Which SLI Card(s) For Over Clocking?!

P-Trix

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Hiya, i have been researching and buying parts over the last few weeks! I'm down to the last few things, Graphics Cards, Memory and a PSU!

I have a Asus P5ND2 Motherboard, a Pentium D 805 and full watercooling kit with two SLI waterblocks!

I have a max budget of £260 for both cards!

I want a pair of SLI cards that will be good for overclocking, within my price range and compatible with my current components!

I would appriciate any feedback, thanks J
 
I think 260 isn't a lot of money....... I'm thinking american, and haven't done the conversion. But seeing the small amount of money you have to put out, I'd forget sli, and go with the single fastest card I could get with 512 memory on it. It'll be better.

Are these euros ?
 
Hiya, i have been researching and buying parts over the last few weeks! I'm down to the last few things, Graphics Cards, Memory and a PSU!

I have a Asus P5ND2 Motherboard, a Pentium D 805 and full watercooling kit with two SLI waterblocks!

I have a max budget of £260 for both cards!

I want a pair of SLI cards that will be good for overclocking, within my price range and compatible with my current components!

I would appriciate any feedback, thanks J

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814130017
 

P-Trix

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I think 260 isn't a lot of money....... I'm thinking american, and haven't done the conversion. But seeing the small amount of money you have to put out, I'd forget sli, and go with the single fastest card I could get with 512 memory on it. It'll be better.

Are these euros ?

£260 is about $485!
 

P-Trix

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http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814130017

I did see these, and they are within my price range! About £130 each, so perfect! 256Mb each too!

Thanks, i will have a look into these cards more :)
 
They only have 128bit memory interface. Get at least 256/256. I'm telling you from experience.......... for the money you have, get one highend card. Games like F.E.A.R. will love you for it.

If you can get two 7900gt's......... 256/256, or two 7800gt's, 256/256.......... I'd say ok. But NOT the cards you picked.
 

P-Trix

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They only have 128bit memory interface. Get at least 256/256. I'm telling you from experience.......... for the money you have, get one highend card. Games like F.E.A.R. will love you for it.

If you can get two 7900gt's......... 256/256, or two 7800gt's, 256/256.......... I'd say ok. But NOT the cards you picked.

Do these cards overclock well, condsidering i will have adequt cooling!?
 

P-Trix

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You're only going to get so much out og those cards. If the 7600's is what you have on your mind to do, do it....... it's you money. But it's a mistake !

Well can you recomend any other cards that will overclock well and are 256/256!?
 
This one card, an updated version that takes care of all the artifacting issues that the older 7900's had, LEFT UN- OVERCLOCKED, will be much superior to the 7600's. If you run one or two of these, you'll see you don't need to oc.


http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814130033

I have to edit this. Water cooling is good, but the newer cooler on this card also provides a way to cool down the memory on the card....... thats something the water block isn't going to do. Something to take into concideration.
 

quantumsheep

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There is no point going SLI when you're spending that kind of money. 2 x 7600gt will stil be slower than a single 7900gt.

So the advice, ditch the whole SLI idea and get a 7900gt. You can get one for under £200 here in the UK.

Try www.aria.co.uk or www.overclockers.co.uk
 

P-Trix

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There is no point going SLI when you're spending that kind of money. 2 x 7600gt will stil be slower than a single 7900gt.

So the advice, ditch the whole SLI idea and get a 7900gt. You can get one for under £200 here in the UK.

Try www.aria.co.uk or www.overclockers.co.uk

I guess i need to spend a bit more money for a dual sli setup, i noticed the 7900 on overclockers for £190 so i could just wait til the follwing month to buy new memory and get two 7900GT's!
 

GavinLeigh

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I agree with most of the posts on here. I have run two 7600gt in an SLI rig and was dissappointed with the performance :(
I already had one and added the second for a boost. I did see a significant boost in performance when the second card was added. But coming from a new installation point of view I would definitely go with a fast single card, then win hands down.
You might want to consider holding off on spending a lot on video cards though. I imagine we will see DirectX10 capable versions in the next few months and then you may want to buy something new to take advantage of this technology. Of course there is no guarantee that SLI will even work with Vista ( although I hope they will sort that out by the time Vista ships).
So as everyone else said... No to the 7600GT... yes with the 7900 series. Definitely stick with a 256bit bus with 256Mb of ram. Or otherwise buy a couple of cheap 6600gt 128Mb cards for now and get something SWEET when Vista and DX10 hit the street. :wink:
 

dougie_boy

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Are these euros ?

ha. the pound is not forgotten. ur from the US yeah?? :D

u cant get a good SLi setup for that money. save it and get a single great card. the 7900gt's are fucking sterling. and for £200, you cant shake a stick at it. it will run faster than a dual 7600gt setup, even after overclocking them.
 

yourmothersanastronaut

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Well can you recomend any other cards that will overclock well and are 256/256!?

The 6800GS overclocks pretty well. At all stock speeds, the 7600GT beats it, but it's not that great at overclocking. The 6800GS, however, is very good.

But still, go with a fast single card.

At what resolution do you play your games? Just as a reference, I have a 7900GT and I play FEAR with everything maxed (even softshadows) at 1680 x 1050. I do get the occasional stutter, but that's when the game loads a new area. Other than that, it's never dropped below 30FPS, stays closer to 50.

