Will ATi jump on the SLI bandwagon?
- Thread starter Karma Police
- Start date
More than likely they didn't want to pre-announce their next chipset.
Well, I don't recall seeing any offcial ommentry about their next gen chipset. The initial "87% performance increase" was for SLI, and that was using Tumwater.
NVIDIA always prefered multi-GPU sollutions even for professional markets and that for years now. Just look at the Independence systems from Quantum3D. A difference here might be that Quatum has it's own patented Clarity 16xRGSS algorithm for those systems.
http://www.quantum3d.com/products/Independence/Independence1.htm
http://www.quantum3d.com/products/Independence/Independence1.htm
Karma Police
Regular
If I may be so bold, I think this thread is alot bigger than I thought it would be! I'm only a noob, after all! 
I guess I will add to this thread some more. I don't see any big feature set coming until Longhorn with SM4. Two years away if we are lucky I might add. Then the uptake for the new operating system and then programs using those ability is probably 1-2years after that (like DirectX9).
This time around we are not going to get a new Directx or OpenGL standard every year making older graphic cards obsolete and thus SLI setups limiting. The tech in NV40 as in features are rather solid for the next 2-3 years I estimate. That doesn't mean efficiency can't improve or improvements with AA etc., just the features are rather complete.
So for a customer as in myself I see SLI as saving me money. When I need the performance I can add another card probably much cheaper then the first card I bought and much cheaper then buying another high end card 12-18 months later. Even now after 6 months of ATI's annoicement for the X800 XTPE they are still almost impossible to find. Without a SLI setup there is no guarantee that a higher performing card will be available for me to purchase when I need it.
Now I don't see a SLI setup costing that much more, reason being the motherboard would be a purchase for my normal upgrade cycle with an addition of an extra PCI express slot for graphics. Maybe costing $30 more, really nothing compared to my other costs and habits. I end up buying one high or near high end card now at high cost and then subsequently when needed another card hopefully at a much reduce cost, good deal or sell etc.. I get 1.8x graphic performance possibly for maybe $150 - $200 which for me would be a steal of an upgrade with virtually the same features as any new high end card coming out.
I don't understand the logic in that SLI will cut into Nvidia future sells, come on now. If you have twice the number of slots to fill and you are the only one to fill then as in Nvidia, wouldn't it imply you will sell more boards? If you buy a used board to fill that slot to stop you from buying the next big thing from Nvidia may mean the other guy who sold it to you is going for that big green symbol in his/her dual slot PCIex graphic solution as well. In addition if multichip designs where bad then why would ATI even have that capability in their chips? The answer is they are not. Especially now with the API set in stone for the next 2-3 years.
I think Nvidia did the right thing and for those who need or want top performance without dryice and exotic cooling methods. This is a smart option which I think many will try out in the end in the next 1-2 years. Testing a SLI setup at 1024x768 without AA and AF is really not telling of real performance of a SLI setup. We sdon't know how well or not Nvidia option will pan out yet until readily available and tested.
This time around we are not going to get a new Directx or OpenGL standard every year making older graphic cards obsolete and thus SLI setups limiting. The tech in NV40 as in features are rather solid for the next 2-3 years I estimate. That doesn't mean efficiency can't improve or improvements with AA etc., just the features are rather complete.
So for a customer as in myself I see SLI as saving me money. When I need the performance I can add another card probably much cheaper then the first card I bought and much cheaper then buying another high end card 12-18 months later. Even now after 6 months of ATI's annoicement for the X800 XTPE they are still almost impossible to find. Without a SLI setup there is no guarantee that a higher performing card will be available for me to purchase when I need it.
Now I don't see a SLI setup costing that much more, reason being the motherboard would be a purchase for my normal upgrade cycle with an addition of an extra PCI express slot for graphics. Maybe costing $30 more, really nothing compared to my other costs and habits. I end up buying one high or near high end card now at high cost and then subsequently when needed another card hopefully at a much reduce cost, good deal or sell etc.. I get 1.8x graphic performance possibly for maybe $150 - $200 which for me would be a steal of an upgrade with virtually the same features as any new high end card coming out.
