@@. wow great job AMD/ATI .

should i go HD3870 CF or this R680 ???

i think 3870x2 should be better than 3870 CF.. it's running on single slot x16... while CF does dual slot @ x8 rite..

the truth is... 3870x2 really pown the 8800ultra.. price & performance..  it will take both...

Well, it's no surprise it has the same problems with CF. It is, after all, a dual-GPU solution. If you take a look at the CPU-Z, it says "Crossfire: Enabled". So, I think it's still using the same Crossfire communication between the GPUs.

There's one more advantage for 3870 X2 over CF, you don't need to buy an expensive CF-mobo to use it. Which is a huge plus considering CF-mobo is expensive.

But, I really hope DAAMIT can fix the AA performance hit. Enabling AA really hurts any ATi cards.

* Just for some information, DAAMIT is the new ATI/AMD name.

Nah, what I meant is that it's still using the same driver for X2 and CF.. So the performance will be roughly the same..

Nice improvement for Crysis, but it's still not enough =D
What's the setting for Crysis? Ultra High or High?

Anyway, ASUS also has dual fan for 3870X2, and as usual bundled with Company of Heroes.

You do realize that the reviewers didn't put their PC out in the open, in the blistering cold, right? They use heaters at home, to raise the temperature around 25-27°C. Some Malaysians like to set their aircon to the lowest possible (around 16°C) of which, will cause the room temperature to be around 20-23°C.

Yeah, I never lived overseas. But I did go there during winter. But would you think people at Tomshardware, Anandtech, and guru3D would overlook the ambient temperature? And I don't think they don't have problems with heating. Unless you go to forums whereby individuals post their rresults, that's another matter.

Erm...here's something easy to read to know about PCI-Express: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_Express

Jeez it doesn't even matter. PCI-E 2.0 as of now only provides 1-3FPS performance difference from PCI-E 1.x.

a pcie2.0 card installed on a pcie1.1 and pcie 2.0 mobo, i think the different is definitely more than 1~3fps performance..
but a pcie1.1 card installed on a pcie1.1 mobo and pcie2.0 mobo, this can be 1~3fps increase when u install on a pcie2 mobo..

Probably take a look at this: http://www.tomshardware.com/2008/01/23/cro...ress/page5.html

While Tomshardware charts are a little bit... skeptical, but the thing is what I'm trying to pin-point is that running on a X38 board/any board with PCI-E 2.0 doesn't really give much of a performance increase.

I think I would have to rephrase that 1-3FPS performance increase is somewhat wrong, something within the point of 1%-3% increament in performance in most games is more precise. As you set, this will depend on what game but I'm simply taking the average here.

True that later on graphic cards will take the full benifit of the double bandwidth on PCI-E 2.0, but right now, not yet. Not atleast enough to warrant a purchase for a X38 mobo or 780i if you aren't doing multi-GPU setups.

Ok, after playing X2 around for 2 weeks.....

Here's the outcome...

Windows XP.

1. With my current RIG.. (see my sig).. I managed to get 11K from 3DMark2006 with 1280x1204 no AA - using Sapphire CD installation Driver.
2. Went to ATI AMD gaming site to download the latest Driver (Catalyst 8.1)... guess what.. ..... Only managed to get 9k+ with the same setting.
3. Playing Crysis ver. 1.1 Got random black lines appeared during rendering stages
4. Playing NFS Carbon. Random shutter (blank screen) every now and then
5. Playing COD 4 ver. 1.4, No problem what so ever.. (same result with my previous 8800 GTS G90 320 mb)

Windows Vista.

1. Haven't install 3DMark yet.
2. Playing Crysis only got into acceptable playable FPS of 30+ with the setting  all high 1280x1024 no AA
3. Playing COD4, nothing excell from the DX9 version of XP but see the lighting brighter and smokes are more like a real smoke should behaving
4. Playing HellGate London : much better experience compare to DX9 version.
5. Upgrading to the latest Catalyst 8.2 (clean Install), not much different when playing Crysis. Other games have not tried yet.

Overclocking (ATI Overdrive). + This cost me another 600 RM due upgrading my PSU to Acbel M8 750W just to get the 8 pin PCie socket (anyone want to buy my 2nd hand PSU Acbel iNtelligent 510W?)

1. Under XP with Catalyst 8.142 Managed to get the stable overclock of CPU core 855mhz and Memory of 945Mhz.
2. Again under XP to be suprised.. it doesn't much help on 3dMark since the result is the same with the stock frequency.
3. Under Vista, Same oc'ed speed playing Crysis.. not much different feel.. still the same wif stock. Dunno if using FPS counter software could be differnet.
Conclusion.

Seems that this X2 is more Vista friendly compare to XP. 

Yesterday i just go LYP ...PC Zone C Zone and Cycom haven't sold 3870x2 yet.....u guys get from online orders?

I bought it from Atom Computer LYP. Taiko is a member of mine. Only 1 unit he got in stock. But last week I saw new shipment of BFG XFS 8800GTS AlphaDog edition.. yummy...

Ok

here's my 3dmark06 using e8400 running 4.14ghz

The driver is normal Cat 8.2 and the 3870X2 is not overclocked( stock speed).

-all using Air cooling.

result.



For daily usage

At the moment trying push to 4.40 Ghz.... so far no luck. Eventhough already put the vcore up to 1.5V

Able to boot into windows but failed run prima95 or orhtos with both core.

Any suggestion? Still same temp load is around 65C and idle 42C