Crossfire + Eyefinity

[Guest]

Hi all,

I recently came across a couple of worn out Dell U2312HM monitors (things like pixel lines and so on) and since I have a decent condition one as my primary display I decided to go for a 3 screen eyefinity setup putting things like the pixel line screens on the sides so they are out of my direct line of vision, based on demonstrations of the HD6850 playing Eyefinity well I brought myself a HD7850 2GB from XFX, overall I am happy with the principle result I got and it is indeed working across three screens however I have some problems/concerns...

Firstly the card seams to be at 98% GPU usage all the time, even though the card remains at around 68 degrees C most of the time (highest its ever gone to was 82 and that was in crossfire for reasons I'll explain in a moment) I am still not comfortable with that higher GPU usage, is that normal and will it damage my card even if the temperatures are ok?

Secondly as I know its not a massively high end card I decided to buy a second one, despite buying the exact same card based on model number etc its actually a slightly different version, both are XFX Core Edition HD7850 2GB cards with their Ghost single fan cooler, main difference from what I can tell is the heat sync attached to GPU is slightly different on each and one has an extra DVI port on the back. But anyway I tried them in Crossfire and due to my motherboard only allowing me to put them right next to each other I added a Static Pressure fan blowing straight onto them to help cooling, the problem I had next was that when trying to play games with it I would still be hitting 98% GPU usage on BOTH GPUs, games I tested were Tomb Raider, Guild Wars 2 and World of Warcraft, I know the latter of the three is a bit dodgy with Crossfire and Eyefinity and trust me it took me a long long time to make it even playable on both GPUs,

For the time being I have removed my second card and gone back to using just one as I am not happy with how close they were in the system and since I have no alternative ports and a second graphics card currently stops my soundcard from fitting in the machine I intend to buy a new motherboard with a more suitable layout, however I am just wondering if my results I got while using Crossfire was normal, it seams a little bit strange how when in eyefinity GPU is being hit 98% by games and the addition of the second GPU makes no difference and seams to make it worse as now both are being used 98%, its worth noting I diden't even have these games on massivly high settings aside from the resoloution, rest was all around fair.

What can I do to get the best performance out of my setup?

Intel I7 3770

8GB Crucial Ballistix Tactical Tracer

2x XFX HD7850 2GB

Is basically what I'm working with, as for motherboard if its relevant I currently have a Maximus V Gene but since I use a Midi ATX case I intend to get eaither a Gigabyte UD/P4-TH or one of those new MSI gaming series boards.