False truth about SLI?

[tvh]

Ok since the release of the 8800Gt I have been estatic and overjoyed to plan and hopefully build in the near future a new computer. Especially when I heard that 2x 8800GT cost just about as much as 1x 8800GTX. So in my head, my logic starts to slum through my thoughts, and aren't 2 'things' better then 1? So I began to create this bahemeth of a computer and also fullfil my life fantasy of a new powerful but froogle computer. So I start my heavy research spending hours a day, at home and at work, finding out specks and tweaking my wish list for the perfect system. As I was doing this I came across an astonishling amount of people saying that SLI is a waste of money and doesn't have hardly any performance gain (just like the software RAID 0 fad). Now is this true? If so then I have major remodification to my plans. ( I was hoping to have SLI 8800GT with a C2D E6720 on a samsung 226BW 22" 1680 x 1050).

Please explain to me your ideas and thoughts about this.

Why go SLI?
Why not to go SLI?
Is SLI a misleading fad?
Is it worth it?

 

[randomizer]

Go SLI if you have the money, but only on high end cards. 2 lower end cards will generally lose to a cheaper overall higher end card. The 8800GT's pricing, however, makes it quite tempting to go SLI, considering it performs so close (except at very high res) to the real high end cards.

Why not go SLI? Well for reasons stated above but also because of compatibility and stability issues. The very fact that you have extra hardware means you have a thousand more possible conflicting combinations of hardware in certain applications. For the most part, with mature drivers the problems are few and far between and generally either minor or severe.

I don't think it's misleading, only the graphs used to represent the performance increase over a single card. Don't expect 2x the performance, coz you aren't going to get it. More like 60% at best (don't mark my words here, I'm taking a guess based off buried memories of graphs). You monitor's resolution happens to sit on the fence where anything lower only needs one card and anything higher really needs the best single card or SLI/CF to run at max settings and native res. So this can be tricky to decide if you have the money.

As for whether it's worth it or not, depends what you intend to play and are you a hardcore gamer? If you want to play crysis or FC2 at 1680x1050, SLI would be a good option IMO, especially at high or very high settings. But by the time FC2 comes out, newer single card solutions may crush your SLI 8800GT setup. But as cleeve said, never upgrade for future games.

 

[hipflask]

to be honest - if i was you id go with one 8800gt for the moment and wait till the newer x9800's are out (maybe xmas). then buy one of them and sell ure 8800gt on ebay or use it in a 2nd machine. SLI is buggy in my experience most games dont support it propperly loads of mainboards have issues with it and when i ran my 2x7900gtx's with it i was forever disabling sli to get stuff running propperly. However that said the driver supports getting better as well as game support - but you only really gain about 20% when it does work propperly. Waste of time IMO.

 

[jitpublisher]

A single high-end card is better than 2 lesser cards in SLI. Spend your money initially on the single fastest card you can afford. Or as suggested, buy an 8800 and wait until the next round of cards comes out.

 

[systemlord]

If I had the money and was playing at resolutions higher than 1680x1050 or really wanted to play Crysis at very high setting then yes I would go SLI. If I really wanted to get two 8800GTX in SLI it would only take me two months to come up with the extra money. Theres so many other places I could put that money, as I have many other hobbies that could use some more attention.

 

[baddad]

There isn't a game I have or program that doesn't work with SLI and the performance gain was 90% more, not double but damn close. My opinion is that the 8800gt would make a good SLI Machine because of the price performance.

 

[tvh]

Ok thank you all for your replaies, please keep them coming as I try to make a dicsision. I agree totally that one high end card will beat two lesser cards in SLI, but with the performance gains of the new G92 and plus buying two (when the price goes down and availability comes) is around the same price as a single 8800GTX. Now I want to get EVGA cause I've heard good things about there step up program. So could I get the two 8800GT and use their step up program to upgrade to the 9800xx for little money in the future?

 

[Belinda]

Best option unless you have money to burn is buy the 8800GT now and save the money you would have spent on the extra card and sli MB and upgrade to a better card sooner after. better use of money i think.
But like people have said depends on your monitor size/res and how high and what framerates you find acceptable.

 

[tvh]

MY Ideal in my head is with the 226BW 22" with 1680 x 1050 res with max quality in most of todays games (other then crysis of course). I may seem like I will buy one GT now and 'IF' in the future I go sli drop one in later and then use th e evga step up program to upgrade to the 9800xx series of cards. Unless i don't fully understand evga step up program. so will two 8800GT become future proof especially with the step up program? Or should I do like what some has mentioned by getting one 8800GT (still with a SLI MOBO for Futre 9800xx series) to hold me over until the new cards come around? There are just so many choices, I am going to ponder this for a little bit.

