Page 15 - Conclusion
The Verdict
AMD's Radeon HD 3870 X2 is a pretty interesting product. Now I had to admit that when I first learned about the product I was a bit skeptical. See, this card makes use of Crossfire technology and history has proven that on many occasions we ran into issues with Crossfire. So I was a little weary of that.
The fact however is, that precisely one game was showing an issue while all are showing off massively increased performance results, so that was quite a positive experience. The one game that had an issue was World in Conflict, the font in the menu was completely garbled making it impossible to select anything. The rest of our test suitegames all worked fine and where showing a close to X2 performance increase over the regular HD 3870 graphics card in the highest resolutions. So the name X2 for this product indeed is candid.
Despite that, personally I am a strong believer for single GPU graphics cards as in the end you will have less combatibility issues. For example, if a new game is released and it's not yet supported .. you'd have to wait until ATI releases a driver that supports Crossfire rendering for that game. Until that time, you'd be utilizing only one GPU. ATI's track record in releasing a new driver monthly however is exemplary.
With the X2 AMD's ATI finally is emerging in the high-end segment again. For example, this product is faster than a GeForce 8800 GTX 768MB and several cases than a 8800 Ultra, but these two products are aging. Also we included the results of 8800 GT in SLI, and in pretty much any scenario that setup is faster. But ... GeForce 8800 GT SLI requires an expensive nForce SLI mainboard. The 3870 X2 will work on any PCIe x16 mainboard, which is a clear advantage as in the end this will be the most inexpensive solution. ATI does need to keep it's focus on Crossfire driver development continuesly for this to work well and become succesful though.
So we established that the HIS Radeon HD 3870 X2 is working pretty darn nice, with okay power consumption levels. The card is has good and pretty in-audible cooling at a sales price of roughly 399 EUR. I think that prices will come down even further in the weeks to come. So in closing for the HIS Radeon HD 3870 X2 in general; the card offers high-end gaming performance and features for the money, you'll have the new UVD engine on-board and with the help of PowerPlay excellent improved power consumption, especially in 2D (desktop) mode. Expect some reviews soon of these puppies in CrossfireX (4 GPUs) mode as well.
For 399 bucks you'll have 1.3 Billion transistors at your disposal, 1 GB framebuffer (although for Crossfire the memory is cloned in 2x512MB) and a teraflop of computing power ... (this is a small hint to our Folding team) that's pretty impressive. We had very few problems with the product, yet due to the nature of Crossfire and this relatively new concept, do expect to run into some child deceases with it.
We do have to mention though, and although it'll be a minor update, the 3000 series are already DirectX 10.1 compatible so there are some other yet small gains in favor for the AMD products. Yes my friends the choice right now is not easy at all. But you know what ? That's good ... I like that. This means that there is competition in the market again. With this graphics card Crysis became more playable for sure as well, and although on the thin line of acceptable at 1600x1200 we where able to play with High Quality settings.
If we look at a slightly older yet modern game like Ghost Recon 2 at 2560x1600 we where playing with a framerate of 52 FPS with high image quality settings, that's pretty darn impressive.
It's again HIS that provided us some samples prior to the launch, so we can actually tell you how the product performs and what bundle you'll be receiving. There's nothing else to say that HIS offers a classy product and bundle for sure. Everything you need to get started is in that box whether you connect to CRT, DVI, HDMI .. buy a HIS product and you are good to go.
HIS will have this product in the shops starting this week, expect initial sales prices of 399 EUR / 449 USD which will drop a couple of weeks after volume availibility. I just love innovation, and although I'm a strong believer of single GPU computing & gaming ... the 3870 X2 did surprise me in terms of compatibility, stability and performance. And therefore I can wholeheartedly recommend it.
For more info on HIS products, click here.
Game on people.
Hilbert
Product type: 1024 MB high-end graphics card
Manufacturer: HIS
Website: hisdigital.com
MSRP: 399 EUR / 449 USD
