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- Date:
- Tuesday , May 03, 2011
- Author:
- Brent Justice
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
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NVIDIA 3-Way SLI and AMD Tri-Fire Redux
We have re-tested performance between GTX 580 3-Way SLI and Radeon HD 6990+6970 Tri-Fire with a brand new Sandy Bridge 4.8GHz system. Our readers wanted to know if the CPU speed would improve performance and open up the potential of this triple-GPU performance beasts. To put it succinctly, they were right. The results completely turn the tables upside down and then some.
A2A Gameplay Performance
Now we get down to the meat of the comparison, how these two triple-GPU video card setups compare on our new 4.8GHz system. This page can be compared directly with this page on our previous evaluation, we have done the same tests, with the same drivers, just with all tests now being done on our new 4.8GHz system.
All apples-to-apples (A2A) run-throughs are done at 5760x1200 with settings that do not bottleneck VRAM. What you are about to see are the tables turn on Tri-Fire. Note that we are testing the default shipping stock frequency of the Radeon HD 6990, which is 830MHz GPU frequency. (Yes, we know we will hear some of you whine as to "unfair," as is done with every article we have ever published, but you will just have to live with it. Maybe we follow up with a full three 6970s?
Dragon Age II
In DA2 AMD Radeon HD 6990+6970 Tri-Fire maintains the performance advantage providing 21.7% more performance over GTX 580 3-Way SLI. The faster CPU has not changed the result in this game, the better experience is still had with Tri-Fire versus 3-Way SLI here.
F1 2010
The same cannot be said for F1 2010, in a very shocking twist, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 3-Way SLI is walking all over Radeon HD 6990+6970 Tri-Fire. As we saw on the previous pages, GTX 580 3-Way SLI received a 30% boost in performance, while Tri-Fire received a 14% loss in performance. With 3-Way SLI going a lot faster, and Tri-Fire going slower, the tables turn on this system with 3-Way SLI offering the flat out best experience. GeForce GTX 580 3-Way SLI is giving us 27.6% more performance.
Metro 2033
In our previous evaluation, we experienced much the same performance between both configurations on that system. With the new 4.8GHz system GTX 580 3-Way SLI edges out Tri-Fire by 6% now. Keep in mind though, GTX 580 3-Way SLI is still $500 more expensive, so 6% more performance for $500 more dollars.
Battlefield: Bad Company 2
The CPU was holding back 3-Way SLI in this game as we saw, and now the performance is able to exceed Tri-Fire where it did not on the previous system. We are now getting 24.3% more performance with 3-Way SLI versus Tri-Fire in this game.
Crysis: Warhead
On our previous system, Tri-Fire gave us slightly more performance in this game, but the tables are turned with the new system. GeForce GTX 580 3-Way SLI is giving us 7.5% more performance.
Quite a turning of tables, we are experiencing differences as low as 6% but as high as almost 30% also. GTX 580 3-Way SLI now performs a certain percentage faster than Tri-Fire in all of these games except for DA2.