Nvidia or ATI?

[maroon1]

You can see 9600GT SLI vs HD3870 crossfire benchmarks on this review
GeForce 9600 GT vs. Radeon HD 3870 - TechSpot

I recommend two 9600GT in SLI, and I think it is cheaper as well

EDIT

8800 GTS SLI > 3870 crossfire > 8800 GT SLI
but it's close between 3870's crossfired and 8800 GT's SLI'd

8800GT SLI > HD3870 crossfire

t-break - Crossfire vs SLI
AMD's Radeon HD 3870 X2 video card - The Tech Report - Page 7

Both reviews are more up to date than the review from expreview.com. In addition, the review from expreview is the only review I ever saw that doesn't show 8800GT SLI outperforming HD3870 crossfire

 

[Apokalipse]

You can see 9600GT SLI vs HD3870 crossfire benchmarks on this review
GeForce 9600 GT vs. Radeon HD 3870 - TechSpot

I recommend two 9600GT in SLI

That's because you always prefer Nvidia.

either 3870's or 9600 GT's are a good choice. 9600 GT's perform a bit better when you've got anti-aliasing, 3870's perform better without it.
Crossfire is extremely easy to get running. You literally just have to check one box.

The 9600 GT's have single slot coolers, while 3870's have dual slot coolers.
The 3870's will run cooler, and won't be as loud, though depending on your motherboard, they might prevent you from using PCI-PCI-E slots you might need.
Unless you get aftermarket cooling (such as the Thermalright HR-03 GT's, which fit on 9600 GT's and 3870's)

*edit*
I'm pretty sure Catalyst 8.5 performs significantly better overall than Catalyst 8.2
the newer forceware drivers also have performance improvements, but not as much....

 

[veg1992]

You forgot to mention the 55nm Process helps it run cooler as well ^^

 

[35g700]

But with crossfire cant you use two differnt cards? So if I use one 3870 and in the futre instead of getting another 3870 I could just get a better card and have better preformence? rather then having to buy another 9600GT or 8800GT?

 

[ricanflow]

It scales down to the weaker card...

 

[Apokalipse]

It scales down to the weaker card...

kind of... the weaker card will slow down the stronger card in scissor mode and super-tiling mode, since the stronger card will have to wait for the weaker card to put together the entire frame (each card renders part or parts of the frame, and then the main card stitches the images together)... it might be faster with alternate frame rendering though.

But with crossfire cant you use two differnt cards? So if I use one 3870 and in the futre instead of getting another 3870 I could just get a better card and have better preformence? rather then having to buy another 9600GT or 8800GT?

You can use two cards of the same series (you could, for example, use a 3650 with a 3870 or something... though I wouldn't recommend that)
I don't think you can crossfire a 3800 series card with a 2900 series card. I'm not sure if a 4800 series card would work with a 3800 series card. AMD have reworked crossfire so it works much simpler now, so it might be possible....

 

[thirdshiftdj]

get hd3870's and oc the snot out of them.

 

[ricanflow]

get hd3870's and oc the snot out of them.

Or voltmodded 3850's.

 

[veg1992]

Or Pencil Mods

Gurusan did that ^^

 

[Drizzt]

Or just buy 2 9800gx2's and have a blast.