quad sli? valid question here!

I

irishmikeirl

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Nov 15, 2007
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im thinking of building a nice gaming rig.

probably quad qx6850
corsair xms2 dominator xtreme 4gb

anyway, for graphics ive got one of these
7950gx2
http://www.evga.com/articles/321.asp
and i can get a second for very cheap.

would they run in so called quad sli?

and could anyone suggest a board suitable if it would work?
 
each 7950gx2 is technically 2 gpu's so 2 of them make quad sli.Any sli compliant board would work but I would recommend a nforce one just to ensure u get the best compatibility.
 
sounds good.

its just ive read so many reviews on it, and lots of people said it doesnt work to the extent it was use to. but those reviews were over a year old.
 
Unless you can get them at dirt cheap prices, I fail to see the point of this. SLI doesn't add 100% to your framerate for each extra GPU you add...in fact, I've never seen an increase of 100%. Usually it's like 40%. Sometimes it's -10%. Add on top of this the fact that the 7950GX2 doesn't do DX10 and it consumes a HUGE amount of power and puts out a HUGE amount of heat, and I fail to see why this is preferable over 2 8800GTs, if you want to go the SLI route.
 
I ran quad, and its only worth it if you run a 30 incher and you love bf2

lol It was simply amazing the performance i was getting back then ,,,,,,,,,,, ah the memories
 
irishmikeirl said:
im thinking of building a nice gaming rig.

probably quad qx6850
corsair xms2 dominator xtreme 4gb

anyway, for graphics ive got one of these
7950gx2
http://www.evga.com/articles/321.asp
and i can get a second for very cheap.

would they run in so called quad sli?

and could anyone suggest a board suitable if it would work?
Click to expand...

From what I remember running quad SLI was an incredible waste of time and money. Most of the time you would get the exact same performance from two cards that you got from one card (and sometimes it was even worse in SLI).

I forget most of the details of why it ran so bad but I remember the major limiting factor for the card doing so bad was to DX9 not having the right kind of architecture (I think it was DX9 having only 3 frame buffers available and quad sli had for available, but I doubt it). I think a DX10 Quad SLI solution will be much more beneficial but we can only tell when the time comes for it to re-emerge (if it even does).
 
If you are doing this just because:

a) you can

b) looks

c) the pride of saying you have "Quad SLI"

...then go for it!

But if you are doing it thinking you will get performance, forget about it. I'm not saying dual 7950GX2's aren't powerful, but they are easily out done by todays high-end cards. Dual 8800GT's or even 8800GTS's would cream a "quad SLI" setup. Granted, you would have 1GB of dedicated memory to work with, but if you want that, then get 2 HD2900XT(X) in a 1GB model (though I would recommend getting the newer and better HD3870 cards).

In DX9, the newer cards beat it and the Series 7 cards can't do DX10. Period.

Honestly, if you can find one for around $100 to $150, then by all means go for it. But beyond that, it's just not worth it to invest into a couple of cards that are quickly becoming out of date. As more and more DX10 titles come out, these cards will not be able to support the DX10 features, though you can still play them with DX9.

Take it from me, I used to have an SLI machine with two of the card in my sig, but I dicided to break the machine down and sell one of the cards in another system. I'm currently investing into getting a HD3850. It may not be the best, but it beats the hell out of my 8600GTS and my remaining 7900GT (which can't do DX10). Oh, and due to the shitty 128-bit memory bus width on the 8600GTS, running DX10 games above 1280x1024 is just not an option.

Another thing, the drivers were never really reworked for quad SLI, so functionality is going to be iffy at best, especially in Vista. You would be much better off getting either two HD3870's and going Crossfire or get two 8800GT's in SLI.

...if you really want a quad-GPU machine, get a CrossfireX mobo and 4 HD3XXX cards. I hear the HD3870X2 will have dual-GPU's. Running these in CrossfireX will give you an EIGHT-GPU setup! Go for it the [H]ard way!


EDIT: I forgot to mention, in shader-intensive games, the Series 7 gets its ass handed to it (take it from me, I know). This is one area that ATI and the NVIDIA Series 8 accelled at.
 
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