980 vs 970sli

[Dayaks]

What would you guys do? 980 or 970sli?

I've been burned by crossfire. It seemed to take 70 FPS on crossfire to match 40 FPS on a single card. Then game compatibility issues.. Ect. How's the green side of things with sli?

 

[BroHamBone]

It seems like everyone is talking 970 sli.

Drivers are the case when optimizing sli for games and nvidia seems to push harder for them.

 

[Dayaks]

I am leaning 970 sli... The value is just too good. And I could add a third card later (or now). I think you're right about Nvidia's drivers.

4GB and DSR has me pretty sold!

 

[xBanzai89]

I would take 970 SLI in a heartbeat if you are willing to spend the extra cash on it. Really seems like a no brainer IMO. Even in the event you turn off SLI the 970 is that much slower compared to a 980 anyway.

 

[new2019]

970 sli is way better than one 980.

 

[Tgrove]

Nvidia really hammered the price/performance market with gtx 970 sli. It's very comparable to the gtx 670 vs gtx 680, were talking an avg of 10 fps give it take. I mean think about it, would you rather spend $550 for one card or $660 for 2 cards? It's like a moot point really

 

[Dayaks]

Nvidia really hammered the price/performance market with gtx 970 sli. It's very comparable to the gtx 670 vs gtx 680, were talking an avg of 10 fps give it take. I mean think about it, would you rather spend $550 for one card or $660 for 2 cards? It's like a moot point really

Well, to me it's spending 25% more for 50% more performance. Take into account you can't OC as high and maybe it's 25% more cash for 40% more performance. Good deal to me! One assumption I'll have to make (or take your guys word for) is 50 FPS on sli is just as smooth as 50 FPS on a single card and you don't have to factor in a hit there. On the red side I could notice the microstutters even after the fix with my 7970 trifire.

So I suppose that's the real question. Does 50 FPS feel the same on sli as it does a single card?

 

[addictedto60fps]

SLI in general is pretty good, but if you're sensitive to microstutering, it's also present in SLI setups too. As an example, there is a scene in Tomb Raider where just before you're ascending the icy cliffs and you have these shutterboards falling apart, if you pan the camera from left/right, you get microstuttering. It's very noticeable and extremely annoying. If you run that scene with just one card, the microstuttering is gone.

If you are sensitive to microstuttering, my rule of thumb is ALWAYS to go with the most powerful single gpu for the smoothest gameplay experience possible, but if one card doesn't deliver the frame rates that you need, then add a second card. But when you do that, you have to ask yourself if you're willing to deal with all the associated issues that come with a multi-gpu setup - microstutter, sometimes no SLI profiles at launch, etc. If you're willing to deal with all that, then SLI is still definitely worthwhile to invest in.

EDIT - Just remembered - there was also a tomb in Tomb Raider where my fps counter showed 50+, yet it was choppy as hell. It was horrible. I believe I was running it in 4x AA or something, so I wasn't able to test that tomb with one card because the frame rates would plummet like a rock. But I'm pretty sure this was yet another case of microstuttering rearing its ugly head again.

 

[dmonkey]

Well, there's also G-Sync.

 

[Dayaks]

SLI in general is pretty good, but if you're sensitive to microstutering, it's also present in SLI setups too. As an example, there is a scene in Tomb Raider where just before you're ascending the icy cliffs and you have these shutterboards falling apart, if you pan the camera from left/right, you get microstuttering. It's very noticeable and extremely annoying. If you run that scene with just one card, the microstuttering is gone.

If you are sensitive to microstuttering, my rule of thumb is ALWAYS to go with the most powerful single gpu for the smoothest gameplay experience possible, but if one card doesn't deliver the frame rates that you need, then add a second card. But when you do that, you have to ask yourself if you're willing to deal with all the associated issues that come with a multi-gpu setup - microstutter, sometimes no SLI profiles at launch, etc. If you're willing to deal with all that, then SLI is still definitely worthwhile to invest in.

EDIT - Just remembered - there was also a tomb in Tomb Raider where my fps counter showed 50+, yet it was choppy as hell. It was horrible. I believe I was running it in 4x AA or something, so I wasn't able to test that tomb with one card because the frame rates would plummet like a rock. But I'm pretty sure this was yet another case of microstuttering rearing its ugly head again.

