Widescreen Gaming Forum

Hi there

I was quite a while of WSGF (lots of work). Now I have a little more time for gaming and think about changing my GPU-setup. I game on 5760x1200 with one single ATI 5870 2GB (Saphirre Vapor-X). I had an aircooled 5870CF but these two cars were loud as hell. Month's later one card died and I kept the single 5870 Vapor-X 2GB for Eyefinity. It performs ok in my games, but I have huge banding issues and artifacts in some games as well as picture quality is not that good. Then even on desktop the picture seems to "reset" itself for a second from time to time and my mouse cursor changses occassionaly into a graphics failure ingame. So I'm not really lucky with my ATI Eyefinity.

So I consider going back to the green camp and have two options to go:

1. Buying a GTX 560Ti SLI 2GB for nvidia surround
2. Buying a single GTX 580 3GB (Gainward Phantom), add a GT430 and going back to SothTH

Both will cost me the same. I thought about getting evga 560Tis with 2GB and hope they are quiet enough. If nvidia would allow Triplehead on one GPU I would instantly choose a 580 3GB. Will the 560 SLI be the better option? How is overall reliability of nv surround compared to Eyefinity? Did anyone made the change from EF zu NVS? Or should I stick with my single 5870 2GB? What dou you think about the evga 560tis?

What would you do and why?
Thanks a lot.:)
Blue

go for the 560's sli.
i went through a mix of dual 5870's and 5970's trying to get eyefinity to work. Eyefinity worked but i got sick of the driver issues , vsync, adapter issues and crossfire support so i went to dual 480's and all my problems disappeared and havent looked back,
K, nvidia sucks for desktop management, and arkward to swap between triple and single monitors like eyefinty does, but nvidia works in game wher it counts.

But thats just my opinion and everyone has one.

I wont be ditching eyefinity anytime soon, because they are the only solution that allows for 5x1.

Guys, if you worry about desktop management, just download WinStep eXtreme (TM) Vista Start Menu and Maxtor PowerDesk.
A single card is not enough to power 5760 x 1080, and I wouldn't use some no name hacks and mix 2 different cards in SLI, that's just a recepie for troubles.

I personally don't think 2 x 560's is enough for 5760 x 1080 I was running crysis 2 with 2 x 480's and I was barely getting 60 fps with 98% GPU utilization.

Just by 2 x 580's, you can save money if you can get a lower vRam edition, 3GB is a waste of $$, all you need is 1.5GB

It all depends on what your happy with and what your running. Personally I'm still running XP with a Matrox Digital triple head to go.
I have always tried to stick with a single card solution to my 3 screens or 3+1 screens. This is the simplest most versatile set-up for me anyway. Less driver issues, more stable platform, and more air in my old case, lol. Each set-up has issues but I have tried to stay away from the SLI or X-fire do to their quirky works that i have read about. I know I am being limited in a number of ways with my set-up currently but it is almost plug and play with most games.
Currently thinking about upgrading to Win7 and maybe going to Nvidia surround, but only because I already am mostly there with my hardware anyway. Eyefinity sounds like a great way to go, and Im sure they will get some drivers out soon with some stability.

I'm happy with Eyefinity, but if you want to go NVIDIA I would get a pair of 2GB cards. The 3GB card is overkill, and I wouldn't go to SoftTH, unless you need some funky unmatched panel arrangement. You lose SLI/CFX with SoftTH, and have overhead on top of that.

SoftTH = DirectX9 only and lots of hassles = FREE, I used it for two years before finally buying 2 x GTX470s and would not go back. You really would miss the DX11 in some titles.

Also, soooo much easier to get games running with nVidia Surround 2D as compared to SoftTH.

I recently updated my drivers to nVidia 280.19 Beta and can once again run every game out there at max detail, texture and resolution (except perhaps GTA IV which allows crazy texture loads).

So would definitely recommend 2 x Nvidia whatever you can afford, would not go with X60's, go for 470/570 or 570/580.

I have never been happy with ATI from personal experience, don't like their video card or tv cards.

Both sides of the fence are problematic. If you are looking for a largely trouble free solution you won't find it. All options have their down sides. It's the price to pay with having such a specialized setup.

Thanks for the input guys. I know there is no clear winner. But what are the flaws of nvidia surround? OK, if SLI doesn't work, surround won't work either. What else?

@tricky
thanks for the reminder on dx9 in SoftTH. When I used SoftTH two years ago this wasn't a big problem but now its an argument.

Edit: What about a GTX590? And would my Seasonic X-750 handle it?

I would never switch to surround unless they allow me to use only one card like amd does

You will need 2 cards anyway, 1 card is just not going to cut it for 5760 x 1080

One is enough for me. So far. And I don;t have a top-of-the-line card, either.

