What do u think?

[patzy]

I'm planning to upgrade my computer and I'm not sure on the graphics cards, weather I should take:

1x AMD HD6970 (300€)

or

2x AMD HD6870 via CrossFire (150€ each)

So what would you buy?

[me3]

crossfire sure looks good in benchmarks but i heard of many issues and ppl hardly suggest it - next be sure to take a mobo that got 2 16 x PCIe, many stated with crossfire or sli ready , and it comes out 2 nd slot just has 4x ....

i´d take the 6970 or a 6950 with flashable bios , would do the job of a 6970 after

[Grumpf]

Two cards mean twice the power consumption, the noise and possible failure, crossfire is only useful for geeks giggles... My humble opinion...

But I'm interested in your results should you go this path...

[me3]

yep needs a strong Power supply unit, but in case of the 2nd 6870 its only approx 120 watts , compared to a single 6970 - if u can believe toms hardware ^^ next part would be the cooling of that thing , sure needs more case fans , prolly more noise aso , ull need a board with fan management to keep it quiet , atleast in idle ..... like grumpf said only for geeks . my poor opinion

edit : btw look for ASUS MARS 2 , thats for uber geeks ....

[beck11]

Dont xfire and dont amd.

[patzy]

Ok, so it shall be one HD6970.

No AMD is no option, I allways used AMD/ATI and don't wanna change that.

[gregathit]

Patzy, the one HD6970 will serve you better both in the short and long haul as later on when the 6970 gets a little dated you can always pick up another one (should be a lot cheaper by then) and run them in SLI to extend their life

I too used to be an AMD fan (as they did out pace intel for a time in tech) but I have since switch to intel as the clearly when all the benchmarks at this time. That said, get the best you can afford and are comfortable with

[teals03]

I like Intel and Nvidia myself, but I agree with gregathit. The slower vid cards in CrossFire will ultimately be faster for most games, but the better vid card will end up costing you less should your computer start to become outdated in a few years and you need to upgrade again.

The weird thing with video cards is that there is no real way to know for sure which set up will work the best for any givin game until you actually put it to the test. Some slower Nvidia cards perform better on some games than faster AMD cards and vice versa.

I generally go a generation down and then choose the card that has the best ratio between running cool and running fast. With computer components being ultra-sensitive these days I really feel like reliablity is worth more than clock speed.

[beck11]

An AMD fan is like a battered woman, both get repeatedly punched in the face and yet never seem to learn their lesson. Good luck with your 6970. A 6950 would be a better choice since it costs less and not that much weaker than the 6970 but why you're buying a AMD GPU now with southern island's(HD 7000) release imminent in the first place I do not know, unless you're worried your CPU will bottleneck.