2 x card or sli ?

[Jim]

title says it all whats the better performance investment of the 2 ,should I go with sli or a 2 x vid card ? based on a comparison of apples to apples so to speak ( aside from the fact that my cpu will be a bottleneck) is sli over rated ?

thanks

[kirk_d]

OK, I got ya. You're talking about running in SLI, as opposed to just two cards
I don't know. I would imagine SLI would give better results, however a little more buggy.

I tried the same thing with ATI, and it was nice without the CCC running in the background.
Results weren't as good as crossfire, but way less overhead running.

I also experienced a very minor stutter in crossfire, only in 3dmark06; wasn't there
with just two cards.

Just Two cards did provide more performance than a single card.

My mobo has a uli chipset, and I've run it SLI.( Major crash, but worked for a minute)
Experiment!
Muhahaha Hahhahaa!

[Babrbarossa]

What kind of budget range are you looking at? SLI scales much better than it used to so it's a good option for planning an upgrade path, but generally I just get the fastest card I can afford.

[kirk_d]

Originally Posted by Babrbarossa

What kind of budget range are you looking at? SLI scales much better than it used to so it's a good option for planning an upgrade path, but generally I just get the fastest card I can afford.

...and Mr Babrbarossa is totally correct, because you're in effect buying two cards
for the performance of 1.3-1.8 cards. Hope that makes sense!

[Jim]

Originally Posted by Babrbarossa

What kind of budget range are you looking at? SLI scales much better than it used to so it's a good option for planning an upgrade path, but generally I just get the fastest card I can afford.

$300 , guess since I already have 1 vid card matching one bout 100 bucks on ebay will need a mobo that does 2 x 16 pcie , (anybody have a used 680i mobo )

[Jim]

Originally Posted by kirk_d

OK, I got ya. You're talking about running in SLI, as opposed to just two cards
I don't know. I would imagine SLI would give better results, however a little more buggy.

I tried the same thing with ATI, and it was nice without the CCC running in the background.
Results weren't as good as crossfire, but way less overhead running.

I also experienced a very minor stutter in crossfire, only in 3dmark06; wasn't there
with just two cards.

Just Two cards did provide more performance than a single card.

My mobo has a uli chipset, and I've run it SLI.( Major crash, but worked for a minute)
Experiment!
Muhahaha Hahhahaa!

sorry by 2x Im talkin single card 2 gpu's

[Babrbarossa]

If you're running an e4300, - you're going to get bottlenecking if you get anything too high-end so I might be tempted to sell your cpu/mobo and buy something like an e8400, p5q pro combo with the $300. Then you're ready for a faster video card when you can afford it. But you could always go fo rthe GPU now- you can get a 4870 for around 240, or a GTX 260 core 216 for just a little more.

Might be worth haunting the FS threads for a while, lots of us upgrade junkies selling off fairly new mobos and CPUs around here. (I do have a used 680i, but that probably isn't the best route ;-)

[Jim]

Originally Posted by Babrbarossa

If you're running an e4300, - you're going to get bottlenecking if you get anything too high-end so I might be tempted to sell your cpu/mobo and buy something like an e8400, p5q pro combo with the $300. Then you're ready for a faster video card when you can afford it. But you could always go fo rthe GPU now- you can get a 4870 for around 240, or a GTX 260 core 216 for just a little more.

Might be worth haunting the FS threads for a while, lots of us upgrade junkies selling off fairly new mobos and CPUs around here. (I do have a used 680i, but that probably isn't the best route ;-)

wow thats great info Babrbarossa , thanks, yea i know the 4300 gotta go,so replace the combo or gpu...hmm, if I replaced cpu/mobo would I see appreciable performance in game (COD5) right away in terms of frames / second with max features on ?

[kirk_d]

Budget would be an AMD system, the 720 triple core is a haymaker.
Couple that with some nice video, you're laughing!

I guess you could go intel.

[Babrbarossa]

The biggest imnmediate improvement for games is going would be a new GTX 260 or something, even if it isn't fully utilized, but for everything else, it would be a CPU/mobo, and you would have a good foundation for a later GPU upgrade- not sure what I'd do actually- would depend on what kind of deals I could find-- maybe even something like this: NCIX.com - Buy AMD March Madness Phenom II X3 710 Triple Core Processor & MSI DKA790GX Motherboard - X3-710-790GX In Canada.