SLI not what it's cracked up to be!

Well, it looks like I'm scrapping my plans for SLI (see sig). So I'll have two cards for sale very shotly.

Out of all games, the one I play most is Joint Operations and it is why I was building this system (sticking to an LGA775 for now until SLI mobos).

SLI will only work for certain games, that have profiles for that game stored in the drivers! This is not how my old Voodoo2 PCI SLI system worked. The voodoo2 system worked for all games, no matter what.

Nvidia actually said their SLI will not work for certain games, NovaLogic's Join Operations being one of two they listed! Argh, I'm so ticked.

So, there's no need for me. In one part I am relieved as I don't have to plan on upgrading mobos and/or CPUs anytime soon, as it won't make a difference.

The other part of me really disappointed in hearing this news.

Source: THG -> http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20041123/sli-performance-05.html (read entire article for details)


Then again, ThG has been known to report wrong things. But that sounded like a solid kick in the face to me.


Boooo....

thats why i dont buy hardware when it first comes out cuss something liek this may happen,

True, but I play far too many games to make a system decision based on one game. Besides they may have support for it later. Just because they cant get it working now dosent mean they never will, or does the article say its something that hard to do?

why people are jumping on the SLI wagon so early on I do not understand.

Feel for you buddy sorry it did not work out for you

CK

Cisco Kid said:

why people are jumping on the SLI wagon so early on I do not understand...

Click to expand...

4 monitors with full video acceleration?

Sorry for the gaming dissapointment, eduncan911. You may wish to reconsider, as future games will be able to exploit this technology...

hl2 works AWSOME w/ sli.....im humping the bandwagon

wow that is gay! Maybe ATI will come out with a 2x card system that works will all games. Thats normaly what they do isnt it? Let Nvidia make something great, then top it little bit later.

capmuffin said:

...im humping the bandwagon

Click to expand...

Sevin7 said:

wow that is gay!...

Click to expand...

I'm probably going to get in trouble for this, but I just couldn't resist.

I believe that capmuffin meant to say that he was JUMPING ON the bandwagon...

I honestly can share the same concern over SLI.
It's been such a gigantic dilemma running through my head it's not funny!

According to anandtech.com and tomshardware it's true that SLI is not applicable for all games yet (I too was looking forward to playing Joint Operations in SLI mode) but perhaps in the future something can be developed. But at the same time does that mean I hope in anticipation or simply revert to the highest SINGLE GPU card I can find?

There's just waaaay too many choices now open for us gamers as to what to choose.
There's the single 6800Ultra, the X800XT, and the X850XT all capable (if not now soon) of running in dual modes (SLI or ATi's Mulit Rendering).

Then you ahve the problem of having two cards in SLI but it's performance being limited because the processor is waaaay too damn slow! Most hardware review sites would attest to the even teh mighty FX-55 not being fast enough to take full utility of the SLI configurations (6800 series). Meaning that our measly A64 2.2 Ghz or our trusty Bartons' overclocked to the 2.6Ghz range still may not be enough to show a consdierable difference.

Running Farcry for example in SLI at 1280X1024 (all AA settings enabled) is quite noticable then a single card solution but only if you have a fast eough CPU.

Is it worth spending the extra $500 on a PCI 6800GT card? Or would you rather get a X850XT PE(which is 20% faster than a 6800 Ultra) and overclock it to over 11 billiion textures/sec. The XT800 PE runs 8.3 at stock so 11 for the X850Xt should be no problem. $549 for the X850 PE is significantly less than the $800 dual PCI-e 6800GT solution + the nforce 4 boards ($200) = $1000!!!

What's the point of getting the SLI set up when the processor simply isn't stron enough.

PLUS people there have been sites saying that the 512 MB solution should come out roughly next summer... meaning we've got another potential competitor outperforming the SLI behemoth.

Dang so many choices!!!

hafa said:

I'm probably going to get in trouble for this, but I just couldn't resist.

I believe that capmuffin meant to say that he was JUMPING ON the bandwagon...

Click to expand...

rofl

Cisco Kid said:

why people are jumping on the SLI wagon so early on I do not understand.

CK

Click to expand...

ya, thats what happens. they jump on and find out the wagon has a square wheel.



what gets me is the power and heat from that setup almost
mandates water cooling adding even more to the cost.

What's the point of getting the SLI set up when the processor simply isn't stron enough.

Click to expand...

turn up the settings

There's just waaaay too many choices now open for us gamers as to what to choose.

Click to expand...

I dont think any of ati's current cards ship with a connector for their sli, so you would need to wait on them to do it.

your head is just like myne. I have these internal debates that go on for hour and hours and i can never decide. For instance- my x800pe is coming next month- i got it new in box made by ati for $450. But it wont ship til dec 23rd. I couldnt decide weather to cancel it and get sli, or wait for Nforce 4 and x850pe. Since i currently have AGP i knew the agp card would be outdated very soon. But finaly after hours of debating i decided to order a 6600gt AGP, and when my x800pe comes, im selling it to my freind for $200- so im only paying $25 to use this awesome card for over a month. (my 6600 comes today). And im going to build a new computer late this summer when the new cards come out.

NVIDIA only talks about frame buffering techniques used in games of this sort that are problematic for SLI.

Click to expand...

If this is true, not even if ATi came out with somwthing it would probably have the same problem.

I found that review somewhat lacking. Thats great he showed the maximum fps but what about the average and low fps of the game. Thats where it's possible SLI really shinned.

His scores certainly don't reflect what others have posted for frame rates in HL2.

I agree, the low end of the fps is the most important, hell I would use vsync with that much power for sure.

Can they not just patch games to work with SLI?

They may, but only time will tell. I still cant see a couple of games changing my decision to go with a range of hardware especially considering most new games from here out will most likely make use of this new technology.