But as stated above you just don't get the performance benefit as you could with purchasing better cards. I still feel crossfire and SLI are for bragging rights more than anything. A dual 6800gt SLI setup did not impress me. I'd rather have 1 6800gt for half the cost and lose a few seconds during renderings.
Well, it depends on games that take advantage of it. And right now, on many of the benches, it's hard to justify an extra 10 fps.
SLI boards are cheaper now. So buy one. Buy the card you can afford. 6800GT or 7800GT being good bets. And when you need a boost, buy the 2nd card in 6 months time or so.
To get the ulimate use out of SLI, we're going to have to see games houses, the next wave' of games...programmed for it, for dual-core cpus. Even the 'fastest' cpus can't push the cards hard enough now. And with mhz all stalled out...now what the gamers going to do? What are the software developers going to do? That used to rely on Intel making faster chips. But they aren't going to do that anymore. Intel are making chips do more work per clock and slower speeds in the future.
They're going to have to a bit more clever to wring out speed out of Dual Core and PCI-Express.
I fail to see how one can justify spending 800+ to get a complete SLI system (or $600 if u just want one card) when many people are entirely happy playing on an AMD Athlon XP 2200+, an 80gig hard drive and a 9600XT.
The above is the system configuration of bussiness which is very succesful - you give them 12 dollars, they give you a computer for three hours.
Those computers would probably cost $1000 or less.
Another example is Microsofts $300 XBox - it has a PIII 800mhz and a Geforce 4 - the whole thing having a grand total of 64mb of memory. Dont throw that crap at me that its optimised, becuase optimised as it may be, it doesnt have a dual core proccessor and two really, really high end graphics cards, with probably a gig or so of ram, not including GRAM.
All prices are in AUD.
That said, I'm sure some pretty graphs will satisfy enough to go and waste hard earned cash.
If PCI-E and SLIdge are so important, someone please tell me why AGP graphics cards still represent 70% of the market?
The interesting thing about SLI is that even with buying a new/second card, it still doesn't make sense for the bulk of consumers. For wealthy gamers and a few specialized professionals, it is an excellent way to get increased performance without footing the bill for a rare/high-end graphics card.
However, for most consumers, the single card is almost always more reasonable. If large numbers of people plan on doubling up soon after their initial purchase, companies would realize this and offer that level of performance via a single card. If waiting until long after the purchase of their first card, consumers will typically find that a single new card is cheaper and faster than two old ones. Don't forget to figure in how much extra they had to pay for the SLI board initially.
SLI is inherently unsuitable as a mainstream technology. It is prefectly suited to high-end pro or luxury uses.
I think the best analogy is this. Even though dual processor computers are fairly common, you never see dual mother board machines in the consumer market. If dual MB machines were selling at high volumes, the same performance would be much more cheaply mass produced on a single board.
Also, I still feel dual core graphics cards are the future. Onlooker doesn't agree with me on this one. Gigabyte did a great job throwing together a dual core 6600. The thing flys! The downside (if you can call it that) is it requires a certain motherboard at this time. It makes a lot more sense to have 2 cores on 1 card than 2 seperate cores..... just like processors.SLI isn't appealing to me for a few reasons... but mainly because it takes up too much space and doubles your heat distribution from GPAs. Some of these modern GPUs are running extremely hot. My AOpen 6600gt burned out from a slight overclock in memory frequency. I used to be able to grab a lot ouf of cards. They are just being pushed to the limits now days. I threw another fan on the AOpen and was able to grab 150mhz more with the 2nd card.
Point is... room and heat can really kill a system. For the average person... i don't see this to be very appealing. For huge rendering farms...... I can see a slight advantage.
It's not that I don't agree with you it's that you just don't get it.
If you put dual cores, or dual processors on a single card you can always just put two of that card in an SLI configuration. With SLI I can have 2x2 of the card your speaking of regardless. So it's more on how much you need the speed for what you do, and that I can always use more doing what I do.
What makes more sense is to buy what you need, and let those who need more use more. Because your solution I can always double up on it if I need it with SLI.
It doesn't matter, Apple won't have enough slots to allow 2 double-slotted video cards anyway.
I think a far better solution would be to have 2 GPU's on a 12 inch card.. or maybe a dual core GPU.. or maybe just more vram
They talk about cost/performance.. well I think it'd be cheaper to have 1 card with twice the power than than 2.
I'm also wondering if games have to be coded to multi-thread GPU operations to take advantage of SLI.
As far as SLI Vs. Crossfire... well it'd seem to make logical sense that SLI would be better because the cabling is on the INSIDE of the case (see page 5).
Maybe one company will figure out how to have 2 cards in there but have 1 pipe all its operations through the others' bus--eliminating the need for a specialized motherboard and maybe even use of an extra slot.
