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ATI Launches Crossfire... Finally

Posted by Hemos on Mon Sep 26, 2005 10:00 AM
from the launching-to-catch-up dept.
Graphics Software Hardware
Steve from Hexus writes "After a long wait, ATI's multi-GPU solution - CrossFire - is finally here. Hexus checks out Crossfire using an X850 Crossfire setup, which can be beaten in performance by a single GeForce 7800 GTX in some games. Too little too late, or will R520 based Crossfire prove more fruitful? Hexus also examines how Crossfire works, how easy it is to setup and what its limitations are with current hardware." Looks very interesting - I'd love to get one for review.
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ATI Launches Crossfire... Finally 50 Comments More /

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  • what's the deal? (Score:4, Funny)

    by HiroProtagonist (56728) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:02AM (#13650726) Homepage
    You guys trying to kill Hexus today or what?

  • Oh Boy... (Score:5, Funny)

    by jwilhelm (238084) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:02AM (#13650729) Homepage Journal
    Happy "Abuse Hexus Day" everyone!

  • Argh! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by bassgoonist (876907) <aaron,m,bruce&gmail,com> on Monday September 26 2005, @10:03AM (#13650736) Journal
    Max res of 1600x1200 at 60hz...how...disapointing.
    • Yes, with the bigger displays getting cheaper by the day, a higher resolution than 1600x1200 at 60Hz would really be preferable. At least run it at 100Hz. 60Hz really strains your eyes.
      • 60Hz is essentially the maximum you can achieve over DVI-D at 1600x1200.

          • Re:Resolution issues (Score:4, Informative)

            by default luser (529332) on Monday September 26 2005, @03:47PM (#13653510) Journal
            No. LCD pixels aren't just "more persistent" than CRT pixels.

            LCD pixels hold their current state until the input signal changes. There is no scan period on an LCD, the 60Hz signal is simply a convenient way to bridge the gap between raster scan displays and active-matrix displays.

            So, if you send an LCD a set of successive white screens, after the initial white screen no pixels will change, ever. A CRT, on the other hand, will write a white pixel to every part of the screen once every 1/60th of a second...and while the beam is not concentrated on a particular pixel, its brightness will fade.

            It has nothing to do with LCDs' slower reponse time, as you implied.

    • Re:Argh! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Brain_Recall (868040) <brain_recall@@@yahoo...com> on Monday September 26 2005, @10:43AM (#13651043)
      The Inquirer [theinquirer.net] discussed this limitation before. The Crossfire system can do 1920x1200, but only at 52Hz. The SiI 1161 chip on the Crossfire card that merges the two data streams has this bandwidth limitation, and it appears ATi won't be fixing it for awhile.

      Personally, I feel the Crossfire solution has far too many drawbacks for the benifits. Not only do you require a special motherboard, but now you also need a special Crossfire capable video card. The second card can be any card, but the RAM buffer should be the same size, otherwise it will defualt to the lowest value for both cards. The external cable adds some nice external heft to the system, as well.

      So, what do you get over the SLI system? There are added antrisropic filtering methods and increased anti-ailising, but these are already appearing in the latest nVidia drivers. You can use your exisitng card to upgrade to a Crossfire system, but you can already do this with SLI. All in all, the system has it's flaws, too many I think to make it worthwhile.

  • Linux support (Score:5, Funny)

    by digitalderbs (718388) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:04AM (#13650751)
    Great! Now we'll only have to wait about two years for mediocre linux support.

  • ATI had better watch out... (Score:5, Funny)

    by LegendOfLink (574790) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:06AM (#13650760) Homepage
    ...for Jon Stewart. Folks say that man has been known to cease CrossFires that are just full of hot air. ATI had better deliver.

  • Coral Cache (Score:4, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2005, @10:06AM (#13650766)
    Coral Cache [nyud.net]

  • Dammit (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MatD (895409) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:07AM (#13650769)
    Why, why, why, can't the editors change the links to use coralcache ? It's retarded that every story on slashdot concerns an article that no one can read. Is it really any wonder that people post without RTFA?

    • Re:Dammit (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Bronz (429622) on Monday September 26 2005, @11:30AM (#13651447)
      It might be that part of the /. revenue stream is selling subscriptions to people who want to read stories before the servers melt. I'm not saying that's bad, I'm just saying it might partly answer your question.

