Official HD4870X2 (R700) Review Thread

[Kondik]

Amazing, simply amazing *claps*
Still I'd like to see a test with 2x 4870X2 on a decent Quad , around 4 GHz.
I know the socket will melt, the south bridge will me vaporized, but the performace would be somethin we newer saw. I understand that it will be completly useless as the X2 is powerfull enough, but why not ? Gimme Gimme

[ether.real]

I tried 4xAA/16xAF at 1920x1200 with both GTX 280 and HD4870X2... not at all as playable as hoped; while some scenes give nice FPS, when the going gets though the FPS dip well below playable. However I did not include my numbers as I hadn't finished testing all the AA in detail and had some strange numbers, either buggy drivers or buggy bencher rather than include unsure numbers I'm going to provide a followup with Crysis AA performance later on

At 1920x1200, 16xAA, all Very High, I am getting steady 30-40FPS. I have been playing all weekend, its been rather glorious. No unplayable rate drops here.

[jmke]

DX9 or DX10 ? What CPU do you have? How much memory? What drivers? What part of the game?
I compared 0xAA vs 4xAA and got same FPS in some scenes; have to spend more time on it... future benchies

Amazing, simply amazing *claps*
Still I'd like to see a test with 2x 4870X2 on a decent Quad , around 4 GHz.
I know the socket will melt, the south bridge will me vaporized, but the performace would be somethin we newer saw. I understand that it will be completly useless as the X2 is powerfull enough, but why not ? Gimme Gimme

yup the HD4870X2 is CPU limited at anything below 2560x1600 in all games but one: Crysis

[ether.real]

DX9 or DX10 ? What CPU do you have? How much memory? What drivers? What part of the game?
I compared 0xAA vs 4xAA and got same FPS in some scenes; have to spend more time on it... future benchies




yup the HD4870X2 is CPU limited at anything below 2560x1600 in all games but one: Crysis

DX10, Q6600 @ 3.54GHz, 4GB DDR3-1770, Played from the Harbor all the way through the mountain, now I am on the other side.

[LightSpeed]

A.m.a.z.i.n.g

[Catalyst2211]

There's that. Glad I waited. Gonna pick one up in a week or two when the dust settles

[jmke]

DX10, Q6600 @ 3.54GHz, 4GB DDR3-1770, Played from the Harbor all the way through the mountain, now I am on the other side.

thanks; will see if I can do some testing with similar maps, harbor is quite heavy and inside the alien spacecraft also very taxing.

[ether.real]

Let us know how it goes

[disruptfam]

Still, it surprises me that the CF 4870 512Mb trails by a small margin. This makes me wonder why some people are waiting for the 4870 1Gb model. TPU disabled one core to give us an idea but there seems to be a few problems when they did that.

4870 512Mb is still a great card for those with 16xx resolutions.

the 1gb version is out @ some aus e-tailers

[adamsleath]

http://www.mwave.com.au/newAU/mwaveA...3&sku=42021960
one entry from staticice...4870 1GB.

[MomijiTMO]

PcParts.net have a Sapphire one for $420ish. Pre-order of course.

[JumpingJack]

DX9 or DX10 ? What CPU do you have? How much memory? What drivers? What part of the game?
I compared 0xAA vs 4xAA and got same FPS in some scenes; have to spend more time on it... future benchies




yup the HD4870X2 is CPU limited at anything below 2560x1600 in all games but one: Crysis

Amazing how quickly the GPU progress has ramped up over the past couple of years isn't it!

[naokaji]

thread crapping inc, uk pricing sucks... linky.

[YukonTrooper]

[ether.real]

Still no AA....Cmon people!

[eleeter]

Still no AA....Cmon people!

Tell me about it. Nice work BTW, the Crysis AA benches are astounding!

[Xanadu]

http://www.ncixus.com/products/32472/D1/Diamond/

NCIXUS has one up for $510.

[Mumid]

These cards are definately bottlenecked with a 3Ghz cpu. I can understand why reviewers do it (so mainstream users can get an idea of the performance they can expect from these cards) but for us power users its annoying for us to not see the true power of these cards unleashed! I mean for example with the setup in my sig, I am getting better vantage scores than some reviewers are getting with 4870x2 Xfire! One thing I have noticed is that these cards do scale well with more cpu mhz and they love high fsb. I am just trying to work out whether to trade in both my 4870's for a x2 or whether its not really worth it.... hmmm

[Lightman]

This is XTREME!!

All these scores make me sick! Such a high numbers that I'm getting dizzy!

[flopper]

These cards are definately bottlenecked with a 3Ghz cpu. hmmm

hardwarecanucks and skymtl are planning a 4ghz+ overlocking and testing.
I hope to see a 4.5ghz myself.

[LightSpeed]

all the scores are with sodeport disabled?

whens the driver coming?

[Eastcoasthandle]

Most of these reviews are using beta drivers but, the 4870 X2 nice performer. I particualarly liked Mad Shrimps CPU scaling aspect to their review.
source

[disruptfam]

adding another card adds 2 fps!!! wth

what about 1920 x 1200 4aa

[jmke]

@disruptfam: ATI Crossfire-X doesn't scale well in Crysis, that's nothing new but it has more to do with the CryEngine 2 than with the CF or SLI. Let's hope Crysis Warhead addresses this issue; too bad they won't update original Crysis for this performance patch

Amazing how quickly the GPU progress has ramped up over the past couple of years isn't it!

exactly, the 8800 GTX at launch was a sign of things to come; only a handful of games available then too which could stress that card. But as developers get used to the extra power, they'll design game engines that will require these cards to run at high settings. 2560x1600 with Oblivion 4xAA/16xAF is very playable... if the next Elder Scrolls provide an equal IQ jump as the previous, the power of GTX 280 / HD4870X2 will be put to good use.

These cards are definately bottlenecked with a 3Ghz cpu. I can understand why reviewers do it (so mainstream users can get an idea of the performance they can expect from these cards) but for us power users its annoying for us to not see the true power of these cards unleashed!

the reality is though that these cards offer FPS levels high enough for fluent gameplay even with a 2.66Ghz CPU; overclocking it to 3.5Ghz offered a speed boost for sure but didn't really improve gameplay.

I did some CPU Scaling tests here, the HD4870X2 overall will scale better as the CPU sped increases!

Most of these reviews are using beta drivers but, the 4870 X2 nice performer. I particularly liked Mad Shrimps CPU scaling aspect to their review.
source

yes that one will get a follow-up for sure; didn't have time to further tweak the system, wanted to include 4Ghz numbers... added to TO DO list
Harsh reality is that the only game which I really would have liked to see higher FPS (Crysis) doesn't scale at all with higher CPU speeds; but as mentioned above ^ more in-depth Crysis tests are warranted as performance results change a lot depending on the level/situation tested

[fornowagain]

all the scores are with sodeport disabled?

whens the driver coming?

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3372&p=3

What a joke.

pushed AMD for a firm commitment on how it was going to handle future support for Sideport and honestly, right now, it's looking like the feature will never get enabled. AMD should have never mentioned that it ever existed, especially if there was a good chance that it wouldn't be enabled. AMD (or more specifically ATI) does have a history of making a big deal of GPU features that never get used (Truform anyone?), so it's not too unexpected but still annoying.