Crysis Warhead maxed out on a $700 PC

[hanselthecaretaker]

I kind of like the AA........yeah, from afar it doesn't do much, but the up close kills look alot nicer.

Real quick, pop quiz.......what would you take, those new gtx 280's or two 9800 gx2's in sli?

Personally I'm not a big fan of SLI or Crossfire setups. I'd rather one higher end card than two slightly below it, or even equalivalent. Less strain on the PSU and one less potential headache to deal with as far as compatibility/driver updates/etc go. The performance difference to me is negligible when compared to the cost of the extra card required to get it. But then there's uber geeks like Kano who would probably scoff at this notion, lol.

If you're looking for Nvidia, the 280 is going to be the best bang for the buck. The GX2's in quad SLI have been charted around the web as averaging anywhere from -2 to around 10-12 frames better, so it's a bit of a crapshoot depending on stuff like varying clock speeds of different brands, optimization, etc.

Here's a helpful topic on single card vs. sli; almost a year old but still generally relevant-
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/245926-33-single-card

For ATI (AMD) the Radeon 4870X2 is where it's at, and actually I think is still the single card to beat. It runs hot but you won't have a problem playing Crysis at any resolution maxed out. The game was designed to scale for the future though, so extras like AA thrown in will still bog down any card available. I'm happy getting solid framerates on medium to be honest.

 

[redsamurai]

the gx2's are the best of the 9800 series right??

And why did they go back to the g80 processors with the 280's??

Personally I'm not a big fan of SLI or Crossfire setups. I'd rather one higher end card than two slightly below it, or even equalivalent. Less strain on the PSU and one less potential headache to deal with as far as compatibility/driver updates/etc go. The performance difference to me is negligible when compared to the cost of the extra card required to get it. But then there's uber geeks like Kano who would probably scoff at this notion, lol.

If you're looking for Nvidia, the 280 is going to be the best bang for the buck. The GX2's in quad SLI have been charted as getting about 10-12 frames better on average, but that's up to you on how much you want to spend.
For ATI (AMD) the Radeon 4870X2 is where it's at, and actually I think is still the single card to beat. It runs hot but you won't have a problem playing Crysis at any resolution maxed out.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

the gx2's are the best of the 9800 series right??

And why did they go back to the g80 processors with the 280's??

Yeah the 260's/280's were after the 9800's. No idea why Nvidia changed processors. I've read they haven't been doing too well lately, and AMD is making strides to compete....maybe it's a financial strategy, tough to say.