 

[Evilonigiri]

I personally would never go SLI (never say never tho).

Well that being said, currently the best price/performance vid card is the 8800GT, and buying 2 now to SLI is actually worth it....right now. In the future, it would not be worth it at all anymore, but hey that's technology.

Go with SLI or don't go with it, there is no clear winner here....right now.

 

[starcraftfanatic]

SLI or not really comes down to conditions. dual GT's will generally beat a GTX in a game like Crysis at your res and higher settings, but there also can be driver, heat and power issues. SLI/Crossfire is conditional.

 

[computertech82]

I would say sli is worth it.
http://www23.tomshardware.com/graphics_2007.html

http://www23.tomshardware.com/graphics_sli2007.html

The higher the resolution, the more power you want. Crysis can bring alot of systems to their knees. Dual cards help out alot.
Since ATI doesn't make good cards anymore, the market is pretty much standing still. The 8800GT will be a high-end for a LONG time.

 

[wirelessfender]

I am really enjoying this thread as these are my exact questions as well. I’m am looking at creating the Best possible gaming machine by Xmas for about $2k and I already have the Samsung 226bw monitor.

However the comment on ati not making good cards anymore I wouldn’t agree with. At least to state such as of yet. This month will be very interesting after the ATI HD 3*** series are available. I’m anxious to see what a 3 card crossfire is going be capable of producing.

I’m also very anxious for benches and price/performance ratios on the new Phenom X4's as well. And not to forget the 790fx chipset!

So as of what hardware that will be available by xmas, what do you guys think the best gaming mobo/GPU/CPU would be if you had about $1k to budget on those components.

 

[computertech82]

I am really enjoying this thread as these are my exact questions as well. I’m am looking at creating the Best possible gaming machine by Xmas for about $2k and I already have the Samsung 226bw monitor.

However the comment on ati not making good cards anymore I wouldn’t agree with. At least to state such as of yet. This month will be very interesting after the ATI HD 3*** series are available. I’m anxious to see what a 3 card crossfire is going be capable of producing.

I’m also very anxious for benches and price/performance ratios on the new Phenom X4's as well. And not to forget the 790fx chipset!

So as of what hardware that will be available by xmas, what do you guys think the best gaming mobo/GPU/CPU would be if you had about $1k to budget on those components.

ATI hasn't made anything that has come even close to the fastest Nvidia video card in over a year now. You could call that 10 years in our standard time (computer world ages much faster ). Pretty sad when Nvidia doesn't have to change the price AT ALL for over a year! And with the 2900XT barely matching the 3rd place card (which is now 4th place), that's NOT good. Like I said, ATI is NOT in the game for high-end.
As for Phenom, there are already benches on it. The Intel Quad 6600 crushes it without even trying. Even overclocking the Phonom, still gets stomped by Intel cpus. NOT good.
You want gaming, it's Intel and Nvidia, NOT AMD and ATI.

 

[Flingpoo]

It is a good thread. Questions we all contemplate when planning a new system.
Maximum performance!


I just got done building my system and decided against SLI. Here's my "why go SLI" list that helped change my mind.

It's just not the price of the two cards, but an SLI motherboard cost more too.

The motherboard it's self. You more than likely will be using a 680i chipset to go SLI. They seem to have heat issues, not to mention two cards in SLI generate more heat. I recommend looking at the EVGA 680i board if you want to go SLI.

Not every game supports SLI. If the game you love doesn't support it your extra card is just kind of sitting there doing nothing.

SLI really only shines in high resolutions. I have a 226BW too. Awesome monitor BTW. A single card will do just fine in 1680X1050 or so it seems. I haven't had any problems with my 8800GT running demos like Call of Duty 4 and UT3 in there highest settings. I'm sure you will get some higher FPS, but the benefit of going SLI really starts to kick in at even higher resolutions than the 226BW supports.

Basically what it came down to me is buying a motherboard with a P35 chipset if I don't want SLI, or a 680i if I wanted SLI. As far as overclocking, stability and overall performance goes the P35 wins. If nVidia and Intel ever kiss and make up I would be a happy man. I probably would have gone and got a Q35 board and bought a second card further down the road.


BUT! If SLI is really what you want and it's in the budget I say go for it. I've seen a benchmark with two 8800GT's in SLI and the numbers were impressive. I can't say it doesn't perform. It just doesn't have a good performance, money ratio. If that ratio is lacks meaniing to you, DOOOoo IT!

 

[lakedude]

It would be a good idea to wait because so many new things are just on the horizon. Yeah new stuff is always coming out but right now more stuff than usual is in the pipeline. Phenom, Intel's 45nm high K, ATI's 3xxx, and nVidia's new 65nm, higher end (higher end than the 8800GT) 8xxx or 9xxx stuff, all pretty soon.....