  • ExtremeTech's Review (Score:5, Informative)

    by ThinSkin (851769) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:08AM (#13650778)
    Under the hood, performance, compatability issues, SLI differences.....

    http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1862962 ,00.asp [extremetech.com]

  • MGP (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Doc Ruby (173196) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:09AM (#13650783) Homepage Journal
    Multiprocessing general-purpose apps on a GPU [gpgpu.org]?
      • Er, did you click the link? That's an extensive website representing some of the General Purpose GPU work delivering apps right now. According to your feasibility criteria, general purpose Internet apps aren't possible due to client/server latency. Yet you're reading this message.
  • I just checked ati.com :)

  • And what you really need (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ...is a link to the single page version:

    http://www.hexus.net/content/reviews/review_print. php?dXJsX3Jldmlld19JRD0xNjUx [hexus.net]

  • Compared to NVidia's Offering (Score:5, Informative)

    by PIPBoy3000 (619296) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:13AM (#13650812)
    NVidia currently has a couple SLI cards [hardocp.com], which perform quite well. I recently picked up a 7800 GT, the low-end of the high-end cards, for around $350. The plan is to pick up a second one when the price drops to around $100. It's very reminiscent of my Voodoo 2 experience - the first cost $300 and the second cost $30.

    Of course, Crossfire has the benefit of working with any other ATI card past a certain point. With NVidia's offerings, you have to match the card exactly (though supposedly the manufacturer doesn't matter). For my needs, it doesn't matter all that much, but it's something to consider.

    Not that I'm a fanboy of either vendor. My last card was a Radeon 9800 Pro, which has worked great these last couple years. Now it seems that NVidia has the card that works best for my needs. Ain't competition grand?

    • Re:Compared to NVidia's Offering (Score:5, Insightful)

      by UnrefinedLayman (185512) on Monday September 26 2005, @11:11AM (#13651302)
      The plan is to pick up a second one when the price drops to around $100.
      By the time you pick up a second one for $100 you're going to be a long, long way behind the curve. The GeForce 6800 GT (the previous generation equivalent of your card), released in June of 2004, still retails for $260-$280. Even the vanilla 6800s are ~$175. I would be surprised if you could buy a 9800 Pro for $100.

      SLI is a neat idea if the performance increase is tangible, but considering a single 7800 GTX can outperform an SLI setup of 6800 Ultras in many cases after only one year since the previous generation's release... by the time a 7800 GT is $100, it won't be worth $100 (much like all $100 video cards).
      • Like most things, it'll depend on issues such as cost, performance, and the timing of where I am in the upgrade process. Adding a second Voodoo 2 for $30 was great, as that's basically pocket change. Of course, by that time the computer was my secondary computer anyway. The boost in performance was nice, but not critical.

        I typically have two gaming computers at any one time. It doesn't have to be top-notch, but it's handy if it has reasonably good performance. When it stutters or is slow, my son mak

  • Drivers... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by juiceCake (772608) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:15AM (#13650823)
    I recently took the plunge and went back to ATI after hearing their drivers had much improved. After far too many VPU errors I ditched them again and went back to nVidia. Is it just me that has these problems? I wonder if the same driver issues will come up in the SLI cards.

  • A slight bit of promise (Score:4, Informative)

    by Namronorman (901664) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:15AM (#13650825)
    It sounds like, even though Crossfire might not be the glorious thing everyone has been waiting for, that in the future it might prove better than SLI. I for one though, feel that it would be better to just wait for that one graphics card than to get two at the moment, considering how fast they become obsolete.

    Anyways, from what I've read and been told, SLI requires special profiles to be taken advantage of in games, while crossfire simulates 1 graphics card and doesn't require anything but the default drivers to be taken advantage of.

  • Poor research / lack of knowledge (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2005, @10:16AM (#13650839)
    Page 2 :

    "By definition, a single-link DVI connection only has enough bandwidth at its maximum clock rate to carry a 1600x1200 image at up to 60Hz, or a 1900x1200 image displayed at 54Hz. Therefore in terms of what the slave can send the master board for output via the compositing chip, it's limited to those resolutions."

    Limited only if you read the original DVI spec. How does he think people run the HP and Apple 23" displays and the Dell 24" display over a single-link connection?

    All card manufacturers, and 1920x1200 display manufacturers, allow you to run the channel with a reduced blanking interval, and so squeeze in the extra bandwidth needed for 1920x1200x60.

    Bad start to the review - I'm not going to continue reading (even if I could after it has been slashdot'ed.

  • Sounds cool, (Score:3, Interesting)

    by hungrygrue (872970) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:18AM (#13650854) Homepage
    but where are the Linux drivers? Doesn't matter how awesome the card is if we have to wait two years for drivers.

      • Re:Sounds cool, (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Ford Prefect (8777) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:42AM (#13651036) Homepage
        Why would a Linux user need a 3D graphics card?

        You do realise a significant proportion of high-end CAD and film animation is done using Linux workstations?

        They've kind of pushed out the old SGI boxes in that they're (a) considerably cheaper, and (b) considerably faster. Have a random example from Google [kdenews.org]...
      • Why would a Linux user need a 3D graphics card? This kind of card is for people that play video games on Windows.

        Actually, a 3d card is for anyone who wants to perform 3d vector operations at a decent rate. The most obvious application of that is 3d graphics, but even that doesn't limit you just to playing games.

        You might as well ask why a Linux user would want sound, or high resolution displays, or a GUI...