Thanks! I was hoping not to read this but I am glad you wrote it. Almost my exact experience with crossfire... Every said they fixed it but surely wasn't up to my standards.

I swore after my 3x 7970s I'd never do multi gpu again just buy the (most reasonable... < $700) single GPU. Tempted to try it again on team green but my gut feeling is I'd regret it. A good 980 would drive my display well for this years games for sure. It's not that big of a deal to sell and keep upgrading. And to beat the trolls, I absolutely love super sampling. BF4 maxed with 200% res scaling I think a 980 would be about 60 FPS. Right at acceptable.

Thanks for the input everyone. I'll think about it for a few days and read more reviews (really lacking on 970 reviews AND overclocks on SLI are nonexistent.). I'll likely go with a 980 because I like shit to just work. Especially after seeing the frame times in this, Kills the immersion for me: http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphi...70-GM204-Review-Power-and-Efficiency/Battle-0

 

[addictedto60fps]

Thanks! I was hoping not to read this but I am glad you wrote it. Almost my exact experience with crossfire... Every said they fixed it but surely wasn't up to my standards.

I swore after my 3x 7970s I'd never do multi gpu again just buy the (most reasonable... < $700) single GPU. Tempted to try it again on team green but my gut feeling is I'd regret it. A good 980 would drive my display well for this years games for sure. It's not that big of a deal to sell and keep upgrading. And to beat the trolls, I absolutely love super sampling. BF4 maxed with 200% res scaling I think a 980 would be about 60 FPS. Right at acceptable.

Thanks for the input everyone. I'll think about it for a few days and read more reviews (really lacking on 970 reviews AND overclocks on SLI are nonexistent.). I'll likely go with a 980 because I like shit to just work.

I'm the same way. I just like shit to work and not have to deal with any annoyances. But at the same time, I very much care about performance and prefer super high frame rates in my games, so will consider SLI and deal with the annoyances that come with it, simply because I like performance. I'm also currently debating whether or not to go with 970 sli or just get one 980. Or I just may wait it out and see if Nvidia comes out with 980 ti or something - lol.

If you haven't seen this yet, take a look at this review.

http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/graphics/74853-evga-geforce-gtx-970-ftw/?page=2

The EVGA 970 ftw delivers nearly 980 performance, but I imagine will cost substantially less - I can't find anyone selling this right now, but I'm guessing it will cost no more than $400? If this ends up under $400, I may seriously consider getting these and SLI'ing them. Since it delivers nearly 980 performance, I could always disable the second card if microstuttering is a problem in a game or something, yet still get nearly 980 performance from a 970 card.

I will add that while microstuttering does still exist in SLI, for the most part, though, the SLI experience has been pretty good. This was my first time doing SLI with 680, and for most games, the SLI experience has been good.

 

[new2019]

Microstuttering are common with sli its hard to avoid it , but its very hardly noticeable.

 

[Dayaks]

I'm the same way. I just like shit to work and not have to deal with any annoyances. But at the same time, I very much care about performance and prefer super high frame rates in my games, so will consider SLI and deal with the annoyances that come with it, simply because I like performance. I'm also currently debating whether or not to go with 970 sli or just get one 980. Or I just may wait it out and see if Nvidia comes out with 980 ti or something - lol.

If you haven't seen this yet, take a look at this review.

http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/graphics/74853-evga-geforce-gtx-970-ftw/?page=2

The EVGA 970 ftw delivers nearly 980 performance, but I imagine will cost substantially less - I can't find anyone selling this right now, but I'm guessing it will cost no more than $400? If this ends up under $400, I may seriously consider getting these and SLI'ing them. Since it delivers nearly 980 performance, I could always disable the second card if microstuttering is a problem in a game or something, yet still get nearly 980 performance from a 970 card.

I will add that while microstuttering does still exist in SLI, for the most part, though, the SLI experience has been pretty good. This was my first time doing SLI with 680, and for most games, the SLI experience has been good.

