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ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870 X2

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870 X2

The Mobility Radeon X3870 X2 combines two Mobility Radeon 3870 graphics cards (on MXM boards) onto one laptop in Crossfire (CF) mode. Therefore, the combination has a power consumption of roughly both cards combined. While the total available VRAM has been doubled, the effective VRAM is actually half of the combined total as each card must store the same textures and data onto their own respective onboard VRAM chips.

Depending on the application, the performance of the Radeon X3870 X2 about 0-40 percent above a single Mobility HD 3870 and is even a bit above the GeForce 8800M GTX SLI solution. Most, if not all, DirectX 9 games can run fluently in high resolutions and detail settings. More demanding DirectX 10 games, such as Crysis,  will only run acceptably well on medium to high detail settings with lowered resolutions.

As with all multi-GPU solutions, the HD 3870 X2 may suffer from a phenomenon known as micro stuttering. See here for an overview of the term and why it happens.

Hardware features that can be found on a single Mobility HD 3870 have been preserved in the Crossfire combination. As a result, the dual GPU setup can take advantage of Avivo HD in order to aid the CPU in decoding videos.

The power consumption of the Mobility 3870 X2 can be up to 110 Watt when including the MXM boards and VRAM chips. AMD specifies that the HD 3800 series can draw up to 33-55 Watt per card.

Mobility Radeon HD 3800 Series

Mobility Radeon HD 3870 X2 640 @ 0.66 GHz256 Bit @ 850 MHz
Mobility Radeon HD 3850 compare 320 @ 0.58 GHz256 Bit @ 750 MHz
CodenameM88-XT CF
ArchitectureRV6xx
Pipelines640 - unified
Core Speed660 MHz
Memory Speed850 MHz
Memory Bus Width256 Bit
Memory TypeGDDR3
Shared Memoryno
APIDirectX 10.1, Shader 4.0
Power Consumption110 Watt
Transistor Count1.3 Billion
technology55 nm
Notebook Sizelarge
Date of Announcement01.09.2008

Benchmarks

3DMark Vantage
3DM Vant. Perf. total +
3DM Vant. Perf. GPU no PhysX +
3DMark 06 3DMark 06 - Standard 1280x1024 +
3DMark 06
min: 11290     avg: 13435     median: 13815.5 (18%)     max: 14820 Points
Cinebench R10 Cinebench R10 Shading (32bit) +
- Range of benchmark values for this graphics card
- Average benchmark values for this graphics card
* Smaller numbers mean a higher performance

Game Benchmarks

The following benchmarks stem from our benchmarks of review laptops. The performance depends on the used graphics memory, clock rate, processor, system settings, drivers, and operating systems. So the results don't have to be representative for all laptops with this GPU. For detailed information on the benchmark results, click on the fps number.

Crysis - GPU Benchmark

Crysis - GPU Benchmark

2007
low 1024x768
67.7  fps    + Compare
med. 1024x768
36.6  fps    + Compare
high 1024x768
30.9  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings med..
Crysis - CPU Benchmark

Crysis - CPU Benchmark

2007
low 1024x768
84.1  fps    + Compare
med. 1024x768
37.3  fps    + Compare
high 1024x768
30.1  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings med..
Call of Juarez Benchmark

Call of Juarez Benchmark

2006
high 1024x768
66  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings high.
The Elder Scrolls IV - Oblivion

The Elder Scrolls IV - Oblivion

2006
high 1280x800
60  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings high.
Doom 3

Doom 3

2004
low 640x480
191  fps    + Compare
med. 640x480
191.7  fps    + Compare
high 800x600
190.3  fps    + Compare
ultra 1024x768
181.8  fps    + Compare
» With all tested laptops playable in detail settings ultra.
lowmed.highultraQHD4K
Crysis - GPU Benchmark67.736.630.9
Crysis - CPU Benchmark84.137.330.1
Call of Juarez Benchmark66
The Elder Scrolls IV - Oblivion60
Doom 3191191.7190.3181.8
< 30 fps
< 60 fps
< 120 fps
≥ 120 fps


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For more games that might be playable and a list of all games and graphics cards visit our Gaming List

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Notebook reviews with ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870 X2 graphics card

 

Review Alienware M17 Gaming Notebook

I only want to play… Alienware always offers high performance hardware for the desktop as well as for the notebook gamer, for a respective price, it shall be un...
Intel Core 2 Extreme QX9300 | ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3870 X2 | 17.10" | 4.5 kg

SCHENKER CXG7: Intel Core 2 Extreme X9100, 17.00", 4.5 kg
  External Review » Schenker MySN CXG7

Alienware M17: Intel Core 2 Extreme QX9300, 17.10", 4.5 kg
  External Review » Alienware M17

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Playable games for each graphics card and their average FPS results.

Class 0

Arc A380

Class 1

Class 2

Radeon PRO W6600M *

Class 3

UHD Graphics 32EUs
UHD Graphics 750

Class 4

Class 5

* Approximate position of the graphics adapter