3870 and 4870 in CF

[GrumpyMan]

A buddy of mine has a 3870 already and he wants to get a 4870 which is all well and good. He was wondering if it would be detrimental to crossfire them or if the effort would even produce any higher frame rates for him? Or would it dumb down the 4870?

 

[Lonyo]

You can't do it.

 

[GrumpyMan]

Yeah after doing some more reasearch it looks like you cannot currently, but in the future ATI is working on drivers that may allow you to do it according to this The Guru of 3D but probably not worth the wait. Thanks for the response.

 

[RamarC]

from what i've read, hybrid crossfire will only work with GPUs of the same family (HD 3xxx + another HD 3xxx; HD 4xxx + another HD 4xxx).
anyway, the hd 4870 is so much faster than the hd 3870, it would be like pairing me with rafael nadal in doubles tennis... i would just slow him down and screw up the game.

 

[GrumpyMan]

Originally posted by: RamarC
from what i've read, hybrid crossfire will only work with GPUs of the same family (HD 3xxx + another HD 3xxx; HD 4xxx + another HD 4xxx).
anyway, the hd 4870 is so much faster than the hd 3870, it would be like pairing me with rafael nadal in doubles tennis... i would just slow him down and screw up the game.

Lol.........good point.

 

[Andrew1990]

Well, if they ever get physX working on these cards, it may be worth keeping it. That is IF they can get it to work right.......

 

[vgkarthik88]

Andrew1990 makes an interesting point. the 3870 would only slow the 4870 in actual rendering but if you could use the 3870 as a phyx card it mite actually boost performance. LOLZ anandTech should contact NGOHQ about it!