More reviews 5970..CF=yes, NOW 1st EF review

Post by **Mach1.9pants** » 18 Nov 2009, 07:36

HEXUS.net EF review yay!

Hard|ocp EF review to follow
ExtremeTech

5970 will support CF with EF from launch, however 5870 (et al) CF with EF will have to wait til next year!

EDIT: more:
Anandtech
PCPer
TweakTown

No available in NZ for...1200NZ$!!!!

To quote Agent Smith ..'More, more, more!'
MaximunPC
HotHardware
Official Press Release

Sideeffect · Post by **Sideeffect** » 18 Nov 2009, 08:06

http://www.guru3d.com/article/radeon-hd-5970-review-test/

The Guru3d is nice they even crossifre 2 5970's :lol:

Post by **Mach1.9pants** » 18 Nov 2009, 08:07

From Anandtech:
Below we have a passive mini-DP to single-link DVI adapter. This is only capable of driving a maximum of 1920 x 1200:

This cable works fine on the Radeon HD 5970, but I couldn't have one of my displays running at a non-native resolution.

Wonder if that is true; I doubt it, I guess he hasn't used the adapter in EF mode, only single screen.

Sideeffect · Post by **Sideeffect** » 18 Nov 2009, 08:34

Yes they should know better than to create more confusion about displayport and adapters.

YouTube · Post by **ViciousXUSMC** » 18 Nov 2009, 09:02

Id be tempted for the upgrade :D but cant afford it right now and most of all its only 2GB of ram for the whole card, thus only 1GB usable RAM with the cards in crossfire.

I think a few of us already think that just a 5870 needs more than 1GB for ultra high res games, a 5970 should really have 2x2GB of VRAM....

Post by **BHawthorne** » 18 Nov 2009, 09:08

From Anandtech:
Below we have a passive mini-DP to single-link DVI adapter. This is only capable of driving a maximum of 1920 x 1200:

This cable works fine on the Radeon HD 5970, but I couldn't have one of my displays running at a non-native resolution.

Wonder if that is true; I doubt it, I guess he hasn't used the adapter in EF mode, only single screen.

It was probably using only 1 of the 2 legacy clocks and they didn't have 2 other displays plugged in. Ofcourse it would have worked, but that and 3 display won't. These guys miss the whole 2 clock limitation point. If you've only got 1 display port being used it'll work just fine, but try using 3 ports with that and you'll be SOL. Whether misinformation, or ignorance, it's an incrediably bad idea for them to have that in the article, which could dredge up round 2 of the passive adapter debacle.

whismerhill · Post by **whismerhill** » 18 Nov 2009, 10:20

wow when 5870 were reviewed I thought NVIDIA was late , but now ...

things don't look too pleasant for NVIDIA this time around
for those who remember, I told you guys that hardware.fr estimated Fermi shaders to run @1.6Ghz, new estimates from NVIDIA GigaFlops are now heading in the direction of 1.1~1.2Ghz much to their surprise.
Of course, that's all for the professional world so maybe they got something kept under their sleeves ...

edit:

The number of transistors always works as an indicator of how powerful a product will be

never read something more wrong than that :roll:

Dave Baumann · Post by **Dave Baumann** » 18 Nov 2009, 14:11

Crossfire X Eyefinity is a proof of concept on the 5970 drivers, partially as there is a more controlled environment between the two ASIC's (i.e. the PLX bridge) and it limited to a smaller set of profiled applications. We're doing some work to alter how this is achieved and we expect to have this opened up for the rest of the HD 5000 series in early 2010.

BloodTotal · Post by **BloodTotal** » 18 Nov 2009, 14:53

From the article http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,2356037,00.asp

Because the Radeon HD 5970 is the first graphics card on the market to support AMD's Eyefinity multimonitor technology

Correct me if I am wrong, but you can have Eyefinity on a 5870.

whismerhill · Post by **whismerhill** » 18 Nov 2009, 15:03

From the article http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,2356037,00.asp

Because the Radeon HD 5970 is the first graphics card on the market to support AMD's Eyefinity multimonitor technology

Correct me if I am wrong, but you can have Eyefinity on a 5870.

you're right, is there even a serious review/reviewer/website out there ? :roll:

whismerhill · Post by **whismerhill** » 18 Nov 2009, 15:06

Crossfire X Eyefinity is a proof of concept on the 5970 drivers, partially as there is a more controlled environment between the two ASIC's (i.e. the PLX bridge) and it limited to a smaller set of profiled applications. We're doing some work to alter how this is achieved and we expect to have this opened up for the rest of the HD 5000 series in early 2010.

