Shortly after the release of the Radeon HD 5770 on October 13th 2009, we took a shot at placing two of these affordable graphics cards together. The end result was impressive as we had created a configuration that was not only faster than a single Radeon HD 5850, but also cheaper. Not to mention on occasion the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration was found neck and neck with the Radeon HD 5870.

Given that the launch of the Radeon HD 5850 nullified the single-GPU flagship Nvidia product of the time, being the GeForce GTX 285, the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration made a mockery of it. However since our last Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire performance article, Nvidia has struck back with their new Fermi graphics cards.

Granted value is not a strong suit of the Fermi architecture, however the GeForce GTX 470 is within striking distance of the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration, costing just $30-$40 US more. The GeForce GTX 465 also recently launched at $280, making it $30-$40 US cheaper than the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration. That said, the GeForce GTX 465 is also much slower than the GTX 470, so we are going to concentrate on the faster GPU for this article.

As it stands, a pair of Radeon HD 5770 graphics cards is only going to cost $320 US, while gamers can expect to pay slightly less for a single Radeon HD 5850 or a little bit more for a single GeForce GTX 470. By itself a single Radeon HD 5770 graphics cards is far from impressive, delivering mediocre performance in many recently released video games such as Battlefield Bad Company 2, Aliens vs. Predator, Just Cause 2 and Metro 2033 for example.

Back when we first tested the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire graphics cards, most of the games we tested with saw a single card render over 30fps at 1920x1200. The games just mentioned hammer the Radeon HD 5770 and as a result average frame rates often struggled to get much above 20fps. Therefore boosting performance with a second Radeon HD 5770 has become more important than ever.

Hardware - Intel Core i7 965 Extreme Edition (Overclocked @ 3.70GHz) - x3 2GB G.Skill DDR3 PC3-12800 (CAS 9-9-9-24) - Seagate 500GB 7200-RPM (Serial ATA300) - Radeon HD 5870 (1GB) - Radeon HD 5850 (1GB) - Radeon HD 5770 (1GB) Crossfire - Radeon HD 5770 (1GB) - Radeon HD 4890 (1GB) - GeForce GTX 480 (1536MB) - GeForce GTX 470 (1280MB) - GeForce GTX 285 (1GB) - Asus P6T Deluxe (Intel X58) Software - Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate (64-bit) - Nvidia Forceware 257.15 - ATI Catalyst 10.5

The Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire setup was 82% faster than a single Radeon HD 5770 graphics card at 1920x1200 with a score of 10034pts. Although this meant that the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards were 14% slower than the Radeon HD 5870, it also meant that they were 5% faster than the Radeon HD 5850, and 13% faster than the GeForce GTX 470.

When benchmarking with Aliens vs. Predator using the maximum in-game quality settings with 4xAA/16xAF enabled, we see that even the mighty GeForce GTX 480 struggles to break 30fps at 1920x1200. At this very same resolution the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration was just 6.5% slower than the Radeon HD 5870, while it was 12% faster than the Radeon HD 5850 and GeForce GTX 470 graphics cards. With an average of 28fps, the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire graphics cards were impressive when compared to the competition.

The Battlefield Bad Company 2 performance margins were similar to those seen when testing with Aliens vs. Predator. The Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire setup was just 7.5% slower than the Radeon HD 5870, while it lead the Radeon HD 5850 by a massive 11.5% margin. Furthermore the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire graphics cards were able to beat the GeForce GTX 470 by a convincing enough 6.5% margin, as it delivered 3fps more at 1920x1200.

Despite using the maximum-in game quality settings, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 fails to really push these high-end graphics cards. As a result at 1920x1200 the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration delivered an average of 134fps, making it faster than even the GeForce GTX 480. Here the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire graphics cards were 29% faster than the Radeon HD 5870 and an incredible 50.5% faster than the Radeon HD 5850. Then on top of that the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire setup was still 25% faster than the GeForce GTX 470.

Company of Heroes Opposing Fronts is another game that really fails to push these high-end graphics cards and at 1920x1200 the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards averaged 117fps. This made them just 4% slower than the Radeon HD 5870 and GeForce GTX 470 graphics cards, while they were 11.5% faster than the Radeon HD 5850.

Crysis Warhead is still one of the most demanding games available and this is evident when testing with these high-end graphics cards. At 1920x1200 the GeForce GTX 480 averaged just 27fps, while the Radeon HD 5870 was slightly slower with 25fps. This meant that although the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration was 16% slower than the Radeon HD 5870, it matched the performance of the Radeon HD 5850 and GeForce GTX 470 graphics cards with 21fps each.

Far Cry 2 is a game that heavily favors Nvidia based graphics cards, particularly the new GeForce GTX 400 series. As a result the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards are found to be 21% slower than the GeForce GTX 470, while they matched the Radeon HD 5870 and beat the Radeon HD 5850 by an 18% margin.

The Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards scaled extremely well in Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X, with an average of 103fps at 1920x1200. This meant that the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration was 16% faster than the Radeon HD 5870, 14.5% faster than the GeForce GTX 470 and impressively 34% faster than the Radeon HD 5850.

