Gigabyte's Quad Motherboard

Benzino

Benzino

[H]ard|Gawd
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Mar 3, 2005
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Tom's Hardware Guide (www.tomshardware.com) posted a review a while back on the new Gigabyte motherboard that will accept 4 PCI-E graphics cards via SLI. While the drivers haven't been released for actual functinoality, I wonder what impact this will have on the market. In theory, one could take 4 7800 (512mb version) and combine for a total of 2 gigabytes of video memory.
eek.gif

I see this as a possible overkill, as I imagine not many games could utilize even half of that for some time now.
What are your thoughts [H]ardforum? I see potential down the road, but right now I can't see any use in that except for enlargening one's e-pen0r.
Pictures and link to article for reference:
Link.





Holy freaking lot of monitors batman!
 
benzino_86 said:
In theory, one could take 4 7800 (512mb version) and combine for a total of 2 gigabytes of video memory.
Click to expand...
It doesn't work that way. When two cards are in sli there memory is mirrored so the same amount of data is stored as a single card of the same type. So 4 GTX 512's is still "only" 512mb of video memory.
 
FEAR at 1920/1200 with 8x TR MSAA and 16x AF using onboard sound no thank you.
 
rcf1987 said:
FEAR at 1920/1200 with 8x TR MSAA and 16x AF using onboard sound no thank you.
Click to expand...
That's a good point ;) .

Also, 512 7800GTX's wouldn't work since they use dual-slot coolers. Sure, you could downgrade to single slot cooling, but with the lack of airflow you would have serious problems keeping the cards cool.

I give Gigabyte credit for being innovative, but this mobo is a POS imo. It's probably going to turn out to be a "flop" just like their dual-core 6600GT that they released a year ago.
 
Its just totally overkill. No one has enough money to buy four video cards anyway =P
 
V99 said:
Its just totally overkill. No one has enough money to buy four video cards anyway =P
Click to expand...

I bet you'd be surprised who does or who would think it's not overkill. I'm sure some people would buy it.

I personally think it's too much because I can't afford it. It would be neat to know how fast 4 cards can be though.
 
The real problem is timing...there aren't any games out yet that bring 2 x 7800GTX's to their knees, and by the time there are, the next gen cards will be out, and two of THEM in SLI will do the job. It's great to show off, but I think the impact on the market will be marginal, at best.
Dual PCI-E x8 SLI PPU's?
 
O[H]-Zone said:
The real problem is timing...there aren't any games out yet that bring 2 x 7800GTX's to their knees, and by the time there are, the next gen cards will be out, and two of THEM in SLI will do the job. It's great to show off, but I think the impact on the market will be marginal, at best.
Dual PCI-E x8 SLI PPU's?
Click to expand...


Uhh....F.E.A.R. does....when you turn on soft shadows at high res with AA and AF turned on.
 
PolarbearBigEd said:
Uhh....F.E.A.R. does....when you turn on soft shadows at high res with AA and AF turned on.
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Which looks like crap anyway because FEAR looks terrible with no AA, so no one in their right mind would want to run that.
 
O[H]-Zone said:
The real problem is timing...there aren't any games out yet that bring 2 x 7800GTX's to their knees, and by the time there are, the next gen cards will be out, and two of THEM in SLI will do the job. It's great to show off, but I think the impact on the market will be marginal, at best.
Dual PCI-E x8 SLI PPU's?
Click to expand...
Ummm...sure there is.

FEAR? Quake 4? Call of Duty 2?

Try running *any* of those with all in-game settings maxed, 8xS AA, TR SSAA, 16xAniso, @ 1600x1200.

It'll kill any setup out there! And I *DO* mean KILL it - I doubt even a pair of SLI'd 7800GTX 512mb cards could break 20fps tops doing that.
 
chinesepiratefood said:
Quake 4...no, FEAR, COD2, yes
Click to expand...
Try looking at the [H] review of the 512mbs in SLI.

Yes, they hit 1600x1200 with 4xAA and TR SSAA. Still, they max at 64fps and average at 58.

That's *not* 8xS AA (which is pretty much exactly half the performance of 4xAA right there) and *not* 16xAniso.

Not saying that 1600x1200 with 4xAA and TR SSAA doesn't look damn fine - I'm sure it'd look great. But 8xS would look a LOT better, and it's not doable.
 
dderidex said:
Ummm...sure there is.

FEAR? Quake 4? Call of Duty 2?

Try running *any* of those with all in-game settings maxed, 8xS AA, TR SSAA, 16xAniso, @ 1600x1200.

It'll kill any setup out there! And I *DO* mean KILL it - I doubt even a pair of SLI'd 7800GTX 512mb cards could break 20fps tops doing that.
Click to expand...

The question is at that point is it worth $2000-2500US for that kind of gaming experience?
 
i think this board is great.

people have interpreted this board wrong: the 4 PCI-E slots don't all need 7800ULtras in them. in fact 4x 7800 Video cards is a waste of money/power. It has two uses: installing 1 or 2 video cards and leaving the other two for storage adaptor and maybe later on 10GB ethernet cards...etc... or for multiple display(not for gaming) by just using cheap dual display PCI-E cards at maybe 100 bux a card for 400 total powering 8 screens just like the screenshot. With SLI right now you can only game on one screen, which wastes 7 DVI ports :)
 
CoD2 just runs like crap, Getting SLI doesn't justify making CoD run better because it should run fine on one card anyways.

If getting SLI means you can now run soft shadows in FEAR go for it :rolleyes:
 
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