Thanks for the precisions, I was actually going to ask about exactly that :)
:triplewide

OzHuski · Post by **OzHuski** » 18 Nov 2009, 16:06

Just found this over at firing squad, its a more detailed post (no testing) on what the 5970 EF mode will be able to do on release.. Not as extensive as you would think - but atleast it does prove they are working on it.

Sorry if its in the links above somewhere, but got most the info I needed out of previews I had seen already :P

As an added bonus for Radeon 5970 users however, ATI is providing very limited Eyefinity support to the 5970 only. The 8.663.1 driver contains beta Eyefinity support for over a dozen different titles:

Anno 1404 (aka Dawn of Discovery)
Batman: Arkham Asylum
BattleForge
Call of Duty 4 – Modern Warfare
Call of Duty 5 – World at War
Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood
Crysis
Crysis Warhead
Dawn of War 2 (Warhammer 40K)
Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Enemy Territory – Quake Wars
Fallout 3
Far Cry 2
GhostBusters
Left 4 Dead
Need for Speed: Shift
RaceDriver: GRID
STALKER Clear Sky
Tom Clancy’s HAWX
Unreal Tournament 3
World of Warcraft (plus expansions)

Now the Eyefinity support does come with a number of caveats. For starters, support is limited to the games listed above only. No other games are supported yet at this time. In addition, only landscape configurations scale properly. Running portrait mode will still function, but will rely on the primary GPU only. And again, Eyefinity support is limited to the 5970 card at this time.

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 18 Nov 2009, 18:27

is there even a serious review/reviewer/website out there ? :roll:

And then there's the articles I've seen that laud AMD's EF as if they just invented multi-monitor gaming. Research much?

The WSGF clearly has more in-house expertise regarding MMG than any other source I've found on the net.

Post by **Mach1.9pants** » 18 Nov 2009, 19:43

+1 GA, much more help here. Most of the reviewers have no idea about the problems, and how to get around them, of MM gaming. I guess that will change, to be honest with ATi bringing MM support as standard it is like an introduction of MM to the (upper!) mainstream. These guys, if they are like Kyle from Hard|ocp will learn and knowledge will spread... I hope :)

At least it is good to see DopeFish getting some Kudos in the reviews!

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 18 Nov 2009, 20:40

At least it is good to see DopeFish getting some Kudos in the reviews!

Cool stuff. Got any links?

Post by **suiken_2mieu** » 18 Nov 2009, 21:15

Now Dave, the real Question is why we didn't get one of those samples (send to Ibrin in 10...9...8...).

Post by **BHawthorne** » 19 Nov 2009, 04:13

Now Dave, the real Question is why we didn't get one of those samples (send to Ibrin in 10...9...8...).

Probably because it would be like preaching to the choir here. They get much larger blanket and immediate return on giving review samples out to the huge general sites. The focus is so narrow here, which is a good thing for us who have a focus on this type of stuff, but really very few know about WSGF because they don't think to look. It's a double edged sword. Still, it does make sense to get a knowledgeable review from WSGF and to empower that to happen. Afterall, WSGF has the largest brain-trust of multi-display gamers on the net.

Dave Baumann · Post by **Dave Baumann** » 19 Nov 2009, 04:28

I've already chatted with Ibrin (though truth be told, I owe him a call). We'll support him with a sample, but we'd rather do it when the list of game titles supported in the driver is changed from a "white list" to a "black list" mechanism.

Post by **Mach1.9pants** » 19 Nov 2009, 04:51

[quote]At least it is good to see DopeFish getting some Kudos in the reviews!

Cool stuff. Got any links?I can't be bothered reading the reviews again but if you go to the EF section of the Anandtech one (very effusive), also mentioned IIRC in Hard|ocp and Tweaktown.

Anprionsa · Post by **Anprionsa** » 19 Nov 2009, 05:43

I've already chatted with Ibrin (though truth be told, I owe him a call). We'll support him with a sample, but we'd rather do it when the list of game titles supported in the driver is changed from a "white list" to a "black list" mechanism.

Ooooo.... Go Ibrin! I am eager to hear his comments.

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