9800gt w/ 1gb ddr3 sli, or ATI Radeon HD 5750?

[Stout92]

Hello all.
Just got my MSI P55-gd65 mobo/Intel Core i5-750 built. I have the Corsair xms3 4gb ram(ddr3), and currently only one EVGA 9800GT 1gb video card. I was wondering wether it would be better to get an additional evga 9800gt to use in sli, or get one of the ATI Radeon HD 5750's. Which would give better overall performance. I know the ATI has DirectX 11, which really interests me. If I did go the way of the ATI, would I still be able to use my current 9800gt for a separate monitor? Thanks in advance for any help you give.

 

[Stout92]

self bump.
does anyone have any ideas? I'd settle for a link to a forum that would have more info.

 

[JDV28]

5750 definitely.
Putting two decents cards in SLI never makes one very good card.

 

[Mousemonkey]

Two 9800GT's in SLi would give similar performance to a GTX280 though, so the question is how much is another 9800GT going to cost and how badly do you want or need DX11?

 

[Stout92]

i see. i've actually read a little bit ago that sli doesn't give too much of a performance increase. last question then, can i run an ati and an nvidea card at the same time for dual monitors, or would the drivers be incompatible or something to that effect?

 

[Mousemonkey]

i see. i've actually read a little bit ago that sli doesn't give too much of a performance increase.

It does depend on the game but these days a lot of titles do take advantage of dual cards and if you have one that doesn't by default it's usually possible to force it to via the Nvidia control panel.

last question then, can i run an ati and an nvidea card at the same time for dual monitors, or would the drivers be incompatible or something to that effect?

Only if you are using XP or W7, Vista 32/64 does not allow that.

 

[Stout92]

great. windows 7 here, so no problem. any idea how the GTX 260 performs. can get one with a lifetime warranty for about $220. it has 3D support as well. something i couldn't find with ATI. any idea how the gtx 260 performs? is it better than a sli setup of my 9800gt?

 

[Mousemonkey]

A single GTX260 would be a bit less than the 9800GT's in SLi, however it would allow you to use the 9800GT as a PhysX card if you have any of those titles and give the option of adding another one later (if you are able to get one in a few months of course). As for the lifetime warranty bit, I'm not in the US so I can't really help you there but XFX have a double lifetime warranty for you colonials.

 

[Stout92]

thanks a lot for all the help mousemonkey. hope you don't mind all the questions. if the 9800gt's would be better than a gtx 260, how would they fare against a gtx 275?

 

[Mousemonkey]

They would be about equal sometimes a little better and sometimes a little worse, if you can get your hands on a GTX275 then do so and if you get to keep your 9800GT then even better as that would give a PhysX card to boot.

 

[Stout92]

god bless you mousemonkey. i think i'll go with the GTX 275 then. i noticed my motherboard (http://www.msi.com/index.php?func=prodmbspec&maincat_no=1&cat2_no=&cat3_no=&prod_no=1846) runs the video cards at x8 and x8 when there are two present. x16 when only one. will this be a problem?

 

[Mousemonkey]

The jury is still out on that one, some benchies show a slight performance hit with SLi/Crossfire but I have not seen any figures showing a single and a PhysX card.

 

[Stout92]

last question i have for this thread then mate. can't seem to tell if my motherboard supports dual slot video cards. can you confirm whether it does or not?it looks like it might cover one of my pci slots, which i don't use, but would that be a problem?

 

[Mousemonkey]

Yes, if you were to use the 9800GT as a PhysX card and it's a dual slot example with the chunky HSF then it will cover the first PCI slot, the only problem that might occur is if you need to use the second PCI slot for anything as that card would most likely restrict the airflow to the 9800.