SLI question

[xingyaa]

Which one out of these card would be better for SLI usage? A 8800GTS @ 320mb or a HD3870 @ 512mb? and in general which one is the better card in single usage?

Thanks

[Flewis]

Both SLI or crossfire arent worth it, generally they are slower than a higher performance single card

[xingyaa]

Both SLI or crossfire arent worth it, generally they are slower than a higher performance single card

Id been told that before, am i right in thinking that the HD3870 has better performance in single mode than the 8800GTS though? Thanks for the feedback anywhoo.

[sawyen]

generally speaking..

SLI will have earlier driver profiles, and is in general scale marginally ok.. about 1.3-1.5x on GAMES

Crossfire will get the wallop for update multi-GPU driver release, but current HD series scaling seems to be far better than SLI is giving out.. 1.5-1.8x seems to be the norm.. but bear in mind, you'll have to put up with weak driver update everytime a new game comes off..

8800GTS 320MB is pretty bad value for money now, so a 3870 or a 8800GT would probably be my bet

[xingyaa]

generally speaking..

SLI will have earlier driver profiles, and is in general scale marginally ok.. about 1.3-1.5x on GAMES

Crossfire will get the wallop for update multi-GPU driver release, but current HD series scaling seems to be far better than SLI is giving out.. 1.5-1.8x seems to be the norm.. but bear in mind, you'll have to put up with weak driver update everytime a new game comes off..

8800GTS 320MB is pretty bad value for money now, so a 3870 or a 8800GT would probably be my bet

Ok thanks, ATI have always had a problem with drivers though havent they?

[Webby]

First up since nobody has said it yet, you are obviously going to need a motherboard which will support either SLI or Crossfire. You can't have a motherboard which supports both so do you already have your MB or are you upgrading this at the same time?

What Sawyen said is right especially about the GTS 320MB not being worth purchasing.

Up to £90 HD 3850 256MB
Up to £110 HD 3850 512MB
Up to £150 HD 3870 512MB (can be found for as little as £130)
Up to £180 you will be looking at the 8800GT 512MB
Up to £200 the 8800 GTS 512MB (G92)
Up to £220 2x HD 3850 512MB in Crossfire
Up to £280 HD 3870 X2 1GB (2x HD 3870 512MB on a single card) or 2x HD 3870 512MB in Crossfire
Any more than this and I'm not sure but you will be looking at £350 for 2x 8800GT in SLI which with the lower increases from SLI over Crossfire you may not get significantly better performance than the 3870 X2

[sawyen]

..You can't have a motherboard which supports both..

well, FWIW.. Blackbird 002 has a modified Asus striker that takes both SLI and Crossfire..

Just a heads up..

[oralpain]

There are modded drivers that will enable most boards with the correct PCI-E slots to support either.

SLI/Crossfire is limited by licencing concerns, not technical ones.

[p5-]

Ok thanks, ATI have always had a problem with drivers though havent they?

In what way?

[kalniel]

Ok thanks, ATI have always had a problem with drivers though havent they?

Not in recent memory, quite the opposite actually.

[sawyen]

nail on the head kalniel, I never implied ATI had bad driver issues, just that their multi-GPU updates are lacking (though lacking only on titles that are not supported)..

Nvidia on the other hand has better multi-GPU updates but their default drivers are downright terrible, if you'd look into some of my older threads you'll know much I hate their current set of drivers...

[Rollo]

Both SLI or crossfire arent worth it, generally they are slower than a higher performance single card

There are problems with this.

The most obvious is you can SLi or Crossfire high end cards, which is much faster than single high end cards.

The other is 3870 CF and 8800GT SLi are often faster than a single high end card.

Last is the flexibility a SLi motherboard gives the end user. You can buy one card now, and down the road add another when they cost less to add additional power.

[TooNice]

To be honest, the 8800 GT can be found for as little as £150 even right now (£153 for an OC'ed one). Two of those can give the X2 a decent run for the money.. If it weren't for the added motherboard requirements.

To answer the original question though, I'd expect the 3870 CF to be faster than the 320MB GTS in SLI in games where they are equally optimised (just - and not all round; the two will trade hits).