680 SLI vs 670 SLI vs 690

Killa|3yte

2[H]4U
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Dec 22, 2002
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I'm looking at upgrading my setup to a 5760x1080 setup.

I'm having a hard time figuring out what would work best for me between the three options in the title. The upside to the 690 would be that I won't need to bend pins on my MB. (I have an MSI P67 SLI MB, the only catch is that the 2nd video card doesn't fit if it's big :rolleyes:)

Any opinions on this, or should I be looking at something else entirely?
 
690 you will be limited at 2gig of vram. with the 670 or 680 option you can get cards with 4gigs
 
After having personally gamed at 7680x1600 resolution with a single GTX 690, I would say that it would be more than awesome for you at 5760x1080. Cheaper than 2x GTX 680 (depending on which models you look at), but still better than 2x GTX 670. Power requirements are lower, and the card is just majorly badass.

That is my input on it though. No modifications to your mobo!
 
Yes, I had briefly considered a 7680x1600 setup, especially with these low cost Korean monitors which seem to be quite popular. I decided that that was just too many pixels to push. 1080p is no slouch in my book.
 
From what I have seen, the only major game that benefits from 4GB VRAM is Skyrim with lots of mods.

I've heard that the 690 is the smoothest - likely because it has a dedicated bus between the GPUs and is probably cheaper overall. If I could rustle a deal, I would probably try to sell/trade my 680 and get one.

That said, I recently sold my second 680 and I'm surprised at how well a single card will run surround. I have not tried BF3, but on Bad Company 2 and Guild Wars 2, a single 680 gives at least good, and often great performance.

If you're short on cash or if you play older games that are less demanding, you might start with a single 680 and add a second one if you think you need it and you think you want to stick with surround.

NV Surround can be a pain and it has it's quirks. If you're like me, you might not want to even play most games that don't support it (Lookin' at you Tribes Ascension). However, I've settled into Guild Wars 2 and it's fantastic for this game and I couldn't be happier.

I was also going to mention that I had 680 SLI in a mATX case and I think a 690 in an mITX case would be the ultimate...
 
Well, after scouring these forums for hours, I ditched the EF/Surround idea. Seemed like there were lots of mixed feelings about the setups.

Picked up a 30" Dell locally from the classifieds. Having a hard time deciding between:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...na-_-na-_-na&AID=10440897&PID=3891137&SID=KRB

and

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...-na-_-na&AID=10440897&PID=3891137&SID=rewrite

Thoughs?

both are excellent cards, with similar performance although i dont really think the 680 lightning is beatable. the extra vram should not contribute to much to your decision making.
 
Thanks so much for the replies. Ended up getting the MSI 680.

That said, I fired up BF3 with the 6850 and it seems to handle BF3 maxed just fine :confused: at 2560x1600. Seems to never go lower than about 30. Wondering if I was wrong in assuming that the 6850 would not be up to the task.
 
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