Crossfire with internal bridge

[TroubleM]

ATI seems to go the same way as NVIDIA has done from the beginning. They will loose the dongle and go with an internal bridge to connect the two cards. VR-Zone has some very nice pictures of the ATi RV570 & RV560 using that internal bridge.
Link

The pictures aren't very clear, but you can see the 2 bridges linking the cards. I wonder if the upcoming R600 will use the same connection.

 

[josh6079]

Interesting find. Thanks for the info.

 

[beggerking]

I thought they already rolled out a driver to using PCI-e to connect the 2 cards..

 

[Elfear]

Originally posted by: beggerking
I thought they already rolled out a driver to using PCI-e to connect the 2 cards..

For the low-end cards they did but the high-end stuff doesn't work as of yet because of a lack of bandwidth through the PCI-E bus.

I wonder if the two bridges are for extra performance over one bridge or because Nvidia has patented the one bridge connection?

 

[Fraggable]

You have to have the ATI 3200 crossfire chipset to do it at all, and then it only works with the x1300, x1600, and I think maybe the X1800GTO's.

 

[Munky]

It was only a matter of time before they did internal connectors. No one in their right mind would insist that given a totally new gpu to work with, it should keep the dongle from the older cards.

Actually, the most interesting part I got from that article is that the r600 will be on a 65nm process. Hopefully it doesnt cause any issues a la 130nm nv30, but if it's true and everything goes smoothly the r600 should see some stratospheric clockspeeds.

 

[Elfear]

Originally posted by: munky

Actually, the most interesting part I got from that article is that the r600 will be on a 65nm process. Hopefully it doesnt cause any issues a la 130nm nv30, but if it's true and everything goes smoothly the r600 should see some stratospheric clockspeeds.

Noticed that too. From what I've read the first tape out went fine so hopefully there won't be any delays like with R520. With the G80 hitting 500 million transistors, I'd imagine R600 will be somewhere around the same size. Should make for some crazy cards next gen.

 

[LittleNemoNES]

the external dongle is no bother and in fact makes it easier for me to connect my LCD when I need to peep inside my PC...

 

[nullpointerus]

I wonder whether there's an X2800XT2 card in the works?

 

[Ackmed]

The link is several days old, but still interesting. The dongle doesnt bother me at all. Ive seen it once, when I installed the cards months ago. The dongle actaully serves a purpose, its too bad thats lost on too many who just want to complain about it. Even though they have no intention of buying a multi-gpu setup. And as mentioned by gerrson, it actually makes a monitor easier to hook up, that going right to the video card itself.