Finally, I'd like to point out the part of the PDF where it says "CrossFire is an exciting new technology developed by ATi that allows the power of multiple GPU's to be combined in a single system."
Anyone else see this as fallacious?? Even 3Dfx had this.
I don't see why it wouldn't be possible some time in the future. When more cards make the PCI-E migration all the slots will be PCI-E. And if Apple does use PCI-E eventually we should have SLI in a PowerMac some time. But for optimum performance in SLI you need 2 - 16x PCI-E slots, and that is another story.
It doesn't matter, Apple won't have enough slots to allow 2 double-slotted video cards anyway.
I think a far better solution would be to have 2 GPU's on a 12 inch card.. or maybe a dual core GPU.. or maybe just more vram
They talk about cost/performance.. well I think it'd be cheaper to have 1 card with twice the power than than 2.
I'm also wondering if games have to be coded to multi-thread GPU operations to take advantage of SLI.
As far as SLI Vs. Crossfire... well it'd seem to make logical sense that SLI would be better because the cabling is on the INSIDE of the case (see page 5).
Maybe one company will figure out how to have 2 cards in there but have 1 pipe all its operations through the others' bus--eliminating the need for a specialized motherboard and maybe even use of an extra slot.
Finally, I'd like to point out the part of the PDF where it says "CrossFire is an exciting new technology developed by ATi that allows the power of multiple GPU's to be combined in a single system."
Anyone else see this as fallacious?? Even 3Dfx had this.
More and more cards are single slot now days. But every SLI configuration I"ve seen requires something in between the cards (like another slot (pci-e x1 or pci-x or just pci). I suppose NVidia decided to make it this way so you could use SLI with double slot cards. Well now most cards are single slot again. So not having enough slots isn't a great argument any more.
More and more cards are single slot now days. But every SLI configuration I"ve seen requires something in between the cards (like another slot (pci-e x1 or pci-x or just pci). I suppose NVidia decided to make it this way so you could use SLI with double slot cards. Well now most cards are single slot again. So not having enough slots isn't a great argument any more.
Fair enough, however I still don't think Apple would do it, simply because they seem to really hate having a lot of slots in their powermacs (yes, I'm still fuming over my 4 slotted DP2.5G5, minus 1 because I have the 6800U)
We'll see though. If they're smart, they'll use standard high-end Intel Mobos which have 2 PCI-Ex slots in there.. but if they want to get on their whole "form over function" kick, then I expect the computers will be more expensive and have fewer slots.
This "crossfire" thing offers scalabilty without buying much new hardware.. I wonder how expensive it'll be..
I think that is what ATI is trying to capitalize on; is that you can add the crossfire card to almost any card, and get a substantial increase in performance. And you also don't need a special mobo to use it. Those who need the most performance possible will still go with a SLI, or a 2nd generation SLI I imagine, but The ATI version is probably more appealing to the majority of people being that only a couple fields really can capitalize on SLI as we now know it. I'm still curious to see what Nvidia has for a second generation of SLI technology.
I think that is what ATI is trying to capitalize on; is that you can add the crossfire card to almost any card, and get a substantial increase in performance. And you also don't need a special mobo to use it. Those who need the most performance possible will still go with a SLI, or a 2nd generation SLI I imagine, but The ATI version is probably more appealing to the majority of people being that only a couple fields really can capitalize on SLI as we now know it. I'm still curious to see what Nvidia has for a second generation of SLI technology.
Actually, you need a Main Logic Board with two (2) 16x PCI-Express slots...
Curious question on the CrossFire side though... Over on the xlr8yourmac.com forums there was some posts from either an ATi insider or employee about stringing together multiple (yes, more than 2) ATi cards to boost graphics performance...
It was quite some time ago (6+ months) that I saw this, so as for the actual posts, start looking!
Upon further inspection, it appears that both the nVidia SLI & ATi CrossFire solutions require MLBs that either run one PCI-Express slot in 16x mode, or split said slot and redirect eight channels to the second "16x" PCI-Express slot...
Damn it! I want both of my 16x slots running at 16x!
And I now want, no, demand! that my pair of OpenGL cards have dual GPUs also!
Power, power, power!
Will it never end?!?
Don't you just love how we bitch about the shortcomings of hardware that isn't even available on our platform (non-existant Intel-based Mac OS X workstation) yet...
And give me some of those quad-core Whitefield CPUs, thanks...
for sure the nvidia chip ca be usaed on a single card, i saw it. nvidia itself say that it not their primary focus, but encurage third party to explore that direction. they talk about more than 40 chip sli, also on single card. that can be raelly impressive
Comments
But as stated above you just don't get the performance benefit as you could with purchasing better cards. I still feel crossfire and SLI are for bragging rights more than anything. A dual 6800gt SLI setup did not impress me. I'd rather have 1 6800gt for half the cost and lose a few seconds during renderings.
Well, it depends on games that take advantage of it. And right now, on many of the benches, it's hard to justify an extra 10 fps.
SLI boards are cheaper now. So buy one. Buy the card you can afford. 6800GT or 7800GT being good bets. And when you need a boost, buy the 2nd card in 6 months time or so.
To get the ulimate use out of SLI, we're going to have to see games houses, the next wave' of games...programmed for it, for dual-core cpus. Even the 'fastest' cpus can't push the cards hard enough now. And with mhz all stalled out...now what the gamers going to do? What are the software developers going to do? That used to rely on Intel making faster chips. But they aren't going to do that anymore. Intel are making chips do more work per clock and slower speeds in the future.
They're going to have to a bit more clever to wring out speed out of Dual Core and PCI-Express.
Lemon BOn BOn
It will maybe need a powerful 2006 gpu...but will Intel's 2006 cpus be able to 'push it'?
Lemon Bon Bon
The above is the system configuration of bussiness which is very succesful - you give them 12 dollars, they give you a computer for three hours.
Those computers would probably cost $1000 or less.
Another example is Microsofts $300 XBox - it has a PIII 800mhz and a Geforce 4 - the whole thing having a grand total of 64mb of memory. Dont throw that crap at me that its optimised, becuase optimised as it may be, it doesnt have a dual core proccessor and two really, really high end graphics cards, with probably a gig or so of ram, not including GRAM.
All prices are in AUD.
That said, I'm sure some pretty graphs will satisfy enough to go and waste hard earned cash.
If PCI-E and SLIdge are so important, someone please tell me why AGP graphics cards still represent 70% of the market?
However, for most consumers, the single card is almost always more reasonable. If large numbers of people plan on doubling up soon after their initial purchase, companies would realize this and offer that level of performance via a single card. If waiting until long after the purchase of their first card, consumers will typically find that a single new card is cheaper and faster than two old ones. Don't forget to figure in how much extra they had to pay for the SLI board initially.
SLI is inherently unsuitable as a mainstream technology. It is prefectly suited to high-end pro or luxury uses.
I think the best analogy is this. Even though dual processor computers are fairly common, you never see dual mother board machines in the consumer market. If dual MB machines were selling at high volumes, the same performance would be much more cheaply mass produced on a single board.
Originally posted by emig647
Also, I still feel dual core graphics cards are the future. Onlooker doesn't agree with me on this one. Gigabyte did a great job throwing together a dual core 6600. The thing flys! The downside (if you can call it that) is it requires a certain motherboard at this time. It makes a lot more sense to have 2 cores on 1 card than 2 seperate cores..... just like processors.SLI isn't appealing to me for a few reasons... but mainly because it takes up too much space and doubles your heat distribution from GPAs. Some of these modern GPUs are running extremely hot. My AOpen 6600gt burned out from a slight overclock in memory frequency. I used to be able to grab a lot ouf of cards. They are just being pushed to the limits now days. I threw another fan on the AOpen and was able to grab 150mhz more with the 2nd card.
Point is... room and heat can really kill a system. For the average person... i don't see this to be very appealing. For huge rendering farms...... I can see a slight advantage.
It's not that I don't agree with you it's that you just don't get it.
If you put dual cores, or dual processors on a single card you can always just put two of that card in an SLI configuration. With SLI I can have 2x2 of the card your speaking of regardless. So it's more on how much you need the speed for what you do, and that I can always use more doing what I do.
What makes more sense is to buy what you need, and let those who need more use more. Because your solution I can always double up on it if I need it with SLI.
I think a far better solution would be to have 2 GPU's on a 12 inch card.. or maybe a dual core GPU.. or maybe just more vram
They talk about cost/performance.. well I think it'd be cheaper to have 1 card with twice the power than than 2.
I'm also wondering if games have to be coded to multi-thread GPU operations to take advantage of SLI.
As far as SLI Vs. Crossfire... well it'd seem to make logical sense that SLI would be better because the cabling is on the INSIDE of the case (see page 5).
Maybe one company will figure out how to have 2 cards in there but have 1 pipe all its operations through the others' bus--eliminating the need for a specialized motherboard and maybe even use of an extra slot.
Finally, I'd like to point out the part of the PDF where it says "CrossFire is an exciting new technology developed by ATi that allows the power of multiple GPU's to be combined in a single system."
Anyone else see this as fallacious?? Even 3Dfx had this.
Originally posted by slughead
It doesn't matter, Apple won't have enough slots to allow 2 double-slotted video cards anyway.
