Now here is a really wild Crossfire rumor

[mikeguava]

A "DFI dude" made a statement along the lines of Crossfire not really needing a master card - just 2 regular slave cards...it's all in the Northbridge...
That would be really nice!!!! Hope by leeking this ATI won't pull the plug...

http://techreport.com/onearticle.x/8390

[Magnj]

that is very intresting

[cadaveca]

so all x850's and x800xl's have the composting engine?

[mikeguava]

As a guess no - I would think that if you have X200 chipset - this will replace the need for a render engine - only if you use a non-x200 chipset you in fact need the render engine in the "master card"

[cadaveca]

so then the card is sending out images through the second set of pcie lanes to the other card,....and why the score is slower using the dms connector...more latency on the cable than the pci-e interconnect! superb! The cards can share framebuffers then, through the chipset. guess what's coming with r520!

[cadaveca]

:banana: :banana: :banana: :banana:
OMG CROSSFIRE! CROSS-FIREd VIDEO PROCESSING..A-CROSS(fire) THE CHIPSET!







Do i get a cookie? :p:

[mikeguava]

Do i get a cookie? :p:
Yes - chocolate chip or oreo?

[cadaveca]

so the use of the master cards and the dms cable is for the nforce4 platform, and with a crossfire, becasue of the interconnect built into the boards with the spare lanes, and probably a composting engine somewhere there too, you can use plain everyday cards,

OR

Every x850 and x800xl pci-e have the composting engine. explains the pcb change and the new "inferior" cards coming to market, as well as the new pwm design to the cards.

OR, the crossfire cards aren't really master cards, but slave cards...

how sweet it is.

[mikeguava]

Someone a lot more knowledgable about ATI cards told me earlier that this is probably possible because the compositing chip isn't used in AFR mode (alternate frame rendering) and therefore a two of the same cards can be run like something similar to the SLI setup...but for the supertile and scissor mode the compositing chip will be needed.

[FireDragon]

Well if you remember they where suposed to function in the begging without a cable and with current cards so I am assumming that it is true...it makes sense...and will be infact faster due to the faster tranfers and lower latency and possibly a better rendering engine in the NB itself...

Dragon

[Magnj]

whats the difference performance wise between alternate fram and scissor and such?

[xman01]

i like the slave slave option
no nothing
just 2 cards and that's it :toast:

[Sheik]

How's this ...... :p:

DFI’s project leader told us that it’s possible to run dual GeForce 6 cards in an ATI X200-based motherboard, but SLI can only be enabled when an older driver set is used (he didn’t specify which one). Interestingly, if two ATI cards are installed on an nForce 4 board, ATI’s drivers won’t install. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to test this for ourselves due to time constraints and a lack of resources, but it’s definitely something that we’ll be keeping an eye on in future.

http://www.tweaktown.com/document.php?dType=article&dId=773

[perkam]

How's this ...... :p:



http://www.tweaktown.com/document.php?dType=article&dId=773

OMG ROFL 6800Ultra SLI vs X850XTPE CF ON THE SAME MOBO :eek: ... Would make it easier on reviewers :)

Perkam

[perkam]

Now here is a really wild Crossfire rumor

It isnt a rumour:

Curiously, the first thing DFI showed us was what they described as a pair of slave cards running together cooperatively. The DVI output to the LCD display was only hooked to one of the two video cards, and the system was running 3DMark05. I asked how the cards were sharing data, and the gent pointed to the north bridge chip between the two cards. When 3DMark finished, the score came out like so:

http://techreport.com/etc/2005q2/computex/3dmark-dualslave.jpg


Perkam

[[XC]Atomicpineapple]

Hmpf, ATI drivers wont install? Its possible I could afford a Crossfire master card, but not a new motherboard as well. Hopefully this wont occur in retail products, because if ATi really open up Crossfire across multiple platforms they can take large portions of nVidias SLI market.

[[XC]Atomicpineapple]

The frontpage of HardOCP contains a message from Kyle explaining that although the frames are rendered with the 2 slave cards & DFI, they are not sent to the monitor, at least thats what I make of it, anyone want to jump in and assure me that I'm wrong? Because I'd rather it really did work.

**Edit** Appologies for double post.

[kryptobs2000]

I hope this is true.

[mikeguava]

The frontpage of HardOCP contains a message from Kyle explaining that although the frames are rendered with the 2 slave cards & DFI, they are not sent to the monitor, at least thats what I make of it, anyone want to jump in and assure me that I'm wrong? Because I'd rather it really did work.

**Edit** Appologies for double post.

But if I remeber correctly he wasn't using the dongle - and only the output of one card. Therefore you only saw every other frame. I assume with the dongle in place everything would have worked.
My assumption being, that the dongle is just a very basic bridge/slitter and during AFR operation it is simply sending the alternate frames to the monitor

[YanBooth]

Why all the hype now... The new generation is coming out really soon, why not wait for the CrossFire solution that will come with the R520 cards?

Yan