Hardware scaler - you're talking about wishing you could hook up an xbox? So what's the best way to buy a 3008 in about a year?
With a hardware scaler a monitor can run at whatever resolution it supports. The 3007 will only run at 2560x1600 and then you can change that later with your computer. You can not hook up an Xbox 360 to a 3007 because it will only run at 2560x1600 and the Xbxo 360 doesn't support that.
Why not? They're even thinner/lighter, relatively cheap to manufacture, offer superb contrast and colour accuracy and almost zero response time. The only drawback is that they currently discolour after a couple of year's use. Give them some time to work out the drawbacks...
When LCDs were in their infancy they were too. Creative Zen MP3 players now use OLED screens and they're not overpriced. As I say, give it time. A year is a substantial period of time technology wise. A year ago, the 45nm chips we use don't exist, neither did any of the 8800GS/GT/GTS G92 etc cards or the HD3850/3870s let alone the 4000 series. Hard disks were limited to 750GB and cost £150, and 30" monitors were still four figures in pounds.
It's my hope I can go through this year without spending a vast amount on upgrades (hah, that's a laugh) so I may potentially consider upgrading my monitor at some stage for when I leave my current student accommodation and require a slightly more portable TV than a CRT!
5500... I don't post nearly as much as you do though. I occasionally try to help out peeps in the PC building sections.
Alright alright... enough! For the record, I got GRiD working on the 4870X2 at 2560 with AA in CF mode with a decent frame rate, but there is microstutter which makes it an unpleasant 60fps, rather than the smooth playback you'd expect from 60 frames... No other game I've tried in CF has been like this...
Did you test Grid with your single 4870 to get a feel for the response - maybe something else is off - some setting?
It's a bug with GRiD, all the review sites reported it, Crossfire with the 4800 series causes random lag in the game, it never worked in CF at all with the earlier cards. A single 4870 handles it fine, but lags with AA (not enough memory), not tried it with AA on my solo X2, but with CF off on this, and with using the solo 4870 it runs fine without AA, but then it did on the 3870 as well. Oh well.
I didn't quite understand. The x2 has more memory, right - 1 gig? So that will help with AA, whereas the 4870 solo has only 512mb, right? The Grid problem is CF. Can you run the 4870x2 card in non-CF mode, just for the extra memory, so you can run the AA? (Or did you say you already did this?)