Widescreen needs a hack, but it's really easy and FEAR looks incredible in widescreen.
 

Heyyou27

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I guess i need to spend a bit more money for a dual sli setup, i noticed the 7900 on overclockers for £190 so i could just wait til the follwing month to buy new memory and get two 7900GT's!
If you're already going to get two 7900GTs, get a 7950GX2 instead. It's two 7900GT cores at 500MHz(Or higher depending on the brand) and each GPU has 512MB of DDR3, vs. 256MB of the 7900GTs. When using SLI the memory does not get added together so the 7950's 512MB of RAM will be better than the 7900GT's 256MB. It's true that 512MB does not always mean better performance, but when playing at a higher resolution and with newer titles that use larger textures, you'll be glad you picked the 7950GX2 over the 7900GTs.
 

yourmothersanastronaut

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It's true that 512MB does not always mean better performance, but when playing at a higher resolution and with newer titles that use larger textures, you'll be glad you picked the 7950GX2 over the 7900GTs.

Right. But, he never said what resolution he uses. If it's below 1600 x 1200, like most people, then there would be no benefit to buying a card with 512MB of RAM...except the company gets more money...:roll:

Now, if he games at 1600 x 1200 or higher, then SLI or 512MB of VRAM would be perfect.

1680 x 1050 plays great with 256MB cards. As I said, I max out FEAR with softshadows at 1680 x 1050 on a 7900GT. It doesn't maintain a constant 60FPS, but it stays above 30 for sure. And I haven't tested it while running an overclock on the video card.

One thing to consider - if you plan on overclocking or changing the stock HSF on the card(s), get an eVGA. Their warranty lets you overclock and change the coolers without voiding the warranty.
 

P-Trix

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Id be using a 1440x900 resultion, until i upgrade my monitor! That would be in widescreen too!
I just like the idea of having dual cards, and i have already bought two sli waterblocks!

I just want something that will be good too overclock and sufficent enough to play the latest games in the resolution stated!

Thanks, J
 

Heyyou27

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1680 x 1050 plays great with 256MB cards. As I said, I max out FEAR with softshadows at 1680 x 1050 on a 7900GT. It doesn't maintain a constant 60FPS, but it stays above 30 for sure. And I haven't tested it while running an overclock on the video card.
If you're using antialiasing with softshadows it corrupts the edges of the shadows under many lighting conditions in the game, and playing with softshadows on a 7900GT with antialiasing wouldn't be very smooth.
 

nick_000000

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If you are going nvidia either get a single 7900 GTX and upgrade to two when you can afford it or wait for direct x10 cards to come out instead of getting two in sli. SLI is over rated if you ask most people on this forum they won't recommend it for the price/performance. If you are bent on getting SLI for £260 you will be dissapointed as you won't even be able to get two 7900GT's which I would not even recommend compared to a single 7900GTX.

You can get a single 1900XT for £199 on overclockers.co.uk now it is a very good card alone.

Hope this helps!
 

illinikevin

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I have a setup similar to yours. I got a pair of 7900 gt's from mewegg for $510 USD after rebate and installed aftermarket cooling on them. The stock speeds were 520mhz and 1500mhz on the core and memory respectivaly. I have them overclocked to 580 and 1550. I can set them as high as 600 and 1600 but I get artifacts in the display running 3d aplications at that speed. Increasing the vcore would probably correct this but that requires a physical modification to the card. In all my set up was close in price to a 7950 GT but I don't know if you would have room to run your water cooling on that card. I am not that familiar with the volt mod to the 7900 but I have herd people are reaching speeds in excess of 700mhz making the 7900gt outpreform the 7900gtx. It is alittle out of you budget but I would go with the pair of 7900 gt's.
 

chuckshissle

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Why do you need SLI for? Do you have high-res monitor or planning on playing at ultra high resolution? If so then the SLI is great but if you're only running at 1280x1024 on a single monitor then one 7900GT is good enough for you, besides if you want to upgrade then you can another one for SLI. But for now you should at least just use one card to see if it would fit your need. The 7900GT that has 24 pixel pipelines is better than the 7600GT which has 12 pixel pipelines.

Like I said if you run on high res monitor like 1600x1200 and or multiple displays, then the 7600GT SLI is great but at regular res. like 1280x1024 or 1024x768 then a single 7900GT would do just fine. :wink:
 

Heyyou27

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If you are going nvidia either get a single 7900 GTX and upgrade to two when you can afford it or wait for direct x10 cards to come out instead of getting two in sli. SLI is over rated if you ask most people on this forum they won't recommend it for the price/performance. If you are bent on getting SLI for £260 you will be dissapointed as you won't even be able to get two 7900GT's which I would not even recommend compared to a single 7900GTX.

You can get a single 1900XT for £199 on overclockers.co.uk now it is a very good card alone.

Hope this helps!
Actually, two 7900GTs would outperform a 7900GTX easily, and even the X1900 XT, but if he was already planning on 7900GTs, the 7950GX2 would be a better choice.
 

illinikevin

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Does anyone know if aftermarket cooling can be installed on the 7950? It looks like a pair of cards attached together. Can they be seperated to install water blocks then reassambled? Anyone know of cooling solutions made just for that card. I really wanted that card but from past experiences I know the stock coolers can get loud.