Torn between 2 GFX cards

[Pada]

500W should suffice for the system that you'll have now. The GTX 295 requires more power than the HD 6870.

 

[poffle]

500W should suffice for the system that you'll have now. The GTX 295 requires more power than the HD 6870.

But for Xfire 6870 ?

 

[Archer]

HD6870 draws less than 150W, so a good 500W PSU should handle it, but I would opt for 600W to allow for some breathing room

 

[killadoob]

Wow less than 150W that is damn impressive

 

[Archer]

Wow less than 150W that is damn impressive

Argh, its 151W (full load) actually. Which means its still within the reach of a single good 500W PSU.

Funny thing - the 6870 needs two six pin connectors. With one 6 pin the relevant standard says you can only power 150W. So the second 6 pin is there for a that single 1W.

 

[killadoob]

What about the 75 W from the mobo? 150w plus 75 why the need for a second one?

 

[Pada]

No Archer.
6-pin PCI-E = 75W
8-pin PCI-E = 150W
PCI-E 1.0 16x lane = 75W
PCI-E 2.0 16x lane = 150W

I'm just not sure how the power is distributed.

 

[Archer]

No Archer.
6-pin PCI-E = 75W
8-pin PCI-E = 150W
PCI-E 1.0 16x lane = 75W
PCI-E 2.0 16x lane = 150W

I'm just not sure how the power is distributed.

PCIe 2.0 can deliver up to 150W, but many motherboards only support 75W. Hence you need another 6 pin to get to 150W, and then another to account for the left over 1W

 

[DUDE!@##$%%]

The 6000 series scales amazingly, so in other words two 6870's will be better if not the same performance FPS as two 5870 in Crossfire, and if you look at the prices,
your going to find that the 6870's are much cheaper. However, the 6900 series cards are just around the corner (like a week) and will most probably be the same if not better than the 5870
in single card performance, with new technology and most probably cheaper, get one of those and when you start to fall behind in the GPU part of your pc, just gooi in another one and boom you got 3 more years on your card
They also draw less power than the 5000 series but I believe they have smaller headroom for Overclocks (are you into that stuff?)

hope i helped!


EDIT: one think you should not rule out is the GTX 460's in sli, they are not that amazing by themselves but scale incredibly and should give you around the same performance as a 5970...
but on the downside, the maximum multi-GPU config for these cards is two seeing as they only have one SLI Bridge connection on the tops, but still how long would a 5970 last you?

they retail for about R2500 each, check on prophecy.co.za and landmarkpc.co.za

As for the issue with the PSU, its always best to just shell out a few extra bucks for a good psu, they are one of the most annoying things to upgrade seeing as they dont give you any performance gains.
BUT they are still the most important part in your PC, a crappy psu might just turn your rig into a big pile of crap Ie. BOOOOMMM...

so just shell out some cash, get a nice 750W or a 850W and be happy for the next couple of years, oh and dont now go and get a 1000W psu, sometimes too much is bad because a psu will perform best at about 70% load which is
like a 'sweetspot' and running there will be better for your components and psu, if you buy a 1200W and you are constantly using only about 30% it would actually be bad




dont just look at these benchmarks and ignore what i said

Keep in mind that, even the the overclocking headroom for the HD6870 is minimal (without voltages yet), the little you can do gives it another 3-5 FPS.

 

[poffle]

Thanks for the info dude Yeah i rate i'll be happy with one 6870 for now and the Crossfire scalability is always awesome to have. I'm not really an OC fan so i'll stick with stock, im sure i wont die
Who would of thought it would be such a mission to sell a GTX295 .. haha

 

[killadoob]

Thanks for the info dude Yeah i rate i'll be happy with one 6870 for now and the Crossfire scalability is always awesome to have. I'm not really an OC fan so i'll stick with stock, im sure i wont die
Who would of thought it would be such a mission to sell a GTX295 .. haha

Dude its dx 10, chows power, it's massive and hot. If i may ask why are you buying a 6870 and getting rid of the 295?

 

[poffle]

Well, i wouldnt say hot, 72 degrees max under load is quite good

I dont dig Mutli-GPU.
Ever since getting a 5850 ATI will get my money due to the awesomeness of that card.
I want newer tech (dx11, tessellation etc).
Less Power hungry.
GTX295 is also huge overkill for me.

 

[DUDE!@##$%%]

Dude its dx 10, chows power, it's massive and hot. If i may ask why are you buying a 6870 and getting rid of the 295?

are you saying the 6870 chows power is massive and hot?
if you are, your mistaken, very mistaken

 

[Pada]

As for the issue with the PSU, its always best to just shell out a few extra bucks for a good psu, they are one of the most annoying things to upgrade seeing as they dont give you any performance gains.
BUT they are still the most important part in your PC, a crappy psu might just turn your rig into a big pile of crap Ie. BOOOOMMM...

Uhm, poffle already has a 600W PSU, which ran his GTX 295 just fine, so upgrading that now would simply be a waste of money.

Getting a 750/850W PSU is simply overboard, unless you install 2 very high end graphics card or 3 mid-high end ones.
Like my i7 940 @ 3.92GHz + 2x GTX 460's @ 850/4400 did not even use 500W - the max I measured was 530VA from the AC input and with 90% eff PSU this would translate to ~480W that the PSU would output.

are you saying the 6870 chows power is massive and hot?
if you are, your mistaken, very mistaken

No, he referred to the GTX 295.

 

[DUDE!@##$%%]

Uhm, poffle already has a 600W PSU, which ran his GTX 295 just fine, so upgrading that now would simply be a waste of money.

Mybad, I read it as he has a crappy OEM 500W PSU that he wants to run dual Crossfire/SLI on....
also, with a 750W unit he wont have to upgrade it for ages...

 

[Pada]

also, with a 750W unit he wont have to upgrade it for ages...

Well, I'd guess that a 550W PSU should also last you very long if it has decent capacitors, since the CPU & GPU companies are now aware of how much power their components consume.
I really doubt that we will be seeing CPU's that would be rated more than 135W and GPU's rated more than 300W.

Have a look at AMD, Intel & NVidia's future plans. They all try to manufacture components that would require less power, or at the very least better performance for the same power consumption.

 

[DUDE!@##$%%]

Well, I'd guess that a 550W PSU should also last you very long if it has decent capacitors, since the CPU & GPU companies are now aware of how much power their components consume.
I really doubt that we will be seeing CPU's that would be rated more than 135W and GPU's rated more than 300W.

Have a look at AMD, Intel & NVidia's future plans. They all try to manufacture components that would require less power, or at the very least better performance for the same power consumption.

I Guess your right, looking at the 6000 series it seems they trying more to 'optimize' their cards now

 

[poffle]

which is awesome. Cant wait for my 6870 to arrive, waiting impatiently on rampage gaming ^_^

 

[killadoob]

which is awesome. Cant wait for my 6870 to arrive, waiting impatiently on rampage gaming ^_^

Me as well, tomorrow brother!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Although i have no doubts haha.

 

[poffle]

hahaha, i spoke to the guy on live chat and he said they have some stock left over and they receiving more of them tomorrow, so i rate tomorrow is a good bet NEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeed it