Should I get more Ram, or get another GPU for SLI

[Fazer]

So I am wondering if I should get another GTX PNY Triple-Fan GTX 770 for around $300, and wait to buy more ram, or should I get Corsair Vengeance 8gb 1600mhz ram, to add to my current 6gb of ram, and wait to buy another 770.

 

[d1rtydeedz]

Either would be superfluous, so roll the dice. If you buy ram, make sure you buy the same ram as you have. The exact same.

 

[CTurbo]

What area do you need more performance in? What are the rest of your specs?

 

[jnewegger23]

You will experience higher fps with the 770 in sli over the ram. Once you add more ram you will experience even greater performance.
So, current setup + gpu > gain than ram only. Ram upgrade may or may not see immediate gains in performance and what you do observe will not be as substantial as having a card in sli for games that take advantage of sli and or physx. Both upgrades together will obviously be even better. Just make sure your psu can handle this:
http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/geforce_gtx_770_sli_review,4.html
Guru3d recommends 700~800W PSU for the 770 in sli on an average system. Nice problem! Have fun!

 

[Fazer]

I just purchased the FX-8350, Asrock 970, XFX 850w, and Windows 8.1(64 bit), and I really just want to get more fps, since I have 144hz monitor, and would like to get higher fps in games like battlefield 4. So I guess I will go for another graphics card, and get 8gb of ram later
If you want to know what monitor I have it is this one http://us.ncix.com/products/?usaffiliateid=1000031504&sku=85052&vpn=XL2420TE&manufacture=BenQ
I might want to get 2 more for the triple screen setup, which would be pretty cool, and If I wait a while I might get 32gb of ram, and wait a couple more months for the ram. And it would be nice to for video editing, and would improve performance in games a little bit more I guess, since most games use 8gb of ram.

 

[gameboy1998]

The particular motherboard you have unfortunately doesn't support SLI. So you cannot add another GTX 770 without upgrading your motherboard.

 

[jnewegger23]

I wasn't aware of that. It says it supports crossfire but I don't see sli. Good catch.

 

[Fazer]

Are you sure it doesn't say it supports sli I looked at the Asrock website and it says it does, and pcpartpicker says it does as well. Here is the link to the site about the board http://www.asrock.com/mb/amd/970%20extreme4/

 

[jnewegger23]

Yeah, I didn't see it say it doesn't support sli but on newegg it only lists crossfire and I was going off of what gameboy1998 said. I would trust asrock over some word of mouth but if you want to be sure see if Asrock has a chat system and ask them directly. I was surprised to hear it wasn't. Wish I had direct experience with that board. Let us know what you find!

 

[gameboy1998]

The thing is that there are a lot of asrock 970 chipset motherboard. I don't know most of them don't support SLI but I never knew Extreme4 did. Anyway you should ask Asrock directly about it.

 

[Fazer]

Ok so I figured out it supports sli, but I guess it will bottleneck the 2nd gpu since the gpu slots are weird. I don't know if this is true or not.This will end up making my decision on sending it back or not, and I would like to keep it when it arrives, but if it creates some bottlenecking on my 2nd GTX 770 in the future then I don't want it. I was specifically buying that motherboard for sli, and it was cheaper, than all the other boards I saw, except for one other one, that I didn't think it would be good by the reviews it got. Im not much of a computer wizard, but if you one of you can tell me if the bottleneck thing is true than let me know! here is the link to the board http://www.asrock.com/mb/amd/970%20extreme4/

 

[Fazer]

Ok so I will either keep the Asrock 970 Extreme4 MOBO, or the MSI 970A MOBO, which has 2 16x slots, unlike the Asrock one that has 1 16x, and 1 8x. Which should I get. I watched some benchmarks, and in some games performance decrease is less 1%, and sometimes 10%. should I return the Asrock MOBO, and get the MSI one, or keep the Asrock one?

 

[jnewegger23]

Could you please list the exact msi mobo name as there are at least 3 different versions

 

[Fazer]

Could you please list the exact msi mobo name as there are at least 3 different versions

The motherboard is the MSI 970a G-46 here is a link
http://us.msi.com/product/mb/970AG46.html

 

[Fazer]

Could you please list the exact msi mobo name as there are at least 3 different versions

Ok, now I looked deeper into the Asrock MOBO, and it says on the site and it says it has 3 PCI Express 2.0 x16, aren't those the slots for gpu's, and other stuff like that?Because I saw one or two articles on this site about it only having 1, when the Asrock site says it has 3? Can you check for me just to be sure if this has the right slots for SLI .
Asrock: http://www.microcenter.com/product/382952/970_Extreme4_Socket_AM3_970_ATX_AMD_Motherboard

 

[jnewegger23]

Both boards are good for sli. You can double check here too:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130637
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157262
It looks like the asrock has 3 and the msi has 2. Under features it explicitly states sli support for the asrock. Both boards will work just fine.

 

[Fazer]

Both boards are good for sli. You can double check here too:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130637
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157262
It looks like the asrock has 3 and the msi has 2. Under features it explicitly states sli support for the asrock. Both boards will work just fine.

Thanks, I was getting confused after seeing a thread or two about the asrock board having one 16x, and instead of a second 16x it was a 8x. Thanks 😀 I will keep my Asrock board, when it arrives!