GTX 1080 SLI good for Skyrim special edition with many graphics mods installed?

[Fixadent]

I'm building a new enthusiast gaming rig with two-way SLI GTX 1080 and a Core i7 7700K Kaby Lake with 16GB DDR4 RAM.

Is this good enough to play Skyrim special edition with many graphics mods installed and get a steady 60fps @1920x1080.

Right now, I'm using a two-way SLI GTX 680 with a Core i7 3770K Ivy Bridge and 16GB DDR3 RAM. I have the following mods installed for Skyrim SE and my fps drops to an abysmal 25-30 in some areas.

*True storms special edition
*Real mountains 4K
*Skyrim 2017 textures 4K diffuse 2K normalmap
*Skyrim flora overhaul
*Y.A.L.O yet another landscape overhaul for Skyrim

 

[Rapajez]

Yes, but you could probably get a steady 60FPS with a single 1080. I'd buy one now and see how it performs, before grabbing the second. Really, with that budget, it seems like you'd be better served upgrading the monitor!

It looks like we've both used SLI in the past, and I'd avoid unless you really have the money to blow.

 

[Rapajez]

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/1714?vs=1719

 

[Fixadent]

Enough graphics mods for skyrim will bog down ANY machine.

 

[Rapajez]

Agreed, but 1 1080 should already be about 3x times faster than your 680 SLI.

Start with one and see how you like it, maybe use the money saved on a bigger, higher-resolution monitor.

Loading all mods/textures might be storage-intensive as well. That and you might spend a lot of time staring at the loading screen. Do you already have a good Solid State Drive?

 

[Darshiido]

As of today, sli is not supported in Skyrim special edition. One gtx 1080 would be enough for skyrim special edition at 1080p, but some mods are so demanding your performance may vary ,I remember a few months ago my gtx 1080 had some problem's with the old skyrim when it had graphics mods installed.

 

[Rapajez]

Exactly, one of the issues with SLI games may take a while to support it, if at all.

The issues with mods may be failure to optimize the mods themselves, not insufficient hardware. Again, go single 1080 (or maybe even wait a little to see if the 1080 Ti comes out), and go from there.

 

[Fixadent]

Exactly, one of the issues with SLI games may take a while to support it, if at all.

The issues with mods may be failure to optimize the mods themselves, not insufficient hardware. Again, go single 1080 (or maybe even wait a little to see if the 1080 Ti comes out), and go from there.

Skyrim is notorious for being very poorly optimized, almost as bad as the PC port of GTA IV.

Given the popularity and success of the game and it's GIGANTIC modding community, you would think that Bethesda would release an update for the game enabling the use of multi-GPU setups so enthusiast players can have the extra performance they need (up to four GPU's) to run more graphics mods without slashing their framerate.

Here are some screenshots I took in-game of my Skyrim SE with several graphics mods installed, and it's also where my fps dropped to 25-35.

But then again I'm using old GTX 680 (2GB) and since the game doesn't use SLI, I'm only using one of them. I'm running the game on "ultra" settings @1920x1080, which is the maximum resolution of my monitor at the moment.

There are certain areas in dense forests with thick volumetric fog and complex trees and foliage. That's where my framerate goes to hell.