Gizmodo: Crossfire

HYDRA System Lets "Vastly Different" Video Cards Work, Play Together

John Herrman — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 21:15:36 EDT

Lucid's HYDRA GPU pairing technology could soon allow PC builders to incorporate multiple video cards that - hear this, ATI and Nvidia - don't have to be identical. What this potentially means, among other things, is that gamers could leverage old hardware instead of just sadly setting it aside, though paired cards must be of the same brand. HYDRA differs functionally from Nvidia's SLI and ATI's Crossfire solutions, which split rendering by sectioning off the screen and alternating frames between cards, respectively, by intelligently distributing highly specific rendering tasks between the GPUs. Instead of divvying up all the tasks equally, HYDRA will only send as many polygons or shader calls as each constituent card can handle (see right of the above pic for an example of what one of two cards might be rendering).

The most irritating aspects of current twin-card configurations (well, aside from the fact that you had to buy two cards in the first place) are the high cost and disappointingly low performance gains. HYDRA, which Lucid claims could scale to up to handle four unique GPUs, could remedy both of these issues if it ever comes to market. The company says it'll be soon, but that's as specific as they're getting for now. Visual learners can check out a detailed diagram of the system below. [PcPer via Slashdot]

Dell Ditching Proprietary Parts

Sean Fallon — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 18:15:48 EST

One of the best arguments for building your own PCs is that you make the decisions regarding parts, which means you don't have to scrap the whole system or buy sub-standard hardware from the manufacturer when it is time to upgrade. This is especially true for gaming rigs. Dell, one of the biggest offenders when it comes to this issue, has announced that proprietary parts like power supplies and motherboards will be a thing of the past.

Apparently, pressure from critics and competing devices like the Blackbird 002 from HP prompted the change— which is also evident in their decision to offer support NVIDIA's dual-card SLI or AMD's dual-card CrossFire cards. They have even taken an extra step towards openness by offering support for NVIDIA's Enthusiast System Architecture. The first gaming PC to feature these upgrades will be the "affordable" new XPS 630, which starts at $1249. [Maximum PC]

Shuttle SXDi: Water-cooled PC with CrossFire and Flames

www.gizmodo.com — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 04:19:29 EDT

This is the new Shuttle SDXi and although it's a variation of the XPC, it's also one BMF. It comes loaded for speed with a 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo E6600, 2 GBytes Crucial Ballistix RAM and a 10.000rpm Western Digital Raptor hard drive. But more importantly, the painted flames on the sides are guaranteed to make it run even faster. Or something like that.

Beyond the flames, the Shuttle SDXi supports CrossFire, so it can have two ATI Radeon X1950 Pro video cards. And the whole rig is water-cooled for silent operation. The PC comes with all the required ports, including Gigabit Ethernet, two FireWire, eight USB 2.0 but also eSATA and S/PDIF digital sound output. The SDXi has been announced in Japan but like most Shuttle products, it will probably get to the rest of the world shortly. Images of the back (with all the ports) and the box (with keyboard and mouse, also painted with flames for faster typing, dragging and clicking) are after the jump right now.

Price hasn't been announced yet, but sources point that the custom wheel rims will not be included. –Jesus Diaz

Product page (in japanese) [Shuttle via PC Watch]

ATI's Radeon X2800XT Brings Heavy Horsepower to Apple's Next Gen Mac Pros

Louis Ramirez — Thu, 22 Feb 2007 10:20:03 EST

So if the guys at AppleInsider are on the money, ATI's abnormally long X2800XT could be the graphics card to power Apple's rumored next gen Mac Pros. The red giant will feature 1GB of GDDR4 memory clocked at 2GHz while the card's core will come in at 800MHz. Basically that means it has the potential to eat Nvidia's overclocked 8800GTX for lunch. The card will also bring CrossFire technology to the Mac, so you'll be able to string two of these suckers together for maximum voltage. It's about time we get some heavy duty card options for the Mac. Better start saving now, though, as I'm sure this config won't come cheap. – Louis Ramirez

ATI Radeon X2800XT with CrossFire [via AppleInsider via CrunchGear]

Sapphire's Godfather Makes Quad Crossfire a Reality

Louis Ramirez — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 10:15:43 EST

Sapphire scored some major bragging points this morning by demoing a dual-GPU Radeon X1950 Pro board it's calling, the Godfather. The card runs on a single x16 PCI-Express slot and provides the kind of performance you'd get from running two X1950 cards in Crossfire mode. What's interesting about the Godfather, however, is that it can be paired with another Godfather letting gamers create their own power-hungry Quad Crossfire systems. Chances are you're better off splurging on a single high-end card, but if Quad Crossfire gets your juices flowing, the Godfather is expected to debut in early 2007. – Louis Ramirez

Quad Crossfire, Here We Come [Daily Tech]

ATI Radeon X1950 Pro: CrossFire for the Mid-Range

Jason Chen — Tue, 17 Oct 2006 16:13:42 EDT

Aimed at people who want great graphics performance without having to spend their entire month's rent on a card—and then spend next month's rent on his twin brother. Starting at $199, the X1950 has ATI's CrossFire technology so you can enable CrossFire without using an actual CrossFire Edition card.

The card uses the R540 chip, and goes directly into competition with nVidia's GeForce 7900 GS in the medium-range market. Similar to nVidia's setup, the cards have two internal connectors to link the pair, and is flexible enough to allow for different spacing among different motherboards. There's also HDCP compliance so you can watch the locked-down "entertainment" studios are feeding you these days.

Best of all, the X1950 works with Stanford's Folding@Home beta client which produces around 20 to 40 times as many work units as a CPU. Get your game on and do medical research at home. Nice. – Jason Chen