Reviews - Intel Core i7 and NVIDIA SLI: the way it's meant to be played?

[HEXUS]

NVIDIA claims that Intel's Core i7 will bring SLI to life. We take a closer look at multi-GPU performance.

Read more.

[Hicks12]

Couldnt it be down to the motherboard?Nvidia SLI may be utilised better on the core 7 motherboard which could affect results like this, i dont know if im right or wrong but still . I think amd will have something to say when their card would cost less(2x£350) compared to to £1000 on nvidia card's, look forward to seeing how well ati cards compete.

[kalniel]

Was about to say exactly the same thing as Hicks.

But either way, it's good to know that the core i7 + X58 combination looks like it's a good one for those people wanting triple SLI with top end cards.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

too much money for tri sli and a i7

[j.o.s.h.1408]

What am I missing? How many FPS can a TFT actually show? 60hz? 120hz?

Why would you ever care if your game tried to output at a higher frame than your monitor could display? At best it would be wasted electricity and therefore more heat, and at worst it would make the game judder (effecitively down sampling through frame binning)

If you capped the framerate at the frequency of your monitor, the CPU / RAM would be able to be focussed on game macanics and user interraction without having to pump so much wasted data to the GPU.

In modern games & game engines. Is the FPS linked to processing server commands, user input etc? If so that's just so very old skool.

So never spend effort getting a framerate higher than the hz of your TFT is that a good technique?

Any games able to cap the framerate?

Or am I a doofus?

all this try SLI stuff is so that people can play crysis at full settings with 60fps (still cant do that even with 3 way sli with 280gtx)

[kalniel]

Any games able to cap the framerate?

Or am I a doofus?

It's called V-sync (in a way).

Triple 280 is overkill for small monitors, but if you're running a gazillion pixels, across multiple monitors, use full AA and AF, and play something like crysis or future games, you might just need it.

[moogle]

So never spend effort getting a framerate higher than the hz of your TFT is that a good technique?

Any games able to cap the framerate?

Or am I a doofus?

I wouldn't think it to be a good technique as what happens when the next game comes out, the card that is built to just stay above or near my refresh rate of my monitor wouldn't do so well would it. Do I want to buy a newer card for every new game that comes out? The more powerful setup would drop some frames but might still stay above the refresh rate so it still performs well for longer.


You can cap the framerate it's called V-Sync, but if your card isn't up to it, it will make your movements with the mouse like jelly.

No you aren't you're just asking some interesting questions

Agent can tell us about the FPS thingy I forgot all about it again too

[this_is_gav]

Regarding V-Sync, the limitation (apart from perhaps compatibility issues in some combinations) is that if the theoretical frame-rate drops beneath 60FPS, even to 59FPS, then you'll see 30FPS.

[McEwin]

There's an article on a certain hardware site from tom that has a good cross section of benchmarked platforms and shows exactly where the 3-way SLi/i7 comes into its own. Worth a look at the benches.

[Jamsta]

Shame no Crysis Warhead benchs for the i7, that would test it seriously.

[kalniel]

Shame no Crysis Warhead benchs for the i7, that would test it seriously.

More than Crysis?

[Jamsta]

More than Crysis?

Same as Crysis, but the didn't test that either, unless I'm blind and missed the benches?

[Biscuit]

which other x58 boards have SLI?

V-Sync inst necessarily capping the frame rate as such, its more to do with prevention of the horizontal image tearing. When the processed framerate is above the limit of the monitor this happens... or at least thats how i understand it. Its all very complicated and can involve multiple levels of buffering each frame.

Capping the frame rate in a more traditional sense is often done with a command that runs in the users config file ie for COD4 it would be /com_maxFPS 60.

Dont forget to tell me about other x58 SLI boards btw

[j.o.s.h.1408]

dont they all have sli and crossfire?

[kalniel]

dont they all have sli and crossfire?

They all have crossfire. They all have the capability to provide SLI, but it's licensed, so they have to pay nVidia who will then allow them to use it on that board, so most boards have it, but it's possible in theory to get one that doesn't allow it.

[Biscuit]

Ok but so far, other than the Eclipse, which ones do we know that can provide us with SLI and Xfire?