But really, it's never enough, is it?

Right. :-) I still try to find a set of 2GB evga 560tis. Still not available in Switzerland. I bought the Withcher 2 last week and now I've read that it doesn't support Eyefinity. Seems to be a no-brainer to go for nvidia surround...

Right. :-) I still try to find a set of 2GB evga 560tis. Still not available in Switzerland. I bought the Withcher 2 last week and now I've read that it doesn't support Eyefinity. Seems to be a no-brainer to go for nvidia surround...

Not sure what you meant by not supporting witcher 2 with Eyefinity it will run in 6000x1080...cut scenes will not. I have both AMD tri xfire 6950 at 6000x1080 and nvidia 580 tri sli also @ 6000x1080. I would certainly not say one is more of a problem then the other but for the money AMD is allot better system and you get more vram.

[quote]Right. :-) I still try to find a set of 2GB evga 560tis. Still not available in Switzerland. I bought the Withcher 2 last week and now I've read that it doesn't support Eyefinity. Seems to be a no-brainer to go for nvidia surround...

Not sure what you meant by not supporting witcher 2 with Eyefinity it will run in 6000x1080...cut scenes will not. I have both AMD tri xfire 6950 at 6000x1080 and nvidia 580 tri sli also @ 6000x1080. I would certainly not say one is more of a problem then the other but for the money AMD is allot better system and you get more vram.

You are playing Witcher 2 on the latest patch with Eyefinity? I thought you needed Hayden's utility to do that, and it hasn't been updated for the latest patch IIRC.

id say, whatever you do, go for a single card!

U can see in various tests that the XFIRE performance boost is quite low (about 50%) it does NOT double the performance.
further its not true taht a single gpu cant do the job - im running a 6970 at 5760 1080 with full details with no prob in all games i yet tried.
AND u will have issues with an Xfire/sli setup like asynchronity and flickering.

since xfire/sli with the second best card available atm costs as much as going for the big one (f.e. dual gpu at ONE CARD) id always prefer this.
IMO XFIRE/SLI makes sense when u ve gone for single gpu once and want an extra boost after one or two years and buys another "cheap" card of same verion to save money.
Xfire SLI can VERY seldom compete with a single card at more or less same price.

O

id say, whatever you do, go for a single card!

U can see in various tests that the XFIRE performance boost is quite low (about 50%) it does NOT double the performance.
further its not true taht a single gpu cant do the job - im running a 6970 at 5760 1080 with full details with no prob in all games i yet tried.
AND u will have issues with an Xfire/sli setup like asynchronity and flickering.

since xfire/sli with the second best card available atm costs as much as going for the big one (f.e. dual gpu at ONE CARD) id always prefer this.
IMO XFIRE/SLI makes sense when u ve gone for single gpu once and want an extra boost after one or two years and buys another "cheap" card of same verion to save money.
Xfire SLI can VERY seldom compete with a single card at more or less same price.

O

I do agree with that. Running Eyefinity 6 myself and I have 0 problems. But when I used to have Xfire/SLI it was a b**ch. Ain't worth the amount of money you pay for it. For me the ideal way is if you buy 2 cards you should have double the performance, but that you aren't even close to. You be lucky if you get 5-15% extra out of it.

I have to disagree with you both I have 3 cards in both my PC's and i need em, I don't have any problems with either setup and if I do they are easily fixed. One card is not enough not even close unless you want to run stuff on Low settings and no AA which I think sucks.

well actually u will have ur point since u use it already, but imho as i said there are hard facts about this which dont match with ur telling.
and since ive played everything in max and 5760*1080 on my single gpu so far id doubt that what u say is that true.
And there are already so much posts about probs with xfire only in this forum that that point of urs is to be doubted as well to be honest.

nevertheless, i dont think the initiator of this post does want to buy three double slot high end cards for Xfire, and a new mainboard and due to that also new cpu and memory and so on...

well actually u will have ur point since u use it already, but imho as i said there are hard facts about this which dont match with ur telling.
and since ive played everything in max and 5760*1080 on my single gpu so far id doubt that what u say is that true.
And there are already so much posts about probs with xfire only in this forum that that point of urs is to be doubted as well to be honest.

nevertheless, i dont think the initiator of this post does want to buy three double slot high end cards for Xfire, and a new mainboard and due to that also new cpu and memory and so on...

Here's a hard fact for ya only people that have problems complain and write stuff about their problems this is a fact google it. Not sure what you'd consider a problem but doubt what your are saying is a fact.. i'll bench against your PC at max settings my tri vs your single and will see which system truly runs at max settings!