SLI Bridge Connector, needed?

S

Some Llama

Limp Gawd
Joined
Aug 6, 2001
Messages
379
Hello,

I just bought an Nforce motherboard that has support for SLI for a new system i am building.

I figured with support for dual cores and SLI, this would be agreat way to ensure future upgradability.. my concern is that the current video card i just bought might not support SLI.

Looking at the motheboard manual, it tells me that for SLI mode I need to put 2 video cards in and then connect the SLI Bridge connecter on the gold figers of each card, the problem is (as you can see in the link) the video card doesn't have the gold fingers...

So my qustion is, do I really need the bridge connector in order for SLI to work?

The newegg information says the card supports SLI but yet it doesn't have the gold fingers.. ?

Let me know if I need the bridge conector because i'd rather build the system now with one card and then be able to buy the same card later to do SLI rather than 2 new cards when i am ready for SLI...

Thanks,
Some Llama
 
lol....
Yes, you do ABSOLUTLY NEED the SLI bridge. Basically those "gold fingers" are how the cards "talk" to each other. If your card does not have them it means it doesn't have the hardware to be able to "talk" to another graphics card.
Why newegg says it supports SLI is beyond me.
 
Dr_John said:
lol...actually, no you don't. While it's advisable to use one (you take a performance hit), it's not absolutely necessary.

http://www.ocworkbench.com/2005/nvidia/Forceware 77.72/p1.htm
Click to expand...
ohnoes.jpg


Stupid 6600s :D
 
6600s can do SLI, but they don't use the SLI bridge. They just don't need it. The bridge is for all cards higher than a 6600.
 
Dr_John said:
lol...actually, no you don't. While it's advisable to use one (you take a performance hit), it's not absolutely necessary.

http://www.ocworkbench.com/2005/nvidia/Forceware 77.72/p1.htm
Click to expand...

Shoot :mad: , welp hopefully they improve the performance in the future... anyone know what the bridge does that increases performance? I thought that PCI-e offers sufficient bandwidth and since the rendering controls are in software, what does the bridge do thats so "special".

Thanks for the information guys, i feel better now knowing it will work even if it won't be as fast, this new box is for a friend of mine who doesn't really do much if any gaming, but i wanted to make sure decent video performance would be there if needed (their old system was an emachines lol) :)
 
Your cards support SLi and don't require the bridge hence no gold fingers at the top of the cards. If you needed the sli bridge they are sold out there. If you have a sli mobo with standard space between the 2 slots and not the extra space that the asus motherboards and some others have I know pny sells them and that they work well. You can buy one here (not that your 2 6600LE cards need them, there is no place to plug them in)

https://pnyestore.pny.com/AWWebStore/Products.asp?Category=CABLES*PNYPRODUCTS

91004732 SLI BRIDGE CONNECTOR FOR
NVIDIA QUADRO CARDS In-Stock $34.99

They work for geforce cards too.
 
Some Llama said:
Shoot :mad: , welp hopefully they improve the performance in the future... anyone know what the bridge does that increases performance? I thought that PCI-e offers sufficient bandwidth and since the rendering controls are in software, what does the bridge do thats so "special".

Thanks for the information guys, i feel better now knowing it will work even if it won't be as fast, this new box is for a friend of mine who doesn't really do much if any gaming, but i wanted to make sure decent video performance would be there if needed (their old system was an emachines lol) :)
Click to expand...

The SLi connector can effectively transfer 1GB per second between the 2 cards, and saves this from having to go through the pci express bus, thus improving throughput. This is especially important on the high end 6800U and 7800 cards but on mid range babies like the 6600LE the pci e bus is more than ample to push the data through without any bottleneck even with max IQ. Now how that IQ settings performs in game is not a question of bandwidth but horsepower from the gpu and the gddr memory latencies/timings etc...
;)
 
Lord_Exodia said:
The SLi connector can effectively transfer 1GB per second between the 2 cards, and saves this from having to go through the pci express bus, thus improving throughput. This is especially important on the high end 6800U and 7800 cards but on mid range babies like the 6600LE the pci e bus is more than ample to push the data through without any bottleneck even with max IQ. Now how that IQ settings performs in game is not a question of bandwidth but horsepower from the gpu and the gddr memory latencies/timings etc...
;)
Click to expand...

Ah yes that makes sense, thanks :)

Also for the post above this one, thanks but I already have the bridge connector, it came with the motherboard. :)
 
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