SLI / CrossFire FAQs

[Maziar]

No,it's not possible

 

[portreci]

No,it's not possible

Thanks for ur reply mate !
So i already have a nvidia quadro 2000 ! I actualme in my lidly building a new Pc ! First time in my life Not very wise !
Im stuck about motherboard 🙁 I have a I7 2600K CPU !
I dont know what motherboard i could get ! I have been looking at some !
Like Asus p867 Ws revolution Or Like Msi big bang Marshall !
Im building it for multi purpose ! But the main purpose is 3d softwares and video editing !
And i want to install 2 more gpu. Like 1 Quadro 2000, and for gaming double nvidia sli ! Or double ati ! I dont know if its possible like switching between of cards ! Like when i work on 3d applications use quadro and for another things use another double card !
I hope this is not a ridicuolus question
So what mother board should i get ? And can i put videocards like i drivelled above
And i really would appreciate for ur other recommendations..
Like Cpu Cooler, SSD, PSU etc...
Thanks

 

[Maziar]

I'd recommend non-Quadro cards for gaming and you can't keep the Quadro card and add another card,that's not possible.
As for other components,since they aren't related to this topic,either ask in their appropriate forum section or send me a PM

 

[Djentleman]

That was awesome. You cleared up some of my questions about it

 

[Maziar]

I'm glad it helped If you have more questions about SLI/CF,fill free the ask

 

[dogman_1234]

Does anyone have Info on the 7xxx ATI series yet?

 

[Alias_The_Jester]

Thanx so much for the Informative article Maziar

Cleared up the few things I wasn't sure of and I know I'll be linking this for others who have questions about SLI and CrossFire. Excellent Effort. Well Done.

Just a quick question if I may:
Currently , what would be the best (minimum) Budget Radeon Card to buy right now ... for the potential to use CrossFire down the track.
That is, I want to just buy a cheap GPU for now to get me by and then later upgrade the Mobo to Crossfire compatible and then buy a second matching GPU to run alongside the first.

I'd prefer it to be 128bit , DX 11 , OpenGL 4.0 etc (a recent card) ... but want to keep the cost down. preferably under $80. SO I know that a while ago 4550 or 5550 were popular ones to use (from memory) ... I'd prefer a 6*** series tho.

(FOund a 6770 @ $77 but it sold out instantly before I could buy one 🙁 ... now I can't find that card anywhere under $100 .. even $120 , bummer)

Would you go anything lower than that? and Is there certain models that yield better performance results than others?

Cheers.

 

[Maziar]

Not really,anything lower than 6770 won't give you a good gaming performance

 

[ryswinton]

Ok hears my question i have spent 2 days reading through this forum and still am not quite sure which is better so i will ask you guys. Which would be better
2X NVIDIA GeForce GTX 570 1.2GB 16X PCIe Video Card (EVGA Superclocked)
or
1-NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 3GB 16X PCIe Video Card

Any help would be great

 

[ryswinton]

Or possibly
2X AMD Radeon HD 6950 2GB GDDR5 16X PCIe Video Card (HIS IceQ X Turbo 840MHz Powered by AMD)

As all 3 of these options are roughly the same price give or take 50bucks

 

[dead_silencewh]

I plan on upgrading to two gtx 580s in SLI and don't want to get rid of my three monitor setup.So I have another related question to anyone who uses nvidia surround or sli with multiple monitors. Right now with a custom driver (Its not really a full sli setup) each monitor I have is independent (Which means I can drag a window to one monitor and maximize it only on that monitor and do likewise to all other monitors.) What will this experience be like with sli and three monitors? Also when I game I only like to play across three monitors with certain games. A lot of FPS games I don't like to play with that high of a resolution and fov. With surround and sli enabled can I play a game on one screen without disabling sli or the other two monitors? (Maybe just change the resolution in the game and it goes to only one display?). Thanks in advanced. Still waiting on my card in the mail.

P.S. I asked my boss these things and he told me he doesn't do sli, and therefore didn't know too much about it, but that I was too picky when it came to getting things to work on computers .

 

[Maziar]

@ryswinton
2 570's are almost double as fast as 1 580.
@dead_silencewh
I think you can play on monitor just fine

 

[JoMo87]

I currently have a 6870 Black Edition in my desktop. Plan to buy another as soon as the price drops, again. Right now after MIR it's 210 (after tax) on newegg. I've looked at tons of reviews and one thing I noticed, that wasn't mentioned in the article is a significant benefit of having two gpu's.

I don't have a long history in graphics cards, so I can't tell if this is a recently accomplished deal with scaling, but from the reviews I've read the 6870's in crossfire have a higher minimum of FPS against the higher-end gfx cards (GTX 580 OC's and 5970 OC).

I'd take a higher minimum FPS over an extra 30FPS at something that is already 130 FPS (which is hardly noticeable). I haven't done any research into other CF/SLI set ups, but if it is a reoccurring aspect of Multi-gpu set ups, I'd definitely add in that with a SLI/CF set up, higher minimum FPS is an advantage. Higher minimum is pretty big in my opinion and I didn't notice it being mentioned at all.

The review I based this view off of is from here:
http://www.hardwareheaven.com/reviews/1062/pg13/nvidia-gtx-580-oc-vs-radeon-6870-oc-crossfire-vs-radeon-5970-conclusion.html

Just a thought, not trying to create a significant debate.

 

[Maziar]

2 6870's perform better than 1 580 in almost all games.
And considering the price of 580 and 6870,adding another 6870 to your setup is a more cost-effective option too

 

[traumadisaster]

Can I add a second 580 to the 4x pcie to achieve sli? I didn't think 16x/4x was possible. When my mobo arrives, Gigabyte ga-z68-d3-b3, I will be putting a gtx580 in the 16x pcie, and am curious if I can sli if I buy another card next year.

 

[Maziar]

Yes you can but it doesn't perform as good as dual x16(Though the difference isn't huge)

 

[Tonimus]

Can I add a second 580 to the 4x pcie to achieve sli? I didn't think 16x/4x was possible. When my mobo arrives, Gigabyte ga-z68-d3-b3, I will be putting a gtx580 in the 16x pcie, and am curious if I can sli if I buy another card next year.

Is SLI an option for a motherboard that only has Crossfire support (which I am pretty certain is the case for this board)?

- Tony

 

[Maziar]

Right^
Just checked the specs on Gigabyte's site and it only supports CF
http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3863#sp

 

[traumadisaster]

Thanks, what do you think about using the 4x as physx with an old gtx275 I have?

 

[traumadisaster]

For learning purposes, what is it mechanically that prevents it from working in sli? I'm new to this and heard nvidia doesn't support 16/4 but could still work?

 

[nukemaster]

Its a license issue. Nothing but software stands in the way.
4x will have a certain performance hit as well.

1 580 should be plenty of power.

 

[traumadisaster]

So the software prohibits 16/4 sli. Has anyone tried it anyway?

 

[christians]

Great i like this....

 

[nukemaster]

So the software prohibits 16/4 sli. Has anyone tried it anyway?

The option will simply not be there. Its not 16/4 that is the issue. it is that the board maker only has a license for crossfire on that board.

There are many hacked NV drivers out there to do SLI on AMD chipsets as such(other non sli systems), but not promise they will work in this case.

 

[Maziar]

A big edit !
I tried to make the guide easier to read,added more info and removed some unnecessary things along with the new CrossFire compatibility chart.