8800GT SLI power question

[poonsies]

Hello everyone,

Im toying with the idea of buying a second Point of View 8800GT card to run in SLI in my rig. The specs are as follows:

4400+ AMD Cpu
2gigs DDR Corsair performance ram
3 HDs ( 1TB,1 250gig, 1 74gig Raptor )
1 x 8800GT
580 watt Tagan PSU

I was wondering if firstly if i could run an 8800GT SLI setup with the exisiting 580watt Tagan PSU ? And secondly would the Cpu just bottleneck the systems peferomance so much that its not even worth considering ?

Thanks for the help =)

Sean,

[matty-hodgson]

probably better off just selling the 8800GT you already have and buying a 4850 or a 9800GTX+
save on electricity, be more powerful and cost about the same, if not less

[moogle]

probably better off just selling the 8800gt you already have and buying a 4850 or a 9800gtx+
save on electricity, be more powerful and cost about the same, if not less

8800gt sli >>> 9800 <> 4850

[matty-hodgson]

8800gt sli >>> 9800 <> 4850

what? really?

[moogle]

what? really?

Yepppers, the 8800GT is just behind the 9800 sort of. Maybe 5-10fps until you start reaching into those high resolutions.

[scaryjim]

the 8800GT is just behind the 9800 sort of.

That's hardly surprising - they're based on the same GPU core, after all!

If you're worried about your CPU I'd point you at an earlier discussion regarding CPU / GPU bottlenecks in which I found a very interesting benchmarking section AnandTech have recently set up. They test a number of different CPUs in similar rigs. That should give you an indication of how much difference the different CPUs can make to framerates.

It's also worth saying: most recent benches suggest the 9800GTX+ / GTS250 (yep, same GPU again!) is consistently, although not far, ahead of the 4850...

[poonsies]

Can anyone answer the PSU question ? Thats really the main thing in concerned with.

[moogle]

Can anyone answer the PSU question ? Thats really the main thing in concerned with.

Yes, it's more than enough. Your system wont even be maxing it out.

[poonsies]

Thanks for the help, most useful! Just 1 more, will my cpu totally bottleneck the performance of the 2 8800Gt cards beyond the point of there being any point in getting a second ? Its an Athlon 64 X2 4400+ processor.

[moogle]

Thanks for the help, most useful! Just 1 more, will my cpu totally bottleneck the performance of the 2 8800Gt cards beyond the point of there being any point in getting a second ? Its an Athlon 64 X2 4400+ processor.

It might. It all really depends on what games you play and what resolutions you plan to play at. My E2180 is bottlenecked at stock speeds but when overclocked to 3GHz it gets a massive boost.

I ran my 4200 at 2.8GHz though and that was quite alright for high end games

[poonsies]

Well i have a monitor with a native resolution of 1920 x 1200, so around there would be nice. Games would be the usual CoD4/5, some WoW etc. I guess im wondering whether I would get any substantial gains from buying a second card =)

Sean.

[Badbonji]

Poonsies, for newer games they like to have more than 512mb ram, and for your resolution I would get a GTX275 or a HD4890 (released in April, the 9th probably). These will offer 100&#37; scaling in every game, whereas sli might not scale much. But it is up to you, as another 8800gt will be quite cheap. When I had dual 8800gts 512mb I got around 150fps in Hl2 at 1920x1200. But they were overclocked considerably. In left 4 dead that came to around 80-140fps at 1920x1200 16xQ CSAA, which is where the 512mb is running out. I would imagine your setup will perform about 30% slower, considering I had a Q9450 at 3.7ghz.

[scaryjim]

I don't think your CPU will stop you getting playable framerates, but don't expect anything through the roof. The AnandTech benches page has the 4400+ (well, the almost identical 4450e, anyway!) and it's not the best performing processor by a long way, but they test gaming performance with a GTX280 @ 1680 x 1050 so the GPU isn't fully loaded, meaning the processor will have more of an impact on framerates. At 1920 x 1200 I'm pretty sure you'll see significant framerate increases from 1 8800GT to 2 8800GTs, even with an X2 4400.

[scaryjim]

Poonsies, for newer games they like to have more than 512mb ram, and for your resolution I would get a GTX275 or a HD4890 (released in April, the 9th probably).

Given that the OP already has an SLi capable mobo and an 8800GT, I suspect they'll see the best performance improvement / £ by getting another 8800GT! they start at about £60 on ebay and it looks like about £100 new (although if you can find one in stock is another matter!!). That's a lot cheaper than either of the new cards you suggest...

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I would agree that adding another 8800GT. I wonder if a 9800GT can be used as many were just rebadged 8800GT cards?!

[!TIMMY!]

I can also confirm that the PSu will be enough. My mate has a Q6600 @ 2.4ghz, 4gb ram, 2 x 8800GTS 512mb, 3 HD's on his Tagan 580w and he games at 1900 x 1080 (or whatever it is). With your high res, then getting another cheap 8800GT could defo benefit ur PC.

I would also look at buying 4gb of 1066hmz ram as it is pretty cheap these days, if your running a 64bit OS. If your running a 31bit OS then you would only see roughly 2.25GB of ram so it wont really be worth it.