Dual GeForce 7800 GT SLI Single Card Performance

Maximus writes "Asus is this first board partner out of the block with a single board, dual GPU design based on NVIDIA's GeForce 7800 GT graphics chip. The Asus Extreme N7800 GT DUAL essentially takes a dual board SLI setup and packs it all into a single PCI Express based card. HotHardware has a performance preview posted that shows this card can even compete in some cases with an GeForce 7800 GTX SLI setup, due to improved latency characteristics with respect to inter-GPU transactions, that are inherent to a single board design . This board is a bit pricey though for sure so only gaming speed freaks need apply."

Comments

Gaming freaks indeed.

[Inoshiro]

"This board is a bit pricey though for sure so only gaming speed freaks need apply."

I'm really, really curious about the high-end sales for ATI and nVidia. What kind of people honestly go out and spend almost 1,000$ USD on a card every year? What benefits are there? Despite the fact that these hot, sexy cards come out, I don't see any real push to get software out that uses them. Windows Vista isn't out. Linux still doesn't have X rendering done via OpenGL. Mac OS X is the only OS that uses 3D everywhere.

Beyond that, what games push the card? WoW? Doom 3? Half-life 2? Add in Far Cry and UT, and that's pretty much it for 3D games. If you spend that same amount of money on any console, you can buy more than double those number of games.

What niche does this represent? I'm really curious as to the people that buy this kind of stuff.

Re:Gaming freaks indeed.

[fourtyfive]

The people that buy ATI/Nvidia/Matrox's high end cards (the Workstation ones at least, but I dont know of any consumer grade cards that are 1000$+) are usually CAD and DCC people (Digital Content Creation, IE, CGI video, rendering images, etc etc etc). Its usually BUSINESSES that buy these cards, thats why they can afford them at such a cost.

Re:Gaming freaks indeed.

[freidog]

the same market that won't buy a console because they think the graphics suck right now. Or that the ~500 lines of resolution on a TV is woefully insufficient to render the 'proper' graphical detail they desire in their games.
Or of course, the rich yet clueless. (note: those two are not mutually exclusive...)

Personally my 9600XT is plenty good for my gaming needs, I'd like to be able to run everything at 1280x1024 (native res for my LCD), but I'm not complaing about 1024x768 or even lower, they look just fine to me. Which is why I'm deffinately not the target audiance for SLI.

Right now it's deffinately uneeded, but a year from now we may seem games wher 1280x1024 or 1600x1200 bring a 7800GT / GTX to 'marginally' playable frame rates (say about 30 FPS), you already saw Splinter Cell: Chaos theory was brought under 40 FPS at 1600x1200 AA and AF enabled. It's certainly not unreasonable to expect far more graphically demanding games over the next few years.

Re:Gaming freaks indeed.

[Fweeky]

Soft shadows in games like Chronices of Riddick and FEAR really take it out of my 7800GTX, especially at my TFT's native resolution (1600*1200). SLI's probably pretty much the only way to play at such high settings reasonably. Complex maps/situations in other games can also make it chug, and I'm sure it only gets worse at higher resolutions and AA levels (I normally play with 4X AA, an SLI user will probably be breezing along at 16X).

Then of course there's the people who use 3D hardware as part of their job; CAD, 3D artists, level designers, game engine developers; one of the first SLI forum threads I read was by a guy involved in medical imaging. SLI is also laying the groundwork for future multicore cards; in much the same way that SMP has been the realm of rich bastards and high end professional users until multicore consumer level CPU's, SLI will probably remain in the realm of the same sort of people for a year or two until we start seeing multicore NV chips.

Re:Gaming freaks indeed.

[NanoGator]

"What kind of people honestly go out and spend almost 1,000$ USD on a card every year?"

Do they really need people spending that much money every year? There's enough computers out there that are of various ages and specs, couldn't it be more of a staggered approach to sales? Lots of people have a two year life cycle on their computers. Every couple of years or so they dump a ton of money into a big whiz bang new system intended to 'last' a long time. Get enough people with that sort of mentality buying these things at different times, and ATI and NVidia have a decent revenue stream.

Multi-SLI??

[Coleco]

Now they need to figure out how to get two of these things working together in SLI.. or what about *four* of them in gigabyte's crazy quad mb:

http://www.tomshardware.com/motherboard/20051004/i ndex.html

sweeeeeeet.

Nvidia 2D quality compared to ATI?

[blankoboy]

Not looking to create a flamewar between ATI and Nvidia folks here. I am currently putting together my parts list for a new PC and am down to deciding what to do about a VGA card. The two options on the table at the moment, are: - Nvidia 7800 GT (probably going with Albatron as it is the best price) - ATI X1800XL (would most likely be Sapphire) My question is with regard to.... 2D quality...SUPRISE! Back around 3 or so years ago when I was upgrading my PC it was a toss between a Geforce 4400Ti and a Radeon 9700 Pro. I initially bought the Geforce and was horrified by the 2D quality. The store was kind enough to allow me to switch over to the Radeon 9700 Pro which has been serving me well ever since. I know ATI has always had superior 2D quality in the past but is this still the case? Has Nvidia improved in this area? Thanks and I look forward to your objective and knowledgeable opinions!

Re:Nvidia 2D quality compared to ATI?

[Scorchmon]

The Geforce 4s were known for using a certain low quality 2D filter setup in their circuitry. There were user mods to improve the 2D quality with minimal effort. I don't know how their current tech is, but I just wanted to let you know that your previous experience was tarnished by lackluster design. Whether or not this practice continues with the current generation, I can't say.

external power supply

[rathehun]

has anyone else noticed that this ships with an external power supply? This might then be a decent card for systems with only a 350/400 watt SMPS.

F.E.A.R.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Geforce 7800 GTX (Nvidia's top end card) gets only 30-40 FPS with everything turned on high. That's pretty low for something that's suppose to be Nvidia's flagship card. That's where SLI comes in.

Of course, you could turn down the visuals down a notch. But I tried playing on my friend's computer (who happens to be one of those hardcore gamers) and the experience just isn't the same compared to my Radeon 9800 Pro. The graphics are on a whole another level.

For some, future-proofing.

[OwP_Fabricated]

I tend to only build a new box every 2-3 years. I go bleeding edge on most every component, and my system can run every new title at high settings damn near until the time I usually end up building a new one 2-3 years later. The bonus is that I don't usually have to open my system up for anything but cleaning the whole time.

My two cents on NVIDIA vs. ATI

[antdude]

In my personal experience with NVIDIA cards from GeForce 2 Pro to GeForce 4 Ti4200 and ATI Radeon 9800 Pro AIW (128 MB), I would have to pick NVIDIA cards.

1. Linux support. ATI's driver in Linux = horrible and harder to set up compared to NVIDIA's.

2. In Windows, NVIDIA's drivers and software seems to be less buggy than ATI. I use the All-In-Wonder software (MMC), and it is VERY buggy. Sometimes driver don't work like video out to my TV. I have to reboot to make it work. I know NVIDIA doesn't make TV tuner software and stuff, but the bugs bother me.