I don't understand the logic in that SLI will cut into Nvidia future sells, come on now. If you have twice the number of slots to fill and you are the only one to fill then as in Nvidia, wouldn't it imply you will sell more boards? If you buy a used board to fill that slot to stop you from buying the next big thing from Nvidia may mean the other guy who sold it to you is going for that big green symbol in his/her dual slot PCIex graphic solution as well
. In addition if multichip designs where bad then why would ATI even have that capability in their chips? The answer is they are not. Especially now with the API set in stone for the next 2-3 years.I think Nvidia did the right thing and for those who need or want top performance without dryice and exotic cooling methods. This is a smart option which I think many will try out in the end in the next 1-2 years. Testing a SLI setup at 1024x768 without AA and AF is really not telling of real performance of a SLI setup. We sdon't know how well or not Nvidia option will pan out yet until readily available and tested.
Exactly, once you invested in a dual PEG motherboard, the cost really shouldn't be counted in future upgrades since it is reusable. Buying *any* PCI-E card requires a system upgrade, so IMHO, if I'm going to go BTX, PCI-E, 64-bit CPU, SATA, etc I may as well get a dual PEG motherboard while I'm at it. The extra slot may come in handy, whether or not I'm even going to use SLI capabilities. Maybe for video editing, HDTV apps, or some other video app, I will need two cards.
I think noone ever said that if you are able to buy the top of the hardware already, SLI is not for you. But, if you have so much money i really doubt that 2 years after you will upgrade just by adding the same graphic card that you bought 2 years ago. I bet theses customers will upgrade more parts of their pc.
Really the only people I see using a sli system are people buying directly a dual 6800 GT/Ultra system whatever the cost is.
Really the only people I see using a sli system are people buying directly a dual 6800 GT/Ultra system whatever the cost is.
Lazzarus2nd
Newcomer
Fair go guys, how many people do you think really update hardware to the point that they are ready to accept SLI? i mean really you can update because you enjoy having the fastest and best (as the ole torana boys used to do), or you can update because the games dont work well, and ATM games work fantastic with the latest chipset.
How far do you want to go?? Want to live in the computer game forever? The majority of people i know dont give a fig about the graphics capabilities of the computer. I enjoy doom3 as much as the next guy, however when i go to work on monday 3 out of 100 people want to know about games.
It does seem that personal preference about the card is all it boils down to, however give it 6 months, im updating!! P.S. let me know how to make this sys go quicker, you have a friend for life, and oh, how do you get the tag village idiot????
P4 3.2Ghz Prescott
Sapphire X800Xt
1024 MB PC 3200 Generic RAM
2 x 80Gig SATA HD
875P chipset
How far do you want to go?? Want to live in the computer game forever? The majority of people i know dont give a fig about the graphics capabilities of the computer. I enjoy doom3 as much as the next guy, however when i go to work on monday 3 out of 100 people want to know about games.
It does seem that personal preference about the card is all it boils down to, however give it 6 months, im updating!! P.S. let me know how to make this sys go quicker, you have a friend for life, and oh, how do you get the tag village idiot????
P4 3.2Ghz Prescott
Sapphire X800Xt
1024 MB PC 3200 Generic RAM
2 x 80Gig SATA HD
875P chipset
Very, very carefully. 8)Lazzarus2nd said:
dksuiko said:
Independence systems for Quantum3D appeared after the AAlchemy systems (which contained 4-way or higher VSA-100 chips from 3dfx). They didn't appear yesterday but for a couple of generations already. How recently exactly?
Neither SLI (scalable link interface) nor Quantum3D systems are multi-chip for the record, rather multi-GPU and I said multi-GPU.
Actually if you changed your CPU/mobo/memory for a currently top-o-the-line AMD 64 rig you probably would get a bit of a speed bump, BTW.Lazzarus2nd said:
(Sorry, just thought of it and I can always use another friend for life.
)digitalwanderer said:Actually if you changed your CPU/mobo/memory for a currently top-o-the-line AMD 64 rig you probably would get a bit of a speed bump, BTW.Lazzarus2nd said:
(Sorry, just thought of it and I can always use another friend for life.
LOL - I think you read my mind.
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