The ATI 3870 X2 is faster than 8800 Ultra

[oldkawman1]

Read it for yourself. The fasted card is now an ATI card.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2008/01/...x_2/index.html

[Si_Copath]

But will it cause your machine to crash like other ATI cards (allegedly)?
http://forums.epicgames.com/showthread.php?t=587272

[oldkawman1]

It seems to have worked for Tom's benchmark team. They even did a UT3 benchmark. But, then it always works for the reviewers.

[Epickiller]

... the 3870 isn't the fasted card. 2 cards might be faster than the best nvidia single card, but that's not saying much.

[MEX !,,!]

ATI beats all cuz its red >_>

[damian069]

The 3870 X2 is one card. So ati has a single card that is faster then nvidia's single card. just because it has two cores its still one gpu.

[Im a Chef]

nvidia fanboys can try to compare all they want but we all know that this card is top dawg now read the sig the very last part of it. Dont try to give a card bad reviews just because something is faster and better than nvidia. This card has quality and speed and for half the price its a must buy.

[oldkawman1]

... the 3870 isn't the fasted card. 2 cards might be faster than the best nvidia single card, but that's not saying much.

It is one card, has two 3870 GPU chips and a big crossfire chip all on one pcb. One real big card, same size as the 8800 ultra and draws almost 400 watts. You really should read the review and check out the pics. They took it apart and examined it. It has the real loud fan like the 2900 and 2lbs of copper and aluminum heat sinks.

Nvidia is also coming out with a double gpu card soon.

[oldkawman1]

But will it cause your machine to crash like other ATI cards (allegedly)?
http://forums.epicgames.com/showthread.php?t=587272

No, I think that's just the some of the 1900 series cards and also some of the AGP cards. Way less than 1/4 of the total at most do that.

[Maker216]

Well, it did take some time for ATI to come out with a faster card then the 8800 Ultra and if you look at all the benchmarks, it's not that much faster. So it will not be the top card very long. When Nvidia releases it's 9800 series gpu's it will be king again. Face it guys, ATI is always playing catch up with Nvidia!!!

[Raze.at]

lol: Highest avg. FPS for Crysis: 29fps

I wonder what the next nvidia monster can do

[RUKKUS]

Well, it did take some time for ATI to come out with a faster card then the 8800 Ultra and if you look at all the benchmarks, it's not that much faster. So it will not be the top card very long. When Nvidia releases it's 9800 series gpu's it will be king again. Face it guys, ATI is always playing catch up with Nvidia!!!

dont forget the GeForce 8950 GX2 thats coming.. that will probably trounce this.

its just like how AMD tries to catch up to intel, sometimes it will be close or even even but one will always be better. but ATI like AMD is cheaper so its understandable why people choose them. i wouldnt use ATI ever but i stick with AMD processing. go figure.

[DrFish]

Highest avg. FPS for Crysis: 29fps

Don't take Crysis as a benchmark. Crysis is heavily optimized for Nvidia hardware, and Crossfire does not work as intended (almost same performance as a single 3870)
But I'm sure AMD guys will find a way around this.

[5yzygy]

This card is merely AMD trying to grab some pennys.

It needs Crossfire too work, so straight away your onto using a buggy system, the cards performance is not impressive, at all.

High heat, high power usage, appualing drivers, I don't think much more needs to be said.

I moved from two 3870's too two 8800GT's, my games actually run properly now, performance boost with SLi is 10x better than that of Crossfire.

Not being a fanboy but a friendly word of advice, I would not touch another ATi card with a barge pole.

They need game optimisation, driver optimisation and most of all support.

Take a look at the ATi GAME forums just too see the horrific problems Crossfire presents and how ATi are persistant in selling AGP cards which they do not even support!

/rant off.

[JCSWW]

The 3870 X2 works fantastic in every game I've thrown at it. Corssfire is far superior to SLI since it scales better and is much more stable. You don't have to buy an nVidia motherboard to use CrossFire as well but CorssFire does work on nVidia motherboards. The new dual GPU nVidia cards are currently plagued with heat issues just for starters. Don't expect to see them anytime soon as a result. Look at the cost of the 8800 Ultra's as well. So, just think how expensive the 2 8800 Ultra GPU's will be on one PCB.

Personally, I don't care what company has the best. For $500.00CDN, the 3870 X2 is a great card, it works amazingly well in my setup, and it runs cooler than my X1900XT 512MB. Just for the record, I never had any issues with my X1900XT 512MB either. My 3Dmark06 score did go from around 6,400 to almost 14,000 though which is a nice improvement. Playing games like Call of Juarez, UT3, Crysis, BioShock, and Lost Planet definitely see dramatic performance increases. Just to set the record straight as well. nVidia is the worst offender when it comes to using optimizations in it's drivers.