SLI for all?

[cack01]

I know Alienware already showed us it was possible, but I thought this was intresting as it seems to be 3Dfx's own design. Looks like alienware won't be the only ones with dual cards.

http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/article/1728/

 

[Albuquerque]

It's not 3DFX, as their SLI meant "Scan Line Interleave" and each video card rendered alternate render lines (card #1 does odd lines, card #2 does even lines). This new method keeps the acronym, but replaces the meaning with "Scalable Link Interface". This allows the cards to load-balance dependant on multiple reasons; likely to include (but not limited to) pixel shader output, vertex shader output, total geometry, total fillrate, etc.

It also doesn't render odd / even lines, so it's not even remotely close to the "SLI" of old. Each card instead renders differing portions of the screen -- card #1 renders the top half, card #2 renders the bottom half. The exact line between the halves will depend on the individual load on each card; the line can be dynamically moved based on the required output load of the respective halves.

It's not 3DFX SLi, but it's a lot more intelligent and thus likely a lot better.

 

[cack01]

I know, but I wrote the post before the NDA expired, so I didn't know too much.

This is probably still 3Dfx's technology. I feel the reason they have gone to redering sections of the screen rather than odd/even is because of the new load balancing. You can not load balance odd/even, so the next logical step would be to do sections.

 

[seamadan000]

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=2097

its not at all 3Dfx's tech, they just had the rights to the name, so they used it...

I think that it is pretty sweet, but I could never afford it

 

[MrBozack]

Is it just on the Ultra cards or will it feature on the GT versions too?

 

[seamadan000]

anand reports that it will be on all PCI express boards...