Hi so i have a 4870 right now and im looking to get a second one (yeah i know 5000 series are out but w/e) i heard if u crossfire 2 cards u can only get 1 display is this true? im pretty sure it is but anyway im gettign a second monitor and i was wondering if its possible to switch off from crossfire to normal so i can game on a single one and then just watch while watchign vids on youtube on the second just like that? or would i be better off not crossfiring @ all. and if i dont corssfire what would be my fps boost?

you can still have a two monitor setup with your cards in crossfire.

as far as enabling / disabling crossfire, it's as easy as this: check the box "enable crossfirex"
(i always leave mine in crossfire)

Hello Impulse Fire911,
I have two 4870x2 Cards in crossfire and run two monitors with no issues, as for watching videos on one and playing games on the other, I'm not too sure, when your in game you would have to minimise the game as the mouse wont go to the other screen.
You don't need to turn off crossfire to run two monitors.
Hope this helps, let us know how it goes, good luck.

Originally Posted by stoneys-nutz

as for watching videos on one and playing games on the other, I'm not too sure, when your in game you would have to minimise the game as the mouse wont go to the other screen.

yeah, (i skipped over this upon first reading) most games lock the cursor to the monitor. so to do what you want, you'd have to start the video first on one monitor and start the game on the other. most of the time when i game, i have outlook and tweetdeck open on my second monitor so whenever i have a load for the game, i'll glance over to see my tweets or messages

I like to have monitoring software on my other monitor when gaming, temps, CPU and memory usage, that sort of thing.
It's cool to surf and watch a video or film too.

Originally Posted by stoneys-nutz

I like to have monitoring software on my other monitor when gaming, temps, CPU and memory usage, that sort of thing.
It's cool to surf and watch a video or film too.

+1

And just to back up and clarify what others have said - you can run dual-monitors with crossfire enabled. To run three or more, you must disable it.

For example, the majority of the time I have dual screens with CF enabled. However, when I want to use my projector as a third display, I simply disable CF in CCC.

9/10 this works well. Although every now and then, the drivers glitch when re-enabling CF which is always resolved with a restart.