What you need for a crossfire set up

[Taxation]

Some of you out there might not know what crossfire is, or you do but dont know how to set it up, and what components you need.
Well i am here to help

Firstly,what is crossfire?
crossfire is a multi gpu technology that has been developed by ATI.
what does it do?
Crossfire brings higher graphical performance by using 2 graphics cards to render the images on the monitor/s.

Those are the first 2 questions most people ask.
then they ask ,
what do i need to do it then? (*thinks of sick things in head* :roll: )
1)a crossfire compatible motherboard or mobo :wink:
eg. http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/spec ... ASU-A8R32M (http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?ASU-A8R32M)

2)then you need a graphics card
eg. http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/spec ... ?SAP-X19XT (http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?SAP-X19XT)
the 1600 and 1300 series dont need the connector cable at the back, but the 800/850/1800 and 1900 do require the connector cable at the back to be plugged in.

3)then you need a crossfire edition of the same graphics core
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/spec ... l?SAP-X19C (http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?SAP-X19C)

4)a powerful enough power supply for your specific graphic card setup, because an X1900 will use more power than an X1300.
A 450W power supply is recommended for 1 graphics card, and for 2 graphics cards it is recommended that you have at least a 550W power supply.
http://www.ati.com/technology/crossfire ... nfigs.html (http://www.ati.com/technology/crossfire/certifiedconfigs.html)
and here
http://www.ati.com/technology/crossfire ... rown2.html (http://www.ati.com/technology/crossfire/buildyourown2.html)
check^ for what power supply you need according to your own setup

now that you have the hardware, you just need to install it
1)install power supply
2)install motherboard
3)install anything else eg.hard drives, RAM, CPU etc
4)install both gfx cards (in the correct slots, refer to manual because some boards may vary)
5)connect additional power to the cards (if needed) with 6 pin connectors
6)load up windows
and to enable crossfire just go to the gfx control panel
and
http://svc002.wic379dp.server-web.com/images/features/panel_crossfire1.jpg
your done

[Ammok]

What happens if you use two different cores? anyone tried?

[sammjj]

oh my god....

this needs deleting or updating!

[I3R0K3N7FEET]

What happens if you use two different cores? anyone tried?

yeah this seems like it needs a little updating lolzords

^^if you crosfire two different graphics cores, EG, if you crossfirea 4850 with a 4870<<< the 4870 is downclocked to keep sync with the 4850<< infact >>>>>

4850xf > 4850/4870xf << something to do with scaling so inotherwords< yes yo caan crossfire different gpus< usually of the same series< though its virtually pointless. if you have a 4850 get another 4850, and if you have a 4870 get another 4870 etc<< vvv
(though it seems a 4870 and the 4850 will work well with their x2 counterparts.. though this makes sense really< not sure how the 4890 fairs in this yet though..
http://game.amd.com/us-en/content/images/crossfirex/CF_combo_chart.jpg

[moppy89]

Hmm, jus how much of an update does this thing need? I mean do you still have separate crossfire editions of cards? Or can you jus use any old version of the same card?

[doug7131]

no ,all you need today is two graphics cards from the same seires i.e 48xx and a crossfire mobo and bridge.

[Martini1991]

Can this be removed and updated?