Maximum PC

im new to this and working on my first build. im trying to understand the specs to all these cards and it would be a huge help if someone could give me either some advice or a link that can explain what all the specs etc mean. Where would two lesser cards have more power than one higher end card.

I really appreciate any help you can give. Im looking to build a system that can handle battlefield 3 and I don't want to pay waay too much because I dont realize that a cheaper model card has similar capabilities

...so how much are you willing to spend on your new build?

Here is a start, the minimum and recommended specs you should have to run the game.

http://www.enterbf3.com/information/538 ... uirements/

Nasty

Probably altogether a G. But I've already got a sizable tower (CM Stacker STC-T01) and a power-supply, as well as two DVD optical drives and ram. I have to buy a motherboard, a hard-drive, and a video card...oh yeah, and a processor, lol.

ok so i found the separate specs list and boy do i feel like an idiot. My question now becomes, when using 2 cards do i just use simple addition to figure the power of the two cards together...ie if the card has these specs: Chipset Manufacturer:
AMD
Core Clock: 775MHz
Stream Processors: 960 Stream Processing Units
Effective Memory Clock: 1000MHz (4.0Gbps)
DirectX:
DirectX 11
OpenGL:
OpenGL 3.2
HDMI: 1 x HDMI
DisplayPort: 1 x DisplayPort
(copied and pasted)
would 2 cards give me 2000MHz, 1550 core clock etc...?

The two cards working together give you much higher Frame-rates than one card can render. It doesn't change the speed of the cards at all.

This pretty much explains it all:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMD_CrossFireX

Nasty

Thanks Nasty...This is the build i have as of now. Will make a couple decisions before ordering the parts.

(copied and pasted)
ASUS VH232H Glossy Black 23" 5ms Widescreen Full HD 1080p LCD Monitor 300 cd/m2 ASCR 20000:1 w/Speakers & HDMI, VESA Compatible

Seagate Barracuda ST31000524AS 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

Intel Core i5-2500K Sandy Bridge 3.3GHz (3.7GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 3000 BX80623I52500K
bundled with:

1x MSI P67A-C43 (B3) LGA 1155 Intel P67 SATA 6Gb/s ...

EVGA SuperClocked 012-P3-1572-AR GeForce GTX 570 (Fermi) 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

Or

ASUS ENGTX570 DCII/2DIS/1280MD5 GeForce GTX 570 (Fermi) 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card

ICY DOCK MB990SP-B Dual Bay 2.5" to 3.5" SATA/IDE SSD & Hard Drive Bracket / Adapter

Patriot Signature 4GB 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10600) Desktop Memory Model PSD34G13332

Logitech K100 Black PS/2 Wired Slim Classic Keyboard

Why buy the Intel cpu with graphics if you are intending to use a discrete video card in your pc? Why pay extra for graphics you don't need in the cpu?

Once again, why buy a monitor with speakers that sound like tin cans if you already have a set of speakers? I bought a Samsung SyncMaster PX 2370 monitor for gaming and love it.

I have had Asus video cards in the past. I had to rma a card that died in a crossfire setup. They gave me two new cards of lesser value and performance to replace the two other cards, of which one was dead. This is why I bought XFX cards this time around and not Asus....hopefully they will at least give me equivalent cards if one of the new cards burns.

Nasty