AMD attacks NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 200 series once again. This time they are aiming for the flagship GeForce GTX 280. Our article reveals if the card can reach the top position. AMD's launch policy is quite odd at the moment. With the release of the Radeon HD 4850 the press was not allowed to present full scope details but benchmarks yes, though nothing about the architecture. The same deal for the Radeon HD 4870 X2 card again. We are allowed to publish some benchmarks and impressions while details about the architecture are an absolute no way. But that can't keep us from interpreting the results which is what we are about to do and gives some minor information. - PCGHardware

ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 Gaming Video Board Preview

The Radeon HD 4870 X2 is equipped with two RV770 chips that cooperate via the CrossFireX technology. The reason for this is an economical one. It is much cheaper to develop and produce a small graphics chip. Every additional transistor requires more know how and needs more space on the wafer. Furthermore with a growing size of the GPU, the number of malfunctions rises. While NVIDIA took the risk with the GT200 chipset, the financially stricken Canadians chose the performance of multiple chips. But today more GPU's don't automatically result in a better gaming performance and experience.

The RV770 duo config on the Radeon HD 4870 X2 is called R700 by AMD. For the communication of the GPU's there is a PLX bridge chip. The new chip is compatible with PCI Express 2.0 and that grants an improved data throughput. The clock speeds fully match those of the Radeon HD 4870. Both GPU's run with 750MHz and the GDDR5 memory is working with 3600MHz. Sixteen chips with 128MB each are placed on the board and deliver an overall capacity of 2048MB. Yes that's right, two gigabyte of video memory. And each chip can fully access 1024MB, and yeah the rumors about a combined memory pool are wrong.

The Radeon HD 4870 X2 card needs a lot of energy in order to deliver its high performance. According to AMD this is because not all the energy saving features have been integrated into our pre-production sample. The GPU gets as hot as 90°C in an open test setup. After several minutes running the 3DMark Vantage Extreme setup the maximal fan loudness increased and the card reaches a temperature of around 70-80°C. If the fan speed is forced to 100% capacity it reaches unbearable sound levels. So on that aspect some work can be done, to come up with a better solution to keep the noise levels to a minimum.

The Radeon HD 4870 X2 delivers some brutal performance, as long as CrossFire is working properly. The benchmark with Crysis revealed that the current beta driver is having trouble with the DirectX 10 game mode. If the default artificial intelligence was deactivated the performance increased although only a single chip was working and this caused a reduction in performance in this game. In most of the other tests the Radeon HD 4870 X2 was able to beat the GeForce GTX 280. AMD did not give any numbers regarding the price, but we estimate that the card will cost about $629.