 

[wirelessfender]

ATI hasn't made anything that has come even close to the fastest Nvidia video card in over a year now. You could call that 10 years in our standard time (computer world ages much faster ). Pretty sad when Nvidia doesn't have to change the price AT ALL for over a year! And with the 2900XT barely matching the 3rd place card (which is now 4th place), that's NOT good. Like I said, ATI is NOT in the game for high-end.
As for Phenom, there are already benches on it. The Intel Quad 6600 crushes it without even trying. Even overclocking the Phenom, still gets stomped by Intel cpus. NOT good.
You want gaming, it's Intel and Nvidia, NOT AMD and ATI.

Jeez man what did AMD do to you to make you hate them soo much? Can you link some benches though? The only one I remember was in crysis and it performed right on par with it. Plus, If I remember correctly there where soo many factors that made that bench kind of sketchy. I don’t know... It just doesn’t seem right to me how the phenom is CRUSHED like you say. And the 790fx chipset rocks, I don’t care what you could say against it. Its a overclockers dream too. There are so many factors about the phenom that look promising, like individual core clock ability, and HT3.

But back on subject, I dont like SLI atm for some reason. Not sure why though, I think its just that im not impressed with the motherboards that are out there. Thats why I keep leaning towards that crossfire 790fx... But I would like to defiantly find out more info on the matter. Please keep the helpful speculation coming!

 

[San Pedro]

I honestly think in most games, besides Crysis, which might even not be getting 30 FPS on very high settings at that resolution with GTX SLI), you will not need SLI if you have a 8800 GT at that resolution. By the way, what games do you play, as this could be an important factor in deciding what card to get?

 

[gomerpile]

yes sli have proved to be a great benefit, specially when on line gaming. But take into account that the next generation of video card I'm assuming will have 2 vpu and I'd hope that we will see a comparable single video card that can offer the same benefits of sli. I'm thinking that sli may be an old thing but I'm not sure where graphic is going in the future only suggestions of what could be in the next line I sure hope we see 2 independent cores

 

[wirelessfender]

I honestly think in most games, besides Crysis, which might even not be getting 30 FPS on very high settings at that resolution with GTX SLI), you will not need SLI if you have a 8800 GT at that resolution. By the way, what games do you play, as this could be an important factor in deciding what card to get?

Well, I play games at 1680x1050. I am going to be playing crysis to the best of my soon to be computers ability. But I also play games like Supreme commander, Orange Box games, I am also interested in world in conflict, bioshock, a few others but basically I play Demanding games.... I also plan on running Vista 64 with 4GB of ddr1066memory. I defiantly want to wait for ATI's new cards or for prices on things to fall. I’m sick of this 8800GT fiasco with availability and inflated prices...

 

[tvh]

The games That I love are: Source games (all of them, especially TF2 right now), C&C3, F.E.A.R., Oblivion, hopefully crysis, Fallout 3 when it comes out. So I think I may just go with the single 8800GT, I just don't know as of yet but that is what I am leaning towards.

 

[systemlord]

Its a tuff call to go two 8800 GT's now or one until the 9800 GTX. This is what roadblock were at, right?

 

[Dahak]

SLI is not a fad,nor is CROSSFIRE.SLI will give a 50-70% performance increase over a single card.Maybe even more than that.I have before and do intend to run SLI again very soon.I will be running 2 8800GT in SLI in about 2 wks.I've always been impressed with the performance gains you get from SLI.I feel it is something that will be more closely scrutinized in the near future and perfected on.Go SLI.Goodluck.


Dahak

M2N32-SLI DELUXE WE
X2 5600+ STOCK (2.8GHZ)
2X1GIG DDR2 800 IN DC MODE
TOUGHPOWER 850WATT PSU
EVGA 7950 GX2 550/1400
SMILIDON RAIDMAX GAMING CASE
ACER 22IN WS LCD 1680X1050
250GIG HD/320GIG HD
G5 GAMING MOUSE
LOGITECH Z-5500 5.1 SURROUND SYSTEM
500WATS CONTINUOUS,1000 PEAK
WIN XP MCE SP2

 

[PCD]

At guru3d they test the 8800GT in SLI, and running in SLI it beats a single 8800GTX. You can get 2x 8800GT for the price of one 8800GTX.
Link http://www.guru3d.com/article/Videocards/468/

 

[13thmonkey]

1 single 8800GT will be plenty for the res that you are running at, at higher resolutions it might be preferable to go SLI. But 1680x1050 is not too high for a 8800gt, given that it performs very close to a GTX.