Two Nvidia cards w CrossfireX motherboard compatible?

[teagen]

Hello,
Lookin' to buy new PC (Cyberpower z77). Has as default:
motherboard: [CrossFireX] Gigabyte GA-Z77-D3H Intel Z77 Chipset DDR3 ATX Mainboard w/ IRST, Lucid Virtu MVP, Ultra Durable4 Classic, 7.1 HD Audio, GbLAN, 2x Gen3 PCIe x16, 3x PCIe x1 & 2 PCI (Extreme OC Certified).
Video card: NVIDIA GeForce GT 520 1GB 16X PCIe Video Card

Question: Will I be able to add a second Nvidia card later, even though Nvidia uses SLI and the motherboard is CrossfireX?
Or will I have to buy 2 AMD Radeon cards and thow away the Nvidia, which would suck?

Also, is this a good low budget gaming pc?

 

[randomkid]

Hello,
Lookin' to buy new PC (Cyberpower z77). Has as default:
motherboard: [CrossFireX] Gigabyte GA-Z77-D3H Intel Z77 Chipset DDR3 ATX Mainboard w/ IRST, Lucid Virtu MVP, Ultra Durable4 Classic, 7.1 HD Audio, GbLAN, 2x Gen3 PCIe x16, 3x PCIe x1 & 2 PCI (Extreme OC Certified).
Video card: NVIDIA GeForce GT 520 1GB 16X PCIe Video Card

Question: Will I be able to add a second Nvidia card later, even though Nvidia uses SLI and the motherboard is CrossfireX?
Or will I have to buy 2 AMD Radeon cards and thow away the Nvidia, which would suck?

Also, is this a good low budget gaming pc?

No no no no no no.... don't buy prebuilt PC's. They are normally unbalanced & most turn out to be rip offs because you are later forced to upgrade due to poor graphics card... I checked the cyberpower z77 configuration & it turn out to have an i5-2550K. Good CPU but the GT520 does not match it.
At $740 (the price of the Cyberpower z77), you can get better pc configuration for the same price if you customize with the help of the community here.

 

[17seconds]

Your motherboard documentation needs to specifically state that it is "Nvidia SLI Certified".

Any motherboard can do Crossfire, but only SLI Certified boards can do SLI.

 

[aicom]

Lucid's technology may be able to help you here. I believe there's a way to utilize both an AMD and NVidia GPU as a CrossFire or SLI of sorts by changing some settings in there. It hasn't had much testing or proving in most games but it's there.

 

[17seconds]

It's Crossfire only. No SLI possible.
http://www.gigabyte.us/products/product-page.aspx?pid=4140#ov

The Lucid technology is only supposed to use the on-board graphics to boost the video card performance. It does not allow mixing of vendors into a hybrid Crossfire setup.

 

[teagen]

No no no no no no.... don't buy prebuilt PC's. They are normally unbalanced & most turn out to be rip offs because you are later forced to upgrade due to poor graphics card... I checked the cyberpower z77 configuration & it turn out to have an i5-2550K. Good CPU but the GT520 does not match it.
At $740 (the price of the Cyberpower z77), you can get better pc configuration for the same price if you customize with the help of the community here.

Thank you (and others) for your responses. How hard is it to custom-build a pc once I have all the parts? I'm not a tech guy. Is everything pretty much Plug-and-play now-days or do I have to do mysterious hardware configurations with pins, switches, and wires that can be plugged in to the wrong place?(I added a second hard-drive to a pc about 10 yrs ago, and it was not fun.) And is there much danger of ruining the parts if I do it wrong?

If it IS just a matter of sticking everything in the right slot and pushing "On," can you guys recommend appropriate parts for a gaming pc ~$700-800 or so?
I'm mostly looking forward just to Diablo3, wich is supposed to be easy to run, but I'd like to be able to purchase more demanding games that may come out in the next 3-5 years.

(-maybe parts build around the i5-2550k or some cpu that is cheaper but good enough, and good value for the cost.)

-If it does sound like I'm too noob to put it together myself, is there a good, recommended pre-built game pc in my price range?
Thanks!

 

[sk1939]

It's pretty much entirely plug and play now once you select all of the right parts. There's always the danger of breaking something, but it's much easier to build a computer nowadays, there is little in the way of jumpers and settings that you have to worry about. Most of it is making sure of compatibility between components (like the SLI issue above).

 

[randomkid]

Thank you (and others) for your responses. How hard is it to custom-build a pc once I have all the parts? I'm not a tech guy. Is everything pretty much Plug-and-play now-days or do I have to do mysterious hardware configurations with pins, switches, and wires that can be plugged in to the wrong place?(I added a second hard-drive to a pc about 10 yrs ago, and it was not fun.) And is there much danger of ruining the parts if I do it wrong?

If it IS just a matter of sticking everything in the right slot and pushing "On," can you guys recommend appropriate parts for a gaming pc ~$700-800 or so?
I'm mostly looking forward just to Diablo3, wich is supposed to be easy to run, but I'd like to be able to purchase more demanding games that may come out in the next 3-5 years.

(-maybe parts build around the i5-2550k or some cpu that is cheaper but good enough, and good value for the cost.)

-If it does sound like I'm too noob to put it together myself, is there a good, recommended pre-built game pc in my price range?
Thanks!

There are a lot of how to videos that will teach you how to built PC. But the fun is in being able to come up with a PC configuration that will give you better specs than pre-built ones at the same cost. I'm not one for recommending parts but I believe a lot of helpful member with ready made configs per budget will post some good recommendations soon enough. If you are not comfortable assembling the parts, some stores will built it for you for a small extra charge.

 

[TwistedDTM]

Your motherboard documentation needs to specifically state that it is "Nvidia SLI Certified".

Any motherboard can do Crossfire, but only SLI Certified boards can do SLI.

Thats very false information. It's not just any motherboard that can do Crossfire it has to be the right chipset to do it. Exactly the same as with Nvidia Sli it has to be Crossfire compatible.

I know this makes no difference to the thread as he is looking for Sli boards anyway just thought i would point that out.

 

[TwistedDTM]

Your motherboard documentation needs to specifically state that it is "Nvidia SLI Certified".

Any motherboard can do Crossfire, but only SLI Certified boards can do SLI.

Thats very false information. It's not just any motherboard that can do Crossfire it has to be the right chipset to do it. Exactly the same as with Nvidia Sli it has to be Crossfire compatible.

I know this makes no difference to the thread as he is looking for Sli boards anyway just thought i would point that out.

 

[TwistedDTM]

Your motherboard documentation needs to specifically state that it is "Nvidia SLI Certified".

Any motherboard can do Crossfire, but only SLI Certified boards can do SLI.

Thats very false information. It's not just any motherboard that can do Crossfire it has to be the right chipset to do it. Exactly the same as with Nvidia Sli it has to be Crossfire compatible.

I know this makes no difference to the thread as he is looking for Sli boards anyway just thought i would point that out.