HD4890 or Crossfire or....?

[Jbandy10]

I'm building a gaming desktop right now with roughly these specs:

mobo: GIGABYTE GA-EP45-UD3P
cpu: Core 2 Quad 2.83ghz w/ OC.
gpu: ?

I'm going to be buying an HD monitor with either 1680 x 1050 or maybe 1920 x 1080. But I'm leaning more toward 1680x1050.

I'm going to run Crysis/far Cry/COD5/etc on this system. Hopefully on high with some AA.

Now my motherboard supports crossfire, but I'm simply lost on what gpu to get.

I have 3 options as I see it.

1.Buy an HD4870 and later on buy an additional 48** card for CF.

2.Buy an HD4890 and let that get me buy for a year or two before upgrading.

3.Buy an HD4870 + a lesser HD card and use CF.

What would you guys do?

 

[Eureka]

Well, remember when going for CF it generally tries to match both cards, so you'll have 2x the performance of the SLOWER card.

Right now, I'm using a 4890 with 1680x1050 resolution, don't bother with AA. Since you have a stronger processor than mine (AMD x2 3.2ghz) you may be able to pull it off, but not by much. Right now, running it at EITHER High with 2x AA or Ultra High without will give you 20-40 fps (I'd say average around 25 fps).

I'd say... 4890 Crossfire!

 

[Golgatha]

Get two 1GB 4850s and don't look back.

 

[happy medium]

Originally posted by: Jbandy10
I'm building a gaming desktop right now with roughly these specs:

mobo: GIGABYTE GA-EP45-UD3P
cpu: <Core 2 Quad 2.83ghz w/ OC.
gpu: ?

I'm going to be buying an HD monitor with either 1680 x 1050 or maybe 1920 x 1080. <But I'm leaning more toward 1680x1050.

I'm going to run <Crysis/far Cry/COD5/etc on this system. Hopefully on high with some AA.

Now my motherboard supports crossfire, but I'm simply lost on what gpu to get.

I have 3 options as I see it.

1.Buy an HD4870 and later on buy an additional 48** card for CF.

2.Buy an HD4890 and let that get me buy for a year or two before upgrading.

3.Buy an HD4870 + a lesser HD card and use CF.

What would you guys do?

At that resolution (1680x1050) and rather weak cpu speed (2.83 Ghz), I wouldn't count on highend crossfire giving you much help except with mabe Crysis.

A single highend card 4890/275gtx with 1gb/896mb memory is more then enough for that resolution.

Now if you overclocked to say 3.5 and were using 1920x1080 res then I can see crossfiring a 4870/4890.

 

[nataku00]

For the price of a single HD4890 right now, it's hard to beat the performance you can get. I've been very happy with my MSI HD4890 for playing Crysis/TF2/DoD:S, and may go crossfire with it in the future should I need the extra video processing power.

 

[Jbandy10]

Well I will be Overclocking my processor close to 4.0ghz.

I'm thinking I should go for a single HD4890. If I add another HD4890 down the road will it be worth it?

 

[brblx]

by the time you feel that a single 4890 is inadequate- probably not. just buy the best single card you can afford and don't worry about an upgrade path. a 4890 should be adequate for at least a year or two, and everything will have changed by then.

 

[Jbandy10]

I suppose that sounds like a good plan.

I really just wanted to make sure I wasn't wasting money by buying a single card when I have crossfire available. I know one guy said to buy two 4850's but it sounds like a single 4890 will be better?

 

[McRhea]

I have a 4890 (OC'd to 925Mhz / 1100Mhz memory) in my E8400 OC'd at 3.6Ghz, running all my games at 1920x1200, and it freaking rocks.

In Crysis I can only do 2XAA with 16xAF, and Far Cry 2 is very playable at 8xAA with 16xAA and everything set to Ultra. Cod5 everything is maxed (4xAA is the max in Cod5) including the textures, and it's super smooth, even in the maps with tons of smoke grenades going off and lots of explosions. L4D runs great with everything maxed, but it's not a very demanding game to begin with.

If you're only going to game at 1680x1050, I would think that the 4890 would be overkill, but you'd never have to worry about performance for the next year or more at that resolution.

Check out the Hot Deals forum here at Anandtech, there are 4890's on sale for as low as $175 after rebates and cash back, etc... just be patient and snag one of those when they pop up. I got mine for $185 after rebates, and it's been a pure joy to game with.

 

[Jbandy10]

Thanks. That was very helpful.

 

[OCGuy]

I think you are on the right track with the 4890.

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: cevilgenius
Well, remember when going for CF it generally tries to match both cards, so you'll have 2x the performance of the SLOWER card.

You know; that is not totally true

CrossFire-X evidently allows mismatched cards to give better performance than simply the same as two of the lower clocked cards

4870+4890 works great and it is faster than 4870 CF
- and if you can overclock the 4870, it is faster still

Published proof this weekend

 

[happy medium]

Originally posted by: Jbandy10
Well I will be Overclocking my processor close to 4.0ghz.

I'm thinking I should go for a single HD4890. If I add another HD4890 down the road will it be worth it?

That sounds like a plan:thumbsup:. With that overclock you'll do fine.

 

[Puffnstuff]

+1 4890

 

[apoppin]

2.Buy an HD4890 and let that get me buy for a year or two before upgrading.

Then get a 2nd one or CF-X it with 5890

Keep your options open.
-And 4890+4870 is considerably faster than 4870+4870