Quote Originally Posted by GoldenTiger View Post
Microstutter actually DOES occur on all GPU's be it single card or more. The definition of microstutter is simply stemming from typical rendering, which is "uneven frame times within a second", which simply means that the frames in "frames per second" are not being rendered at an even spacing. A single GPU does not render every frame of every second at exactly the same rate within the second as some are more demanding than others inside a second. However, it typically is described as becoming more visible with 2+ GPU's as you excaberate the effect by using even more uneven times mixed together. The reality is that even with dual-card setups it is basically unnoticeable to most people, some notice it if they look for it because they had read about it (a handful) and a minute number actually notice it for real (non-placebo) while playing. Most people confuse things like load hitching for microstutter .
Most people don't see the blatant stutter in Fallout 3, Oblivion, and New Vegas that appears on any 60hz display. I can see it clear as day and didn't need anyone to tell me about it.

You post on [H], do you remember those HP LP2465 refurbs that were popping up in the hot deals section for a while? The input lag was horrific on that display, yet most people didn't notice it.

When I play Crysis with a GTX280 and then move to a 4870x2 and despite the higher actual framerate the game feels no smoother, thats not difficult to notice. I noticed crap like that in a few games and ended up selling the card in large part due to that. I didn't even know that was microstutter at the time.

I've seen microstutter with 6950s in a couple of games. It really stood out in Metro in a lot of spots. I saw it in Stalker Clear Sky, clear as day. The choppy feeling framerate despite is very annoying at times and can be seen at 40 or so fps. I've never seen noticeable uneven frametimes resulting in choppy performance at any framerate that I would consider playable on a single gpu. I've never seen any research that shows this to be a problem in real world usage with a single gpu. I'm sorry but unlike with sli and crossfire this isn't a well documented problem with a single gpu.

I'm not saying that microstutter will stop me from using sli or crossfire in the future since I've found both solutions to work really well most of the time but I wouldn't buy two mid-range cards in an attempt to get the performance of a high end card. Microstutter was a massive problem with 4870 crossfire but it does appear to be less of an issue these days. Thats not to say that its non-existent.