Conclusion
With the latest drivers from ATI and Nvidia it is very clear that in the high end of the market the GeForce based cards offer significant benefits over the equivalent Radeons. This is true of single GPU systems but even more so of the multi-GPU setups.
Currently Nvidia have SLI working well in Far Cry 2 as our results show but ATI’s CrossFire performance increases are very poor right now. As we went to press ATI released an additional hotfix driver ( 737-38664: Far Cry 2, Stalker Clear Sky, Brother In Arms - Hell's Highway HotFix ) which helped performance on the 4870 X2 by a small percentage but we are optimistic in the future that further gains are maximised.
Our current recommendations for Far Cry 2 would be as follows:
2560x1600 with AA: GTX 260 SLI
2560x1600 no AA: GTX 260
1920x1080 With AA: GTX 260
1920x1080 no AA: 9800 GTX+
1280x800: 9800GT or 4830
We would also suggest that consumers consider that cards such as the XFX products tested in this review are bundled with a free copy of Far Cry 2, so if the screenshots and videos on the previous page were appealing to you those cards would seem to be a wise purchase.
The Far Cry 2 bundles will be hitting the shelves within the next week, and some of our links are currently directing to deals with Assassins' Creed. It is best checking with your favourite retailer as to availability, but we have been assured by XFX that the Far Cry 2 bundles will be exactly the same prices.
Currently due to competitive pricing, great support and higher than reference clocks we are confident that all the XFX products on review today will give you, the gamer, the best performance possible in their respective classes with Far Cry 2.
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