I'll likely be flip flopping waiting for these cards to come into stock. It's just the value of the 970... to have three of those, essentially tri-sli 780ti performance for $1k. Six months ago that would of cost a fortune. Not that 1k is no small chunk of change. If I go multi-GPU again it'd likely be tri-sli. Then you just power through all the nonsense. Could always disable it like you said.

 

[bigbeard86]

I have two watercooled 290s in crossfire. Let me tell you - once you go dual card, single gpu setups all just seem subpar. I would without hesitation get two 970s instead of one 980.

 

[new2019]

Yea , it would give out more boost with 2 cards.

 

[dragonageinquisition]

The only way a 980 is going to outperform 970 SLI is on water with higher voltage, and you'd have to push it to something like 1750MHz.

I have two watercooled 290s in crossfire. Let me tell you - once you go dual card, single gpu setups all just seem subpar. I would without hesitation get two 970s instead of one 980.

I've run 285 SLI, 6970 CF, and GTX 780 SLI and they all felt subpar and I was much happier every time I sold my second card and just overclocked a single card.

 

[addictedto60fps]

Haven't fired up Tomb Raider in awhile, so I decided to fire it up and test the game with single card versus SLI. In SLI, the game just isn't as smooth as a single card, even when the frame rates are higher in SLI. To test this, what I did was just turn 360 degrees and observe the smoothness of the motion.

In SLI, when my frame rate counter was well above 100, the game would hitch when turning 360 degrees. When I disabled one of the cards, my frame rates were well under 100, but guess what - the motion was smoother with no choppiness and hitching.

I also fired up Serious Sam 3 and Shadow Warrior and during intense scenes (in Shadow Warrior) and expansive/intense scenes (in Serious Sam), in SLI, the gpu utilization would drop quite a bit on both cards (I saw it drop under 50 on both cards). With a single card, gpu utilization mostly remained above 90% in the exact scenes. So, in these scenarios, SLI wasn't really working efficiently/properly, and performance degraded quite a bit, whereas on the single card, the card was being used to its fullest.

 

[Michaelius]

SLI in general is pretty good, but if you're sensitive to microstutering, it's also present in SLI setups too. As an example, there is a scene in Tomb Raider where just before you're ascending the icy cliffs and you have these shutterboards falling apart, if you pan the camera from left/right, you get microstuttering. It's very noticeable and extremely annoying. If you run that scene with just one card, the microstuttering is gone.

If you are sensitive to microstuttering, my rule of thumb is ALWAYS to go with the most powerful single gpu for the smoothest gameplay experience possible, but if one card doesn't deliver the frame rates that you need, then add a second card. But when you do that, you have to ask yourself if you're willing to deal with all the associated issues that come with a multi-gpu setup - microstutter, sometimes no SLI profiles at launch, etc. If you're willing to deal with all that, then SLI is still definitely worthwhile to invest in.

EDIT - Just remembered - there was also a tomb in Tomb Raider where my fps counter showed 50+, yet it was choppy as hell. It was horrible. I believe I was running it in 4x AA or something, so I wasn't able to test that tomb with one card because the frame rates would plummet like a rock. But I'm pretty sure this was yet another case of microstuttering rearing its ugly head again.

If I had 2x6850 crossfire and every game where single card was going into 30 fps felt like stuttering mess should I consider myself sensitive to stuttering ?

Altrough that was before frame pacing drivers but I'm afraid of dual gpu configs ever since then.

 

[mls1995]

I went with 980 bc I didn't like the 970 coolers. I'm a huge fan of the Titan cooler

 

[Dayaks]

After reading that pcper article again with frame times I am just goin to get a high end 980 and OC the hell out of it. I'll wait until Thursday since AMD might be dropping something and perhaps more reviews will be out.

Even after frame pacing for AMD (when I had my 3x 7970s) stutter was an issue, some games were unplayable (FC3), worse than a single card. Looking at Bioshock's / Skyrim's frame pacing on the Pcper review and some of the other games... Just god awful. And these are games with massive budgets and waaaayyy after release.

 

[Dayaks]

If I had 2x6850 crossfire and every game where single card was going into 30 fps felt like stuttering mess should I consider myself sensitive to stuttering ?

Altrough that was before frame pacing drivers but I'm afraid of dual gpu configs ever since then.

