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Is SLI for you?

How do you feel about SLI?

  • I'm getting an nforce4 SLI and 2 6800Us ASAP!

    Votes: 11 6.4%

  • My next motherboard will be SLI capable.

    Votes: 64 37.2%

  • I'm waiting to see how stable it is.

    Votes: 16 9.3%

  • Too expensive.

    Votes: 65 37.8%

  • Looks buggy and unnecessary.

    Votes: 16 9.3%
  • Total voters
    172
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^eMpTy^

2[H]4U
Joined
Jul 21, 2004
Messages
3,233
I'm just wondering how everyone is feeling about SLI and if you guys are thinking of picking an nforce4 SLI up with your next system upgrade.
 
Switching to SLI means basically buying a new computer. You will need a nForce 4 motherboard, 2 Nvidia videocards, an AMD processor, new power supply, and more- such as fans. Think of the heat generated by TwO videocards, especially if they are high-end ULTRAS. And to really take advantage of SLI, you probably would want a FX-55 Processor, and two Nvidia 6800 Ultras.

Way, way too much $_$
 
Too expensive, and not enough games benefit from it(cpu limitations on the most expensive setups).
And even a 6600GT still wont perform as good as a 6800GT, since its still 128MB- so you cant turn on IQ and up the res like you would normally with an upgrade.
 
I wanna see how it pans out in the retail channels. Looks promising, just not convinced yet.
 
I think a good upgrade path for 3005 will be a mobo with two PCI-E slots, capable of both ATI's dual card solution (if they have one planed whatever it is), and NVIDIA's SLI, that way you will have a solid foundation, and can build onto it, starting with one card of your choice, then adding another later if you need to.
 
3005? You know where the fountain of youth is? Sorry had to say something.

I was [--] that close to going ahead and picking up a socket 939 cpu and motherboard but decided to hold off. I don't want to have trouble finding a decent AGP card in the not so distant future. Seems that after a few driver revisions and better optimized hardware SLI will become a viable solution. Like Brent said just because you have a SLI board doesn't mean that you have to go out and buy two cards immediately.
 
im going to go about this the same way i did with my voodoo2's
get the mobo when i can then get 1 card now and wait till the price drops and i need more speed then get the 2nd card insted of getting a new top of the line card
 
I would buy an SLI board if I see some flexibility in it, its cost isn't too different from reg.mobos, and if I don't have to upgrade alot of the existing parts in my current PC...I definitely will not buy 2 cards off the top though.
 
The 6600GT SLI Looks very intresting indeed :) But i still want to see the final numbers once the bugs are ironed out and the drivers are mature>to actually see if its a better ulternative than 1 single Highend solution?
 
Well right now I have a good rig, so no *need* to upgrade yet. 2500 Barton, ATI 9800 Pro.

When I do get a new CPU, it will be an Athlon 64, and at that time I will NEED a new mobo anyhow, so I will get an NForce 4 SLI board. And, I figure, by then my video card will be pretty useless, so one good PCI Express card will work. Then a few months down the road I will add a second card. Its not super cheap, but not inplausible.
 
I've done piece at a time upgrading to my current system for the last 4 years now. I'd already planned for a major system upgrade next year before hearing about SLI. I will certainly get an SLI capable motherboard when I redo everything next year. I like to by as future-ready as I can when I do large scale upgrades.

RagManX
 
waiting to see next chipsets from both ati and nvidia next year on SLI and then make my decision.
 
Honestly... I'd be more then happy to use SLI.

However, I doubt I ever will.

I cant imagine spending $600 for a video card now, let alone spending that amount twice just to increase performance 30% or so.

IF... and that is a big if, SLI becomes the norm, top of the line SLI capable PCI-E video cards come down to a price point under $300 or so, perhaps I would go ahead and buy into it.

But at this point I'm running a 3.2ghz P4 with a 6800GT and I can play any game at max settings at 1280x1024... some even run smooth at 1600.

So, right now it would just be a waste. However, tomorrows new games will probably bring my machine to it's knees.
 
Hey everyone,

I have a question concerning SLI that I haven't seen addressed yet (although I might have missed it).

Currently, you can buy a dual head AGP card along with a PCI card and have a three monitor setup. The main drawback is the speed of the PCI card (Or lack of speed as it would be).