  • Resolution / Refresh Rate Limit (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LTC_Kilgore (889217) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:27AM (#13650934)
    I feel that crossfire's biggest flaw is that there is a resolution limit at 1600x1200 @ 60Hz with crossfire enabld.

    The customers who ATI developed this product for (the most rabid and devout hardware addicts with large budgets) most likely have either large CRTs (FW900) or high resolution widescreen LCD's (2405FPW, etc).

    The failure to recognize that these customers would want to run games at their display's native resolution is unexcusable.

    Seriously, why elso would someone drop $1000 to upgrade their graphics hardware if it wasn't so they could run the latest games at high resolution with full detail settings.

    • it doesn't matter that much. not many people are going to buy a crossfire system anyways.

      why? because it sucks ;). that's also why it didn't matter that they didn't get it to market that fast - nobody would have needed it, only reason ati even has it is for PR and feature list.

  • The Point of Crossfire? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 26 2005, @10:33AM (#13650982)
    Looks very interesting - I'd love to get one for review.

    Just one?

  • Hexus must be happy with /.! (Score:3, Insightful)

    by maskedavenger (674027) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:35AM (#13650999)
    Two stories on here both from Hexus. Haha. What was the poster thinking?! He wanted hits but now the site is down!

    Crossfire will never work because who would buy a slave card... If you're primary card fails, you're out 2 cards! Ain't that some stuff!

    Oh, and I was an ATI man myself for years. Started before Radeon, now I have a 7800GT and I will never go back... unless they offer me some kind of deal, and buy SLI rights.
  • Looks very interesting - I'd love to get one for review.

    More like...

    This article looks very interesting - I'd love to see the review.

  • Meh... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ivan256 (17499) * on Monday September 26 2005, @10:39AM (#13651019)
    Who cares about this stuff other than the tiny portion of the population that will ever use it?

    The whole point of this SLI stuff is marketing. It convinces people to buy a more expensive video card than they otherwise would have so that they can fool themselves into thinking they'll get a huge performance boost a few years down the line when they add a second card on the cheap.

    In reality, when the second card comes down in price, the SLI configuration will be outclassed on the same order of magnitude as the single card alone by the latest stuff, and you'll just end up having to buy a whole new expensive card, or living with slow graphics.

    So unless you've got a boatload of cash and are going to buy two top of the line cards *right now*, it really doesn't matter if either of these manufacturers SLI technology is any good. It's just a marketing gimmick.

    • Re:Meh... (Score:3, Informative)

      by Matimus (598096)
      SLI works well for game developers who are writing for next generation hardware. While I agree that there is a lot of gimmicky marketing involved, I think it is a good attempt to raise the bar on what it means to be 'High End' as a response to market demand. Maybe some people do what you suggest, but I know a handfull of people who bought two cards right off the bat. As long as people are willing to spend the money, you can't blame nVidia or ATI for giving them more opportunities to do just that. Also, I d

  • 7800 is overboard anyhow (Score:3, Informative)

    by hexed_2050 (841538) on Monday September 26 2005, @10:42AM (#13651040)
    There aren't any games that require a 7800 SLI configuration and probably won't be for some time. If NVIDIA wasn't worried about releasing a card to wipe out ATI in performance, they could of released the 7800 series in another year or two and everyone would of been happy as pigs in shh.

    If Radeon can offer their SLI combination at an affordable price, there's nothing stopping me from saving a few hundred dollers and purchasing a card that generally is in the same era that games are currently in.

    Sometimes it's not all about speed, nor price, but value.

    • Re:7800 is overboard anyhow (Score:4, Informative)

      by Soul-Burn666 (574119) on Monday September 26 2005, @11:16AM (#13651340) Journal
      What about game developers developers developers? Graphic designers? Movie CG artists?

      The developers need the power to test now what will be standard next year.
      Graphic designers and CG artists need as much power as they can have, for previewing, since the final results are going to need considerably more power anyways, rendered in batch on clusters.

  • Actually... (Score:5, Funny)

    by CurbyKirby (306431) on Monday September 26 2005, @12:07PM (#13651766) Homepage
    Looks very interesting - I'd love to get one for review.

    The point is to get TWO for review. =)
    • Dude, you post this ridiculous mess of a message every time a linux story is submitted.

      Note to author:

      Please get a grip man, and enter a neat place called reality.

      Thank you.
    • Who the hell is this jerk? Why can't he come up with something new or at least factually correct? I mean come the hell on, I don't understand the whole troll mentality to begin with, but surely it would be more fun to come up with something creative and new to piss people off with, wouldn't it? At least some of the GNAA posts have been kindof funny.
    • I agree with the sibling who thought it was the worst game ever, but I'll thank you for drudging up memories from my youth of that song.

      I recall wanting the game for a really long time and never getting it. A friend got it, and I played it a few times. It wasn't nearly as fun as the kid screaming "Yeah!" on the commercial made it seem.

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