Well "micro stutter" to me is where crossfire or sli goes to 30 FPS (or less) briefly from a high FPS (say 90) where on a single GPU it'd be smooth. It's one thing to run into a new part of level that's lower, it's another to randomly have low fps spikes. It messes up my aiming when I am tracking something and the rate of change on the screen doesn't match my hand, makes me aggitated, ruins immersion. On pcper a review for BF4 I was a little concerned some frames on sli would take as long to process as the consistent frame rate of a single card. Then I looked at metro, Bioshock, and skyrim and thought "no way in hell". When a decent amount of frames are taking 4x's longer than a single card... Sure as shit going to notice that! http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphi...70-GM204-Review-Power-and-Efficiency/Skyrim-M

I went with 980 bc I didn't like the 970 coolers. I'm a huge fan of the Titan cooler

Same. Love the Titan cooler.

 

[addictedto60fps]

If I had 2x6850 crossfire and every game where single card was going into 30 fps felt like stuttering mess should I consider myself sensitive to stuttering ?

Altrough that was before frame pacing drivers but I'm afraid of dual gpu configs ever since then.

Well, 30 fps in general is a stuttery mess for me. I imagine 30 fps with microstutter would be even choppier. I think some people just aren't able to perceive microstutter. Using my Tomb Raider example above, if the game is registering over 100 fps as you're panning the camera left/right, and you're able to pinpoint where exactly the game hitches, then I would say you're sensitive to microstuttering.

After reading that pcper article again with frame times I am just goin to get a high end 980 and OC the hell out of it. I'll wait until Thursday since AMD might be dropping something and perhaps more reviews will be out.

Even after frame pacing for AMD (when I had my 3x 7970s) stutter was an issue, some games were unplayable (FC3), worse than a single card. Looking at Bioshock's / Skyrim's frame pacing on the Pcper review and some of the other games... Just god awful. And these are games with massive budgets and waaaayyy after release.

I am also waiting to see what AMD may have to offer before doing anything. I also wonder if using a gsync monitor will help smooth out the choppiness that I'm seeing with Tomb Raider in SLI. If anything, my plan is to actually get the ASUS Rog Swift monitor first before deciding what my card upgrade path will be.

 

[mlcarson]

I've been doing crossfire/sli since the AMD 5850. No more for me. There are always more driver issues in this configuration and in some games you see no performance increase at all. And then in a year or two at most there's a new single card out that performs better than both of your cards.

You're going to be less likely to upgrade as quickly since your losing money on two cards and you'll end up spending more for that SLI configuration than just buying the faster card now. You only should go crossfire/sli if there's some app that it's absolutely needed on -- maybe you can get 120fps with 2 cards and you have a 120hz monitor or something. Even then, it'd probably be best to wait for a single card dual GPU solution.

You'll be happier overall with a single card. You'll be able to overclock a single card easier than an SLI system so that might make up for some of the performance differential. You also won't have the heat/power concerns of dual cards.

 

[Darth Bobo]

Personally I'd just get the GTX980. at 1200p resolution I don't think SLI is worth the hazzle.

 

[VonGriffin]

yeah if 980 was cheaper, but for a couple of bucks more you get 970 sli;
buying a 980 simply doesn't add up

i will wait if AMD pulls a miracle at 25th but despite preferring a single more powerful card the price value here forces my hand ehm wallet

 

[mlcarson]

One more thing to consider with the 970's -- most of them don't seem to have 3 DP ports like the 980's do. This is first with Nvidia for me having 3 displayport monitors and not having to utilize the DVI ports.

 

[harmattan]

I have two watercooled 290s in crossfire. Let me tell you - once you go dual card, single gpu setups all just seem subpar. I would without hesitation get two 970s instead of one 980.

My experience has been the opposite. Ive had dual cards in my systems every generation (both nV and Ati/amd) going back to the venerable geforce 6800 gt. I moved back to a single card setup a couple months back (290x) and it's a much better experience overall: no cf/sli driver issues, no frame stuttering, less power/heat. I'll take those benefits any day over more fps when im already doing >40 in most games.