Just Cause 2 is a new game recently added to the batch of games we benchmark with and it provides a bit of a challenge for the high-end graphics cards. Although Crossfire is not delivering the kind of performance boosts we would like to see, the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration was still very quick with an average of 44fps at 1920x1200. This meant that the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards were just 10% slower than the Radeon HD 5870, while they beat the Radeon HD 5850 by a 7.5% margin and the GeForce GTX 470 by an even more impressive 10% margin.

Since we only benchmark Metro 2033 using DirectX 11, the older GeForce GTX 285 and Radeon HD 4890 graphics cards have been dropped from this game. At 1920x1200 the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards delivered an average of 39fps, making them 2.5% faster than the Radeon HD 5870 and an incredible 22% faster than the Radeon HD 5850. Meanwhile they also beat the GeForce GTX 470 by a 5.5% margin.

Resident Evil 5 is another older game that really struggles to pressure these high-end graphics cards, as we see average frame rates reach and even exceed 100fps at 1920x1200. Here the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards averaged 98fps, making them just 2% slower than the Radeon HD 5870. Meanwhile the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards were 12.5% faster than the Radeon HD 5850 and 15% faster than the GeForce GTX 470.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat is another DX11 title that we do not test using older graphics cards. At 1920x1200 the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards delivered an average of 88fps, making them 14% slower than the Radeon HD 5870, while 5% faster than the Radeon HD 5850. However when compared to the GeForce GTX 470, the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards were 17.5% faster.

The Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards scale well when testing with World in Conflict Soviet Assault, as they were found to be 10% faster than the Radeon HD 5870. Then on top of that they were 7.5% faster than the GeForce GTX 470 and incredibly 27% faster than the Radeon HD 5850.

Finally we have Wolfenstein, and at 1920x1200 the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire graphics cards were just 7% slower than the Radeon HD 5870, while they beat the Radeon HD 5850 by an impressive 11.5% performance margin. Then on top of that they polished the GeForce GTX 470 off by a 23% performance margin.

The thing we really like about the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration is that it’s not nearly as power hungry as you might expect. In fact, a pair of Radeon HD 5770 graphics cards are comparable to the previous generation single GPU flagship products, such as the GeForce GTX 285 and Radeon HD 4890. Although the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards do use around 23% more power than a single Radeon HD 5850, they are also 4% less power hungry than the GeForce GTX 470. So in terms of efficiency the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire setup makes sense.

Another trade off to having not one but two graphics cards in a computer is heat and you will see that load temperatures of the Radeon HD 5770 do increase by 13% when adding a second graphics card. This is the temperature of the primary graphics card only, but still there is a noticeable increase. That said, when compared to the Radeon HD 5850 and GeForce GTX 470 graphics cards, the temperatures are still very reasonable. Also keep in mind we are using graphics cards with reference design coolers, so modified Radeon HD 5770 graphics cards are likely to perform much better.

For example at 1920x1200, which was the resolution that we focused on, adding a second Radeon HD 5770 graphics card improved performance by 75% when testing with Aliens vs. Predator, while we saw a 78% performance increase when testing with Battlefield Bad Company 2. Other new games such as Just Cause 2 and Metro 2033 saw 63% and 86% performance gains respectively.

When testing these newer games we found that the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration outworked the GeForce GTX 470 and Radeon HD 5850. In fact, on average across the thirteen games tested the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards were 17% faster than the Radeon HD 5850 and 9% faster than the GeForce GTX 470.

Perhaps even more impressive than any of that was the fact that the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire graphics cards were less than 1% slower than the Radeon HD 5870 on average. In four games, being Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X, Metro 2033 and World in Conflict Soviet Assault, the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire cards were found to be faster than a single Radeon HD 5870, while they delivered the same performance when testing with Far Cry 2.

When you consider that the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire setup costs just $320 US, making it 20% cheaper than a single Radeon HD 5870, 9% cheaper than the GeForce GTX 470, and just 3% more expensive than the Radeon HD 5850, it really starts to make sense. At just 3% more than the Radeon HD 5850 we enjoyed up to 50% more performance, while on average this setup still provided 17% more performance.

The other great news about this affordable setup is that the supporting hardware won’t burn a hole in your wallet. This setup can be supported by affordable AMD or Intel motherboards as long as they feature dual PCI Express x16 slots with at least x8 bandwidth. The other good news for the more power conscious readers is that a pair of Radeon HD 5770 graphics cards consume less power than a single GeForce GTX 470 under load.

When summing up our conclusion 8 months ago we had this to say…

“While we would not go as far as to say you should forget the Radeon HD 5870 and go for a pair of Radeon HD 5770 graphics cards, there is no denying that these budget graphics cards are really something when used in Crossfire. For those looking to spend around $300 US on their graphics card budget, we feel that the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire configuration is the way to go.”

Now many months later, after the release of the new GeForce GTX 400 series, nothing has changed in our opinion and that original statement still stands. If anything, we are now more sold on the Radeon HD 5770 Crossfire setup, as it has proven to support newly released gaming titles just as well.