Computex 2005: ATI CrossFire Technology

Conclusion

After months of waiting, ATI’s multi-VPU solution is almost here, and on paper it definitely looks pretty promising. We’re eager to test ATI’s claims of CrossFire support with all games. As many of you know, NVIDIA’s SLI currently supports approximately 70 titles natively; ATI claims their figure for CrossFire is in the thousands.

When we quizzed them about this, they indicated that they can boast support for so many titles because of SuperAA. In other words, they’re not claiming you’ll see a performance improvement in every game you play thanks to CrossFire, instead their solution allows you to crank up the AA to levels never seen before previously. Technically this allows them to claim CrossFire support, but it isn’t quite the same as the performance proposition NVIDIA pitches for their SLI solution. Although ATI feels they’ll be pretty strong in this regard too, claiming performance superior to NVIDIA in games such as Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory and Need for Speed Underground 2.

ATI’s unique compositing engine also allows them to support cards released around this time last year, such as the PCI-E X800 PRO and X800 XT. We bet many of you never dreamed you’d be able to pair up your card with a CrossFire for even more performance. X800 XL owners are probably drooling right now too.

Computex 2005: ATI CrossFire Technology [ @ 1600 x 1200 ] > View Full-Size in another window.

On the motherboard side, ATI has signed up manufacturers that they haven’t worked with previously such as DFI and ECS. Long-time partners such as Sapphire and TUL are also onboard to, as are the heavy-hitters such as ASUS, Gigabyte, and MSI. The first motherboards should arrive by the end of the month.

On the graphics side, ATI is going to handle early CrossFire production themselves, with their board partners to follow shortly thereafter. ATI expects the first CrossFire boards will be available in July, although as we stated earlier final pricing hasn’t been determined.

This is where NVIDIA’s G70 throws a wrench in ATI’s plans. If NVIDIA is able to launch G70 on time and it delivers the performance many expect it to, G70 could make life tough for CrossFire. After all, to start from scratch with CrossFire you’d have to purchase a new $200 motherboard, and as it stands right now a $300-$550 CrossFire card, in addition to a second RADEON card. That currently equates to over $1000 for a high-end setup, and about $800 for an X800 XL config. This is quite a bit more than NVIDIA is likely to charge for G70.

If G70 is as fast as many expect it to be, many enthusiasts may just pick up a G70. With ATI’s R520 launch rumored to be delayed until this Fall, ATI will have to quickly adjust pricing on their RADEON and CrossFire cards to hold them over until R520 is ready.

Right now it’s just a waiting game for both G70 and CrossFire though, so for right now, this is all just speculation. But it certainly looks like ATI has designed CrossFire to be more flexible than SLI, and that will likely win them points with many existing ATI card users who already own high-end ATI cards.

ATI stresses that they could also integrate CrossFire into their X700 series and even lower-end boards such as the X300, but they don’t feel these solutions make as much sense from a performance perspective. After all, by the time you’ve purchased a new Crossfire motherboard and two X700 cards, you could have bought a single RADEON X800 XL card that would outperform it.