 

[VonGriffin]

aye you are right, but 2x 970 sli will cost ya around 600 bucks while you will pay for a 980 550;

even if half the games don't have SLI support worth a dime, the 970 -980 performance difference is almost minimal using a single card
if the 980 price would be lower sure, but here i don't see much sense in picking 980

furthermore it would be great if folks that already are using 970 SLI share their experience here

 

[Dayaks]

I've only used crossfire... can you pick which games use SLI on a game by game basis where it loads into it with sli or not automatically?

 

[addictedto60fps]

I've only used crossfire... can you pick which games use SLI on a game by game basis where it loads into it with sli or not automatically?

You can only disable/enable SLI using the Nvidia control panel, which you have to do prior to entering a game.

 

[GoldenTiger]

I'm the same way. I just like shit to work and not have to deal with any annoyances. But at the same time, I very much care about performance and prefer super high frame rates in my games, so will consider SLI and deal with the annoyances that come with it, simply because I like performance.

I will add that while microstuttering does still exist in SLI, for the most part, though, the SLI experience has been pretty good. This was my first time doing SLI with 680, and for most games, the SLI experience has been good.

Same here, though admittedly nvidia SLI has, in the past cases I've used it, been 99% problem-free with most of the 1% remaining able to be fixed in 5 minutes with a quick tweak and working flawlessly from there. I've never had an outright case where it wasn't able to be fixed easily enough and stayed working at that point. Microstutter does exist but with the frame metering nvidia does the effect is barely noticeable to me at least even if I'm looking for it and even then I don't always have the ability to see it .

For me using a 4K 60hz ips monitor, I need all the performance I can get. However, two GTX 970 MSI Gaming cards that people have reported 1500mhz+ oc's on in SLI mode even in some threads, for $655 shipped in my case, was way, way too good a value to pass up and will provide plenty of performance compared to an $1100+ gtx 980 setup (which would have been about 20% faster probably oc-to-oc). I was prepared to spend up to about what the 980 launched at on a pair of cards (I thought I might have to, originally, pay 500-550 each card and was ready to do so) and if the 970 weren't as good as it is, I would have gone for the 980 pair instead. As-is, I have pocketed the savings and will have plenty of performance to spare for the next while at 4K . Maybe I'll get an eventual GTX 1080 or whatever they call it on 16nm FINFET sooner than I was thinking as a result.

(Or maybe the 970 pair oc'd will handle me just fine for years to come... and I'll get an upgrade in a couple of years instead, which seems more likely.)

 

[Dayaks]

Same here, though admittedly nvidia SLI has, in the past cases I've used it, been 99% problem-free with most of the 1% remaining able to be fixed in 5 minutes with a quick tweak and working flawlessly from there. I've never had an outright case where it wasn't able to be fixed easily enough and stayed working at that point. Microstutter does exist but with the frame metering nvidia does the effect is barely noticeable to me at least even if I'm looking for it and even then I don't always have the ability to see it .

For me using a 4K 60hz ips monitor, I need all the performance I can get. However, two GTX 970 MSI Gaming cards that people have reported 1500mhz+ oc's on in SLI mode even in some threads, for $655 shipped in my case, was way, way too good a value to pass up and will provide plenty of performance compared to an $1100+ gtx 980 setup (which would have been about 20% faster probably oc-to-oc). I was prepared to spend up to about what the 980 launched at on a pair of cards (I thought I might have to, originally, pay 500-550 each card and was ready to do so) and if the 970 weren't as good as it is, I would have gone for the 980 pair instead. As-is, I have pocketed the savings and will have plenty of performance to spare for the next while at 4K . Maybe I'll get an eventual GTX 1080 or whatever they call it on 16nm FINFET sooner than I was thinking as a result.

(Or maybe the 970 pair oc'd will handle me just fine for years to come... and I'll get an upgrade in a couple of years instead, which seems more likely.)

1500 OC'd IN SLI?? Oh my gosh. (I say things like "oh my gosh" because I have a 0, 3, and 6 year old... not sarcasm) 970 in SLI or tri SLI is so god damned tempting, especially since it scales nicely in games I actually play (BF4). Good thing everything is out of stock. I'd buy shit uncontrollably right now and I really want to see what AMD releases Thursday and some 270 reviews (like EVGA's blower style, I love blowers.) Deep down inside I know the responsible thing (fiscally and logically) is a good 970....

