"This isn't really a fair comparison between the Nvidia and ATI cards. On the Nvidia side you've got their brand new 480's (out less than a month?) vs ATI's mid grade 5 series cards." Once again, they are testing the best single GPU cards from each company the 5970 is a dual GPU card so the 5870 is the best single GPU they got. Its not Gamespot's fault ATI is slacking and hasn't made a new single GPU lately.

"why didn't they compare the Tri SLI GTX 480 to Tri Crossfire 5970?" Because the 5970 is a dual GPU card, the were testing the top single GPU cards from each company.