SLI Primer

GFXguy writes "If you are looking to catch up on some hardware learning you may want to check out "SL Why?". It is a short article that goes over the basics of SLI graphics. The article goes over some strengths and weaknesses of this technology as well. It looks like one video card is not going to cut it any more, at least for the hardcore gamers out there. "

Comments

Re:Scalable Link Interface?

[ZagNuts]

I thought SLI stood for Scan Line Interleaving. "Scaleable Link Interface" is completly vauge. Did they change the technology and keep the old name, or is this writer just an idiot?

Upon further investigation it seems that nVidia's SLI stands for "Scaleable Link Interface", but you are correct in noting that it used to stand for "Scan Line Interleaving". They likely wanted to keep the acronym so that people would know what the technology's function was, but Scan Line Interleaving would be non-despcriptive, as their cards don't interleave at all, each renders approximately half of the screen.

Re:Maybe something I'll look into

[way2trivial]

you do realize how spot on identicle they must be?

same revision, same card almost?

ever tried to add a 2nd CPU to a multi CPU system 18 months later?

SLI-who needs it?

[Watersharer]

For some of us, SLI is not a new technology, although the current method is slightly different than the old VooDoo SLI. But after years of gaming, one thing stands out to me. You DON'T need the latest and greatest stuff to run games in most cases. Better to use your hardware budget wisely than to splurge on ultra-swank single components.

I run an AMD 1700, on an ABIT mainboard, with an old ATI9600. Not the pro, but the $79 budget card. I have no exotic cooling, just a nice sink and fan. I added a good copper fan unit to the videocard, which came with passive cooling. I use the features of the Abit MB to run the 1700 at 2.11Ghz, and the video got a 80Mhz bump. I see over 70fps in the CS:Source test, and average around 55-60 online. All for about the cost of one video card.