SLI question

2007-04-07 09:33:29

#1

Bell: Frosties > Cornflakes; +362|7015|UK

Was just reading on a forms the 8800gts vs 8800gtx and there where all sorts of opinions floating around as whats the better deal.

Anyways, eventually someone came up with the idea of just buying another GTS and sli later for more demanding games. Then, someone asked, could u SLI an 8800GTS and a 8800GTX? Answer was no, but my question is, couldnt it work, if u overclocked the GTS to the GTX speed? I mean my understanding of SLI/crossfire is, that two different cards, one will underclock to the speed of the lesse card, but not in this case apparantly?

Someone want to expain why not because my understanding is the GTX is just a quicker GTS.......... Or does the GTX 128 instead of 96 stream processors, and a 384 bit rather than a 320 bit wide memory controller make the difference?

Thanks

Martyn

Last edited by Bell (2007-04-07 09:36:22)

2007-04-07 09:34:28

#2

_NL_Lt.EngineerFox: Big Mouth Prick; +219|6997|Golf 1.8 GTI Wolfsburg Edition

Not that I know

2007-04-07 09:41:34

#3

Stormscythe: Aiming for the head; +88|7015|EUtopia | Austria

Erh meh... how shall I put it... It's simply that nVidia software doesn't like the idea of connecting two different cards yet.
That said, imagine tasks (aka screen sections) split equally between them. You can not adjust them to have the same performance, the bandwith of the GTX will always be higher since you can't adjust the memory interface by pure clocking

Still - with SLi 2.0 we'll probably experience something new!

Oh, and by the way: If you're not in need of ultra-high resolution gaming, how about 2x 8800 GTS with 320 Mb?

2007-04-07 10:09:46

#4

Cookie.VXT: Bringer Of Cookies.; +178|6902|UK

SLi 2 allows for differant cards to be mixed

might aswell wait for that

and to answer your question, no i dont think it will work

2007-04-07 11:34:53

#5

Cybargs: Moderated; +2,285|7182

It wont work. Different amount of shaders etc.

https://cache.www.gametracker.com/server_info/203.46.105.23:21300/b_350_20_692108_381007_FFFFFF_000000.png

2007-04-07 11:44:09

#6

Mad Ad: Member; +178|6977|England, UK

now Ive done sli I wouldnt do it again, imo your better off just putting big money into one card instead of trying to add one in later, i found it wasnt saving much, if anything and I would have got more use out of it if id have just gone for the big one to begin.

2007-04-07 12:16:01

#7

kylef: Gone; +1,352|6959|N. Ireland

...the 8800 GTX has a 384 bit wide memory bus and 768 MB of GDDR3 memory while the GTS features a 320 bit memory bus and 640 MB of total memory...

There are more shaders also as far as I know, so no, I wouldn't recommend it.

2007-04-07 12:28:52

#8

The#1Spot: Member; +105|7006|byah

Think of sli as a 3 legged race. Lets say an 8800gtx is a tall fast person and the 8800gts is a short slow person that are tied together. The taller person would have to slow down to the slower persons pace to maintain a good flow during the race as the slower person is straining. Its always better to have 2 things that have equal power to work as 1.

2007-04-07 17:06:25

#9

Bell: Frosties > Cornflakes; +362|7015|UK

So, it be better just to take the cost of the GTX, rather than SLI two GTS's (well buy one now and another as its needed)?

Martyn

2007-04-08 10:38:06

#10

Mad Ad: Member; +178|6977|England, UK

yup, thats what I think....when my two 7800GTs have reached retirement age ill just be replacing it with one....truly not worth the hassle imo- wish id have just got one 7800GTX, it would have cost the same as i paid for 1 new and 1 s/h from ebay several moths later, I wouldn't have had to splash the extra 50 notes for an a8n32 sli mobo either and I wouldn't have had all the irq and xfi 'issues' running both cards, and also id have got more performance out of the GTX.

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