at 770/2250MHz.

The folks at Hot Hardware have pics of the card from the show floor here, whilst the stripped naked pics and benchmarks are over here at OC Workbench. Tasty

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HD 3870 X2 in the flesh

While making our way through various exhibits at CES, Dave and I got a chance to get hands on time with AMD's upcoming ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 graphics card. As we mentioned in our initial coverage of the ATI Radeon HD 3800 series back in November, the 3870 X2 is a dual-GPU powered card that leverages ATI's CrossFire technology. Here's an up close and personal look at the card...

We can't disclose any specifications just yet, but can say that the 3870 X2 has a pair of R670 GPUs on single PCB coupled together via a PCI Express fanout switch from PLX. Frame Buffer memory configurations are likely to be similar to existing Radeon HD 3870 cards - per GPU - but representatives from ATI informed us that board parters are likely to design cards with up to 2GB frame buffers. As for power and performance, once again, we can't give specifics for now. However, think less power than a 2900 XT with performance on par or better than a Radeon HD 3870 CrossFire configuration.

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AMD R680 or HD 3870X2 benchmark results leaked on net

Benchmark results of AMD upcoming R680 is leaked on the net. Picture of the reference card is also shown at ITOCP website from China. From the photo, we can see 2 GPU cores and it also requires to sets of power connectors. The centre is a PLX chipset, which channels data between the two GPUs.

The GPU Core / Mem of this card is rated at 770/2250. In current Catalyst driver, it is recognised as HD3870. In CCC, it shows that it is operating at PCIE 2.0 x 8. It has a memory of 1GB.

In 3DMARK06 at 2560X1600 , benchmark scored 9573 ((SM2.0: 4494, SM3.0/HDR:4476). Lower resolution benchmark numbers are not mentioned in the original article.

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[dennilfloss]

More pics.

http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1261129

 

[Aberforth]

I'll buy it if it beats 9800GX2, although i'm afraid it won't run that good because most of the games are optimized for Nvidia Geforce cards ('the way it's meant to be played' program).

 

[darkxknight]

thats disappointing.

 

[MegaWorks]

Damn! I just got the HD 3870. :| Oh well I guess CrossFire is the way.

How much?

 

[MegaWorks]

Originally posted by: darkxknight
thats disappointing.

Why?

 

[dennilfloss]

Originally posted by: MegaWorks

Originally posted by: darkxknight
thats disappointing.

Why?

Neither dark nor knightly enough maybe.

 

[Tempered81]

man these guys are talking about skulltrail, and other mobos hold 4x pci-e slots. 4x crossfire 3870x2's = 8 gpu cores

lol
http://www.hardforum.com/showt...d.php?t=1261129&page=5


Anyways, this card is going to be awesome, cant wait to see full benchmarks of this vs. a 9800gx2. the only bench of this so far is that 2560res 3dmark 06 score of 9,600. they said similar systems with an 8800ultra scored 7,400.

 

[Avalon]

Reminds me of the days of the Voodoo 5
Man, I remember when my friend bought a brand new 5500 AGP 64MB a week after it came out. I was so jealous of its badassedness.

 

[Zenoth]

Power Consumption for the win

 

[lavaheadache]

Hopefully this thing runs like 1 big powerful GPU and not like it's 2 seperate GPU's

 

[Borealis7]

Originally posted by: Zenoth
Power Consumption for the win

i believe it is spelled "for teh win".

 

[BFG10K]

It's pretty amazing they claim it'll use less power than a single 2900.

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: BFG10K
It's pretty amazing they claim it'll use less power than a single 2900.

I thought 2900s used enough power to light a small city block?

 

[Zenoth]

My finances are so meager when it comes to PC hardware that if I bought such a thing I'd ultimately have to eat one meal per day instead of three. I'm pretty sure that my electricity bills wouldn't be slimmer, and in the long run it'd cost me arms and legs to keep running. Not to mention the actual product's price to even own it in the first place.

You know I wonder why they make such cards. For what market exactly? Are there enough actual consumers for such a product to justify it's very creation? I mean isn't AMD in financial troubles right now, or if not, then are they not at least having problems lately with their CPU branch? I would believe so, and in such a case why not putting time, resources, money and man power elsewhere?! I just can't figure out why they wouldn't just do something else more productive and, especially, for a larger and better established market. Why making such a card for even the slightest number of over-enthusiasts you can find when you could try to fix the troubled products with the same time/resources/ideas/money, a.k.a the CPU side of it?

Anyone following my reasoning? If not then please explain me why a company in trouble allows itself to just stay in trouble. If not again, then tell me how will that very Dual CPU Core graphics card help in any way shape or form AMD/ATi in their current state.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: Zenoth
You know I wonder why they make such cards. For what market exactly? Are there enough actual consumers for such a product to justify it's very creation?

It's called "conspicuous consumption."

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: BFG10K
It's pretty amazing they claim it'll use less power than a single 2900.

I wonder if this holds true, might replace my 2900XT with one.

Edit - According to Wikipedia, this this has a release date of 28 Jan? Not sure how accurate that is, but give the pictures and benches showing it, it'll probably be around then. I couldn't find any reliable pricing information for the 3870x2 though, does anyone have a good handle on what it will cost?

 

[JPB]

I guess the use of my 790FX motherboard that will be here next week will prove useful then in the coming month or two.

By the way, any clue as to when ATI will move from 16 rops + texture units ?

 

[Pabster]

4X 3870X2's on Skulltrail?

You're going to need a separate 1K power supply just for those. :laugh:

Oh, and liquid nitrogen

 

[Creig]

Originally posted by: Zenoth
...tell me how will that very Dual CPU Core graphics card help in any way shape or form AMD/ATi in their current state.

The hard part is designing/building the core. Putting two cores on one PCB is easy by comparison.

All AMD is trying to do now is to blanket the various cost/performance segments to increase overall sales to recoup as much money as possible from the GPU R&D cost. A single 3870 is no threat to an 8800 Ultra for the high-end video card sales bracket. But a 3870 X2? Definitely!

The cost of designing the 3870 X2 is NOTHING compared to the cost of the GPU design. If the 3870 X2 can outperform an 8800 Ultra and ends up costing the same or less, don't you think it will sell?

This is an easy money-maker for AMD. I wouldn't be at all surprised to find that this PCB was being designed at the same time as the single core 3870. Dual-core boards are nothing new, after all. And with the Crossfire platform maturing, a dual-core video card coming from AMD is hardly unexpected.

 

[JPB]

The way I read it was...you cannot run more than two X2's in Crossfire since there is only one bridge connector. As apposed to the 3870's dual connector.