8800GT to HD 3870

[Lynx]

Crossfire X is a key tool for you, and for me. Having a HD 3850 means that if i upgrade, with a crossfire X mobo i can add a new card to my existing card and still get improvments. I have a HD 3850 on folding and within about 2 hours i get through a work unit (i could have this wrong) But these are big 1000 work units. My 3850 runs at 800 core and 2100 memory higher than HD 3870 speeds, and i could push it further, these boards run folding faster with overclocks and do overclock highly, you will do well with one and with a 4850 (costing under 200) You will have 8800GT beating speeds before adding your HD 3870 in crossfire X.

[Lynx]

Ok that was wierd, my post is somehow higher than yours, unless something wierd has happened.

[Mul.]

Hi,

Came to a pretty obvious realisation that I'm no longer a serious gamer. My main high load system usage is Folding@home, which for those that don't know is a distributed computing project that your system can run to analyse DNA in the search for cures for genetic diseases. After a month or so break from it due to my Patriot RAM being a real pain in the back side, I've got my 1GB kit back in and I'm folding again.
So anyway, long story short I run one instance of this application on each core while my system is switched on but I'd like to utilise my system a bit more while I'm just milling around on the internet, doing revision and so on. At present, Folding@Home only has GPU clients for the Radeon X1900's up to the Radeon HD 3870. Effectively at going rates, the swap would cost nothing and I get to contribute more to science and so on.

My only concern is the gaming front. I'm no longer a serious gamer but I'd like to be able to pick Crysis up after my A2's and be able to play it with sensible frame rates. Now I'm under the impression that while the HD 3870 is slower in games, it won't be to the extent that the 8800GT is playable in a scenario while a HD 3870 is not.

My other thought is that I have no intention of ever buying an nForce based motherboard and I'll only be buying boards which happen to have Crossfire support.

Also, how much do you guys reckon a HD 4850 will cost on launch day?

If I could, I'd just like your thoughts on that.

Cheers,

Mul

[Mul.]

I know, that's quite strange. :confused:

Cheers for your opinion. Since my motherboard is holding my overclock back and only has partial 45nm support (duals only) I'll be getting myself a P45, X38/X48 board this summer with some DDR2-1066 and shooting for some 500FSB+ goodness. But anyway the advantages of all these boards are that they'll have at least 8x/8x crossfire support or better. I wouldn't want to buy a Multi GPU solution purely for games as I realise that isn't entirely worthwhile but for Folding, I'd be quite tempted pending funds of course.

The other thing is that the 8800 series are meant to get a beta folding client in the next few weeks but I'm a bit concerned about waiting too long as it's getting dangerously close to the HD 4850 and GTX 260/280 launches and could affect 8800GT residual values quite badly.

[PeterStoba]

3850 / 4850 in Crossfire X would be pretty stupid, the 3xxx would be slower than the 4xxx?

[Mul.]

I didn't really suggest I was going to do that. However, from my understanding I don't believe they have to be in crossfire mode as the only way to utilise both cards with the GPU client is to run one client per GPU. Just like what I do with the CPU console client

[Lynx]

Peter, the point is that crossfire X does not run as slow as the slowest card, it adds performance with more cards, just like a 3870x2 and a 3870 can be put together to get tri crossfire. the new HD range are good in crossfire as they benefit you whatever one you add to another.

[marsey99]

the scaling in games varies from game to game but in theory its a great idea, i think thats why nvidia are doing it too. they are doing it so you can add a gpu to your on board and run a sli config which i think would be great for those on the tightest of bugets.

mul i wouldnt jump on the 4xxx as soon as m8 as nvidia is making bold claims about the gtx26/80s for f@h as they see that as another market section for people like yourself. i would guess the top 4xxx will be priced about the same as aa overclocked 260, i would wait to see whats what first m8.


seti ftw :D they will cure all our ills :D

[Mul.]

Oh great. Find extra terrestrial life and then find now that they've found us they want us dead :lol: but on another note, fair play. I used to use Seti@Home with school back in 2002/2003 with my old Athlon 700MHz processor. Speedy.

Yeah, I happened to notice those GTX 260/280 claims but $450-650 is money I simply don't have, whereas I can move over to the HD 3850 now and the HD 4850 could potentially cost as little as £150 at launch, granted my 8800GT would be worth less by then.

[PeterStoba]

Blaine said you could crossfire X them, but it'd be pointless, you can add an X2 to a single and perform better as they are very similiar.

Anyway, if i was you i would get a cheap dual/quad rig and set it folding, churn more ppd

[Mul.]

That's all fair enough but now we're talking a lot more money than well, £0 to swap over to a 3870 or an extra outlay for something better next month. Like I say, I don't use my PC for much now and it is overkill so I'd like to be able to utilise it somehow rather than building another box.

[PeterStoba]

Fair point. I would just swap to a 3870 now then with 0 losses, then a 4xxx later on.

[Monkey]

Crossfire X is a key tool for you, and for me. Having a HD 3850 means that if i upgrade, with a crossfire X mobo i can add a new card to my existing card and still get improvments. I have a HD 3850 on folding and within about 2 hours i get through a work unit (i could have this wrong) But these are big 1000 work units. My 3850 runs at 800 core and 2100 memory higher than HD 3870 speeds, and i could push it further, these boards run folding faster with overclocks and do overclock highly, you will do well with one and with a 4850 (costing under 200) You will have 8800GT beating speeds before adding your HD 3870 in crossfire X.
Probably sound like a retard to you but recently i keep hearing the term "graphics card on folding" and i just wondered what it means.

Please explain

[Lynx]

Folding at home is a way of helping to cure diseases by folding protien molecules, they can use the amazingly high floating point of a GFX card to fold far faster than a CPU, but not as fast as the cell processor.

[wonderlust]

all you need to know

http://folding.stanford.edu/