I think a far better solution would be to have 2 GPU's on a 12 inch card.. or maybe a dual core GPU.. or maybe just more vram
They talk about cost/performance.. well I think it'd be cheaper to have 1 card with twice the power than than 2.
I'm also wondering if games have to be coded to multi-thread GPU operations to take advantage of SLI.
As far as SLI Vs. Crossfire... well it'd seem to make logical sense that SLI would be better because the cabling is on the INSIDE of the case (see page 5).
Maybe one company will figure out how to have 2 cards in there but have 1 pipe all its operations through the others' bus--eliminating the need for a specialized motherboard and maybe even use of an extra slot.
Finally, I'd like to point out the part of the PDF where it says "CrossFire is an exciting new technology developed by ATi that allows the power of multiple GPU's to be combined in a single system."
Anyone else see this as fallacious?? Even 3Dfx had this.
More and more cards are single slot now days. But every SLI configuration I"ve seen requires something in between the cards (like another slot (pci-e x1 or pci-x or just pci). I suppose NVidia decided to make it this way so you could use SLI with double slot cards. Well now most cards are single slot again. So not having enough slots isn't a great argument any more.
Originally posted by emig647
More and more cards are single slot now days. But every SLI configuration I"ve seen requires something in between the cards (like another slot (pci-e x1 or pci-x or just pci). I suppose NVidia decided to make it this way so you could use SLI with double slot cards. Well now most cards are single slot again. So not having enough slots isn't a great argument any more.
Fair enough, however I still don't think Apple would do it, simply because they seem to really hate having a lot of slots in their powermacs (yes, I'm still fuming over my 4 slotted DP2.5G5, minus 1 because I have the 6800U)
We'll see though. If they're smart, they'll use standard high-end Intel Mobos which have 2 PCI-Ex slots in there.. but if they want to get on their whole "form over function" kick, then I expect the computers will be more expensive and have fewer slots.
Originally posted by Placebo
SLI is a dirty hack of a substitute for having the logic of two cards on a single board.
heh. just like dual-g5s is a dirty hack of a substitute for having the logic of two cores on a single CPU die
Originally posted by Placebo
SLI is a dirty hack of a substitute for having the logic of two cards on a single board.
ignorance.
The more power available, the more people will want...
Originally posted by MacRonin
And when dual GPU cards have better availability, there will still be folks wanting to SLI two of them together...
The more power available, the more people will want...
This "crossfire" thing offers scalabilty without buying much new hardware.. I wonder how expensive it'll be..
Originally posted by slughead
This "crossfire" thing offers scalabilty without buying much new hardware.. I wonder how expensive it'll be..
I think that is what ATI is trying to capitalize on; is that you can add the crossfire card to almost any card, and get a substantial increase in performance. And you also don't need a special mobo to use it. Those who need the most performance possible will still go with a SLI, or a 2nd generation SLI I imagine, but The ATI version is probably more appealing to the majority of people being that only a couple fields really can capitalize on SLI as we now know it. I'm still curious to see what Nvidia has for a second generation of SLI technology.
Originally posted by onlooker
ignorance.
Would you rather have a sizzling graphics card, or two fast ones with 50% or more knocked off of the overall performance?
Originally posted by onlooker
I think that is what ATI is trying to capitalize on; is that you can add the crossfire card to almost any card, and get a substantial increase in performance. And you also don't need a special mobo to use it. Those who need the most performance possible will still go with a SLI, or a 2nd generation SLI I imagine, but The ATI version is probably more appealing to the majority of people being that only a couple fields really can capitalize on SLI as we now know it. I'm still curious to see what Nvidia has for a second generation of SLI technology.
Actually, you need a Main Logic Board with two (2) 16x PCI-Express slots...
Curious question on the CrossFire side though... Over on the xlr8yourmac.com forums there was some posts from either an ATi insider or employee about stringing together multiple (yes, more than 2) ATi cards to boost graphics performance...
It was quite some time ago (6+ months) that I saw this, so as for the actual posts, start looking!
Originally posted by MacRonin
Actually, you need a Main Logic Board with two (2) 16x PCI-Express slots...
You need that for crossfire too? I didn't realize that. Then I would definitely go with SLI.
Originally posted by Placebo
Would you rather have a sizzling graphics card, or two fast ones with 50% or more knocked off of the overall performance?
I would rather have two quadro's with double the performance of one. Thank you.
Damn it! I want both of my 16x slots running at 16x!
And I now want, no, demand! that my pair of OpenGL cards have dual GPUs also!
Power, power, power!
Will it never end?!?
Don't you just love how we bitch about the shortcomings of hardware that isn't even available on our platform (non-existant Intel-based Mac OS X workstation) yet...
And give me some of those quad-core Whitefield CPUs, thanks...