Sapphire HD5770 Crossfire Review
Introduction
Published: 29th March 2010 | Source: Sapphire | Price: £249.96 |
Introduction
Value. If ever a word has a singular definition but multiple meanings it's value.
I can't imagine many of us would consider spending the price of a used car on an item of clothing, but when you consider the work that goes into a Saville Row suit, the quality of the cloth, the cut, the personalisation and how it will last a lifetime, suddenly it becomes "good value".
Alternatively it can be very pejorative. "Value Beans" doesn't tend to make us think we're in for a tasty treat.
By and large though, in PC Hardware terms, its mainly used to define something that gives unexpected performance at a sensible price point. It doesn't always mean it's the best available, merely that you wont be disappointed. When you're young you want nothing but the best regardless of cost. As you move into normal life with all the expenses and responsibilities that entails you tend to seek out those nuggets, that hardware that is good value.
Last generation the Radeon HD4870 was an exceptional card but for those who wanted blazing performance, at a price that wont leave them sleeping on the sofa, there was only one choice. A HD4770 Crossfire setup. It was cheap, fast, didn't cause the electric meter to generate its own gravity by spinning so fast and was, to continue the theme, exceptional value.
Now we're on the 5000 series, have ATI kept up this performance or nerfed it to get us to splash out on the main event?
Sapphire HD5770 Crossfire
Sapphire are probably best known for their amazing Vapor-X cooling solution. Probably the best graphics cooler available on an out-the-box GPU. They have got three different models of the HD5770 available. The HD5770 we're looking at today that uses the original reference cooler, the HD5770 New Edition that uses the modern ATI Reference cooler that expels air into the case rather than out the back, and the HD5770 Vapor-X.
Because we're looking at value we didn't want to look at a card that comes with a premium cooler, nor one that is already a little overclocked. We want to start at the absolute bargain basement HD5770 and see exactly how much performance can be tempted out of its silicon.
Technical Specifications
Graphics cards are fairly simple beasts and so we thankfully have only a small table today listing the specifications. Taken, as always, from the manufacturer website. The main thing of note is that the HD5770 supports Eyefinity and so has the requisite multiple display outputs.
| Output | 2 x Dual-Link DVI 1 x HDMI 1 x DisplayPort |
| GPU | 850 MHz Core Clock 40 nm Process Technology 800 x Stream Processors |
| Memory | 1024 MB Size 128 -bit GDDR5 4800 Mbps Clock Effective |
| Software | Driver CD |
Picture time.
Most Recent Comments
No mate thats completely inaccurate unless the CPU was a single core celeron.
IIRC it was in a super powerful machine but only really occured at ridiculous resolutions. I'll have to do some digging later and see if I can find it :)
Here is a shot with everything maxed on one card in the menu.
[IMG]http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i174/timmahtiburon/benchmin.jpg[/IMG]
And the same menu about twenty minutes later with the second card fitted.
[IMG]http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i174/timmahtiburon/new.jpg[/IMG]
I had a gap between getting one card and the other because the second was an RMA exchange for my dead 280GTX
Start a thread fella, always good to see individual results
Will do. I'm planning on doing GTX280, 5770, 5770CF. The first two now, the latter once I've sold my GTX280. I've got a few benchmarking programs and plenty of games. There'll also be some nice photos!
And another question (more relating to my setup) - are two 8x PCI-E lanes sufficient? Would a better chipset than P45 be worth investing in to make the most from these cards?
Sorry Alex I only just realised you had posted that.
I too have a board that shares the bandwidth into 2 x 8xPCIE. I read for about a week before deciding that it would be fine. In my 3dvantage I scored 14,400 or so on 3dmarks. The test system used for the review here probably cost 2-3 times what mine did. My motherboard was £30 and my CPU will not touch an I7 (Phenom 2 940).
So yes, the particular set up used here scored 3000 more 3dmarks than mine did and it probably allowed the 5770s to stretch their legs more but 14,400 is still a very respectable score for a system like mine.
I did read somewhere that putting the same system into a motherboard with twin 16X PCIE slots gained about 1000 points more than the system with 2 x 8X PCIE slots.
Also consider that your 280 will score about what mine did in Vantage - about 9000 3dmarks. So to sum it up if you already have a system with 2 x 8x PCIE slots then it would be financial suicide for the levels of performance you will gain (hardly any tbh).
GPU @ 875 (XXX speed, now you can see why paying £35 for this paltry OC is brainless) and ram at 1350 (XFX XXX @ 1300).
[IMG]http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i174/timmahtiburon/vantageblack.png[/IMG]
[IMG]http://i72.photobucket.com/albums/i174/timmahtiburon/vantageblackfull.png[/IMG]
I'm not going to push them any harder as I don't need them going wrong. It's also doing a Nelly (getting hot in here) and I don't fancy taking off all my clothes.
CSS Valid