 

[Phlorge]

after using SLI 670s for a hot minute, I am looking for single card options from this point forward. More frames doesnt always mean a smoother game.

 

[kuhla]

One more thing to consider with the 970's -- most of them don't seem to have 3 DP ports like the 980's do. This is first with Nvidia for me having 3 displayport monitors and not having to utilize the DVI ports.

I did notice that and it bothers me too but there is one exception I have found, Gigabyte's card has completely different I/O from the rest:

Newegg - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125684
Product page - http://www.gigabyte.us/products/product-page.aspx?pid=5209#ov

Also note that it's 6+8 power.

 

[mlcarson]

Another reason not to do the 970SLI is that apparently DSR (Dynamic Super Resolution) doesn't work in SLI mode. Considering it's like the only new feature that's currently available with Maxwell without coding changes in games, it's disappointing that it won't work in an SLI setup.

 

[Dayaks]

Another reason not to do the 970SLI is that apparently DSR (Dynamic Super Resolution) doesn't work in SLI mode. Considering it's like the only new feature that's currently available with Maxwell without coding changes in games, it's disappointing that it won't work in an SLI setup.

Wow. That's the sole reason I wanted to SLI. Thanks for that tidbit!

 

[3dfx_zombie]

You can only disable/enable SLI using the Nvidia control panel, which you have to do prior to entering a game.

Not entirely true. In the Nvidia Control Panel you can edit a game's profile and let it use only one card. But it's not the same as disabling SLI.
I noticed this in Fallout 3/NV. In SLI-mode, the water in puddles is broken. Even when the game runs on a single card. But after disabling SLI, the water looks fine.
The HDR in Skyrim is broken in SLI, but works fine in single-card mode. No need to disable SLI. It's weird stuff like this that makes me want to dump my SLI-config ASAP.

980 vs 970-SLI? Why not just buy a single 970 and overclock it? The money you save will come in handy when you're going to buy a 980-Ti. You know you will eventually...

 

[addictedto60fps]

Not entirely true. In the Nvidia Control Panel you can edit a game's profile and let it use only one card. But it's not the same as disabling SLI.
I noticed this in Fallout 3/NV. In SLI-mode, the water in puddles is broken. Even when the game runs on a single card. But after disabling SLI, the water looks fine.
The HDR in Skyrim is broken in SLI, but works fine in single-card mode. No need to disable SLI. It's weird stuff like this that makes me want to dump my SLI-config ASAP.

980 vs 970-SLI? Why not just buy a single 970 and overclock it? The money you save will come in handy when you're going to buy a 980-Ti. You know you will eventually...

Ah, thanks for the clarification. Yeah, it's stuff like this that make me seriously consider going single card for my next upgrade.

 

[Dayaks]

Not entirely true. In the Nvidia Control Panel you can edit a game's profile and let it use only one card. But it's not the same as disabling SLI.
I noticed this in Fallout 3/NV. In SLI-mode, the water in puddles is broken. Even when the game runs on a single card. But after disabling SLI, the water looks fine.
The HDR in Skyrim is broken in SLI, but works fine in single-card mode. No need to disable SLI. It's weird stuff like this that makes me want to dump my SLI-config ASAP.

980 vs 970-SLI? Why not just buy a single 970 and overclock it? The money you save will come in handy when you're going to buy a 980-Ti. You know you will eventually...

The single 970 and OCing it until the 980ti comes out is a solid suggestion.

It's too bad you can't really disable sli per game... I might consider it then. It's tempting to have it on for BF4 and Cysis3 then disable it for other games. If it was just me using my PC I wouldn't care. Other people use it and it can't be finicky or my wife gets on my ass.

I found this old gem at pcper... http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphi...enchmarked-4K-Resolutions/Far-Cry-3-999-Level

I've noticed on multiple sites 2 way SLI seems to generally improve performance over one card, given there are some nuisances. Three way SLI seems to do all sorts of bad. Looks like the best "all out" with minimal compatibility issues is likely 980 SLI with two cards.

 

[GoldenTiger]

DSR is slated to be enabled for SLI in an upcoming driver version.