With SLI can you run three or four monitors? Obviously, you would negate the speed increase gained by SLI but it would surely be faster than the current AGP/PCI three monitor setup.
 
nope. i will be upgrading to athlon 64 3500+ or 3200+ when ati gets their r200P pci express chipsets out. will upgrade video card to X800 XL
 
damn! - selected the wrong button cos the damn browser resized the moment i clicked! substract one from 'too buggy blah blah' and count one more for 'my next setup will be SLI' (just in case, you know :D...).
 
i cant wait for the market to be flooded with pci-e motherboards so i can upgrade to SLI; i currently have a 6800GT and it is sweet. i could get 2 6600GT for the same price and it will run faster than my single 6800GT for about the same price.....whats not to love about that?
 
carrot said:
i cant wait for the market to be flooded with pci-e motherboards so i can upgrade to SLI; i currently have a 6800GT and it is sweet. i could get 2 6600GT for the same price and it will run faster than my single 6800GT for about the same price.....whats not to love about that?
Click to expand...


...that it wont run faster than ure single 6800GT, and at times it will run slower.
 
I am just curious...

Does anybody know why SLI was never used (at least for commercial purposes) for AGP? Wasn't SLI just used for PCI cards back in the VooDoo days? Because if they could SLI AGP, wouldn't that be a good way to go for the industry?
 
WAY too expensive for me. No point in spending money on useless power that I wont ever use. A 3500+ and the A8V was more than I needed, thus the reason why i switched back to nf2
 
You guys realize that at some point there will be no alternative?

ATI's new releases are meager updates that show that there's a wall that will be hard to breach. SLI is the best way to scale video performance. In 2 years we will see 2 graphics cards in a box sold together as a matter of practice. Just like the RAM kits now.

That's my prediction.
 
spencers said:
WAY too expensive for me. No point in spending money on useless power that I wont ever use. A 3500+ and the A8V was more than I needed, thus the reason why i switched back to nf2
Click to expand...

Mmmkay :rolleyes:
 
RS said:
You guys realize that at some point there will be no alternative?

ATI's new releases are meager updates that show that there's a wall that will be hard to breach. SLI is the best way to scale video performance. In 2 years we will see 2 graphics cards in a box sold together as a matter of practice. Just like the RAM kits now.

That's my prediction.
Click to expand...


i can see this happing easyly

i can also see a return of muti GPU card ala RAGE MAXX and Voodoo 5
or more likely dual core GPUs in the next 2-4 years
 
I think the processor would waste that upgrade right now (for the most part), but I'm pretty anxious to see some dual or multiple core processors in 05. Maybe that could keep up with an SLI video configuration. Anyways, I'm pretty sure that is what I want to see in my next processor. And I wouldn't call it power I will never use. It just means the ability to keep a system through what ever comes next.
Think all that would convince the warden...err...wife... to let me do it? :rolleyes:
 
RS said:
You guys realize that at some point there will be no alternative?

ATI's new releases are meager updates that show that there's a wall that will be hard to breach. SLI is the best way to scale video performance. In 2 years we will see 2 graphics cards in a box sold together as a matter of practice. Just like the RAM kits now.

That's my prediction.
Click to expand...

You can't put a limit on technology. The last generation of cards has been one of the biggest jumps in speed of all time. ATI's next cards are not their next generation cards, and won't be anything like the R520. Box makers will never be in favor of 2 cards because of the extra costs involved. Thats why almost every PC maker uses integrated parts - cost savings. Its totally different with memory, where there is a substancial demand for different sizes.
 
killerD said:
You can't put a limit on technology
Click to expand...

Tell that to AMD, Intel and all other manufacturers that have problems with .09 process

I wonder if the same applies to video chips? You bet it does. One of the saving graces of video is relatively easy parallelization, hence SLI either thru multicore on card or multiple cards are our future.
 
I could see multi-core cards, a PCIe x16 should have enough bandwidth, right? Even if it doesn't, I could imagine finding away to use another one of the PCIe channels to give the needed bandwidth.
This article outlines an effort to shrink things well beyond 90nm processors: http://www.tomshardware.com/hardnews/20041201_155716.html
Too bad it's not gonna be ready any time soon. :(
 
Squishead said:
I am just curious...

Does anybody know why SLI was never used (at least for commercial purposes) for AGP? Wasn't SLI just used for PCI cards back in the VooDoo days? Because if they could SLI AGP, wouldn't that be a good way to go for the industry?
Click to expand...
You can only have one AGP port.
 
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