PC Gaming costs: going up!

Its that time again...

The cost of Gaming is once again going up with the introduction of PCIe and SLI, not for your average gamer but for the hard core enthusiast.

Today you can go out and buy a very fast gaming core for around $850 USD, that cost is about to go up to $1250 USD if you want the latest and greatest, which many of us of course do.

SLI will bring the gaming experiance to a whole new level, up to an 85% increase in frame rates over a single card solution according to the latest benchmarks.

I say its about damn time, although im not necessarily looking forward to spending $800-$1000 on just graphics cards, i will do it because i want that insane graphics performance that you just cant get from a single card solution.

With NVidia leading the way to a better gaming experiance, throwing down the gauntlet the future looks bright for PC gaming.

On another note what is the PSU requirements going to be for an SLI setup, the 6800Ultra already recommends a 450w PSU, granted they dont mention wether that is a True 450w or generic 450w, so im hoping that we can get by with a 480w True wattage PSU.

Only time will tell, im excited about SLI, and i know alot of other people are as well. Also im interested in seeing ATI's practical response to SLI, other then just overclocking one of their cards with a refridgeration unit to match the performance of the SLI configuration.

It looks like Nvidia has started a war here, they fired the first shot with SLI, and it was right to the heart of ATI.
Now as we have seen in the recent past ATI is no coward they wont back down from a fight, as they are fierce competitors, i dont imagine we will see them sticking their tail betwen their legs and running, they will come up with an answer to this vexing NVidia SLI problem soon.

ATI this is what seperated the winners from the loosers, the chips are on the table and NVidia has all the aces, what will you do, bluff, or call?

<b><font color=blue>Co-Founder and Administrator of Toms Hardware IRC</font color=blue></b>
<b><font color=red>
Server: hub1.oddnet.net
Channel: #Tomshardware
</b></font color=red>

ATI could take another shot at MAXX. It would actually be cheaper than SLI, with the same results.

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

<A HREF="http://www.hardwarecentral.com/hardwarecentral/news/1077/1/" target="_new">Don't matter, you gotta' love Google!</A>

_______________________
<A HREF="http://www.moviewavs.com/MP3S/TV_Shows/Simpsons/flanderssong.mp3" target="_new">Audio Sig</A>

heya Chipdeath;

There is alot more people that dont have low limited budgets then you think, im not one of them but i make it a priority over some other things. like a more expensive car for example, I drive a camaro instead of a corvette for my summer car, and stuff like that. its all in your priorities when your not loaded. What are you willing to sacrifice to get what you want?

<b><font color=blue>Co-Founder and Administrator of Toms Hardware IRC</font color=blue></b>
<b><font color=red>
Server: hub1.oddnet.net
Channel: #Tomshardware
</b></font color=red>

According to Newegg.com a PCI 6600GT is $215, while at the same time the 6800GT is around $400. According to what I have read, the 2x6600GT should outperform the 6800GT by a pretty big margin.

AMD 64 3400+
MSI K8N Neo Platinum
1 GB Kingston HyperX PC3200
6800 GT
WD Raptor 74GB

No, its all based on the drivers, the games will still only see one video card. According to tests, there is anywhere from a 60-85% gain when using SLI, depending on the application. A 6600GT with a 60-85% performance gain would beat a 6800 GT I think... pretty badly.

AMD 64 3400+
MSI K8N Neo Platinum
1 GB Kingston HyperX PC3200
6800 GT
WD Raptor 74GB

A lot.

Click <font color=blue><A HREF="http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/you.html" target="_new">HERE</A></font color=blue> if you real<b>l</b>y are an <font color=red>idiot</font color=red>.

I did. I bought 2 cheapo Voodoo cards, put them in SLI, and suddenly Final Fantasy went much faster with really nice 3D effects!

Re -> clob:
Why don't all servers use Intel's onchip HyperThreading technology in stead of real dual processors? Because separate hardware has it's own registers, controllers, steering, chipsets, ...
Dual GPU in SLI makes you dream about the future though, no doubt about that - only prob now is that NVidia uses SLI, and ATI -may- be going for dual chipsets...

I must say THG is completely in it's right about the paper releases & late announcements - why bother to take all the effort to review test models that will never make it in the stores in large quantities. My dealer is official importer for my country for quite some products, and they have a hard time training their sales staff to know all the products - I was the one that said they only have old and budget versions of cards (LE cards), still I never saw a benchamerk of LE cards on THG!

I think many end-users end up buying a 'weak' version of the card they saw in a review, not even knowing about it. I found the most effective way of comparisation to be checking what card was reviewed, looking up chip details on the mfg's website, then comparing that to what I find in the shop -> then conclude those LE versions have shorter pipelines, less recent RAM (DDR1), ...

My dealer doesn't even know what DDR2 and DDR3 is!

Maybe it's time to start my own dealership ^_^

Hard times for the hardware noob, perfect time for the pro - I've built 8 systems for clients outside work situation this month, it's quite easy to show where shops and books make mistakes these days, and bargain hunting is really easy!