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Nvidia and AMD Hug It Out, SLI Coming To AMD Mobos
MojoKid writes "In a rather surprising turn of events, NVIDIA has just gone on record that, starting with AMD's 990 series chipset, you'll be able to run multiple NVIDIA graphics cards in SLI on AMD-based motherboards, a feature previously only available on Intel or NVIDIA-based motherboards. Nvidia didn't go into many specifics about the license, such as how long it's good for, but did say the license covers 'upcoming motherboards featuring AMD's 990FX, 990X, and 970 chipsets.'"
I assume the still won't let you mix AMD and nVidia video cards. Asshats. (think dedicated physx)
Belief is the currency of delusion.
I would be more excited if they had announced a new initiative to enable fast memory access between the GPU and system RAM.
2GB for visualization is just too small. 8GB would be a good start, even if it was DDR3 and not DDR5. Something like Hypertransport that could enable low latency, high bandwidth memory access for expandable system memory on the cheap.
Either that, or it's high time we got 8GB per core for GPUs.
Good to see the industry playing nicely with each other. Props to them.
Since all the exclusion did was hurt nVidia in sales for people who stay loyal to AMD and refuse to go intel just for SLi. Allowing SLi on AMD boards will boost nVidias sales a bit.
Hacked drivers solves that problem.
- Don't do what I do, it's probably not healthy nor safe. -
With Intel the only one making SLI motherboards, NVidia needed to buddy up with AMD as leverage? Just a guess.
nVidia and AMD got along great before AMD bought ATi. nVidia really helped keep them floating back when AMD couldn't make a decent motherboard chipset to save their life. nForce was all the rage for AMD heads.
Well it is in the best interests of both companies to play nice, particularly if Bulldozer ends up being any good (either in terms of being high performance, or good performance for the money). In nVidia's case it would be shooting themselves in the foot to not support AMD boards if those start taking off with enthusiasts. In AMD's case their processor market has badly eroded and they don't need any barriers to wooing people back from Intel.
My hope is this also signals that Bulldozer is good. That nVidia had a look and said "Ya, this has the kind of performance that enthusiasts will want and we want to be on that platform."
While I'm an Intel fan myself I've no illusions that the reason they are as cheap as they are and try as hard as they do is because they've got to fight AMD. Well AMD has been badly floundering in the CPU arena. Their products are not near Intel's performance level and not really very good price/performance wise. Intel keeps forging ahead with better and better CPUs (the Sandy Bridge CPUs are just excellent) and AMD keeps rehashing, and it has shown in their sales figures.
I hope Bulldozer is a great product and revitalizes AMD, which means Intel has to try even harder to compete, and so on.
Having built my last two gaming rigs to utilize SLI, my opinion is that it's more trouble than it's worth.
It seems like a great idea: buy the graphics card at the sweet spot in the price / power curve, peg it for all its worth until two years later when games start to push it to its limit. Then buy a second card, which is now very affordable, throw it in SLI and bump your rig back up to a top end performer.
The reality is less perfect. Want to go dual monitor? Expect to buy a third graphics card to run that second display. Apparently this has been fixed in Vista / Windows 7, but I'm still using XP and it's a massive pain. I'm relegated to using a single monitor in Windows, which is basically fine since I only use it to game, and booting back into Linux for two-display goodness.
Rare graphics bugs that only affect SLI users are common. I recently bought The Witcher on Steam for $5, this game is a few years old and has been updated many times. However if you're running SLI, expect to be able to see ALL LIGHT SOURCES, ALL THE TIME, THROUGH EVERY SURFACE. Only affects SLI users, so apparently it's a "will not fix". The workaround doesn't work.
When Borderlands first came out, crashed regularly for about the first two months. The culprit? A bug that only affected SLI users.
Then there's the heat issue! Having two graphics cards going at full tear will heat up your case extremely quickly. Expect to shell out for an after-market cooling solution unless you want your cards to idle at 80C and easily hit 95C during operation. The lifetime of your cards will be drastically shortened.
This is my experience with SLI anyway. I'm a hardcore gamer who has always built his own rigs, and this is the last machine I will build with SLI, end of story.
You realize the limiting factor in system RAM access is the PCIe bus, right? It isn't as though that can magically be made faster. I suppose they could start doing 32x slots, that is technically allowed by the spec but that would mean more cost both for motherboards and graphics cards, with no real benefit except to people like you that want massive amounts of RAM.
In terms of increasing the bandwidth of the bus without increasing the width, well Intel is on that. PCIe 3.0 was finalized in November 2010 and both Intel and AMD are working on implementing it in next gen chipsets. It doubles per lane bandwidth over 2.0/2.1 by increasing the clock rate, and using more efficient (but much more complex) signaling. That would give 16GB/sec of bandwidth which is on par with what you see from DDR3 1333MHz system memory.
However even if you do that, it isn't really that useful, it'll still be slow. See graphics cards have WAY higher memory bandwidth requirements CPUs. That's why they use GDDR5 instead of DDR3. While GDDR5 is based on DDR3 it is much higher speed and bandwidth. With their huge memory controllers you can see cards with 200GB/sec or more of bandwidth. You just aren't going to get that out of system RAM, even if you had a bus that could transfer it (which you don't have).
Never mind that you then have to contend with the CPU which needs to use it too.
There's no magic to be had here to be able to grab system RAM and use it efficiently. Cards can already use it, it is part of the PCIe spec. Things just slow to a crawl when it gets used since there are extreme bandwidth limitations from the graphics card's perspective.
I can run PhysX fine on my machine and it has an both AMD proc and graphic card (HD 3800).
Hard to say(until bulldozer drops) whether NVIDIA thinks that they are really good, or good enough. Since NVIDIA no longer has an intel chipset business, tying SLI to Intel platforms no longer serves to move more product; but to restrict the size of their potential market(since anybody who wants the, often quite aggressive, price/performance of an AMD part won't be buying more than one NVIDIA card, at most).
So long as they are confident that AMD's CPUs will be good enough not to bottleneck SLI configurations, trying to sell multiple cards to people who purchase AMD CPUs seems only reasonable. If, of course, they think that the CPUs will be even better than good enough, the approach is even more reasonable, so it doesn't tell us too much about which it is.
Maybe. I've only somewhat-recently found myself occasionally wanting more than 512MB on a graphics card; perhaps I am just insufficiently hardcore (I can live with that).
That said: If 512MB is adequate for my not-so-special wants and needs, and 2GB is "just too small" for some other folks' needs, then a target of 8GB seems to be rather near-sighted.
The most awesome upgrade I ever had was when I went from EGA to a Tseng SVGA card with 1 MB memory. The next awesomest was when I upgraded from a 4 MB card to a Riva TNT2 with 32 MB. Every time I upgrade my video card there's less shock and awe effect. I'm willing to bet that going from 2 GB to 8 GB would be barely perceptible to most people.
I think the top graphics cards today have gone over the local maximum point of realism. What I have been noticing a lot lately is the "uncanny valley" effect. The only upgrade I'd seriously consider today would be to absolute lifelike perfection, anything less isn't worthwhile.
Probably the next step in graphics cards will be real time ray tracing, I think that would be the next line of development that would justify an upgrade.
anybody who wants the, often quite aggressive, price/performance of an AMD part won't be buying more than one NVIDIA card
{snork}
No sig today...
When the SLI/Crossfire war began it was bad for the consumer.
Fie, fie, fie on your proprietary video bus arraignments!
I wish the consumers would bend together and demand an end to it.
[I used to usually buy an AMD processor and and Nvidia video card. I missed the chipset updates, so this is good news for me.]
https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
Didn't NVIDIA stop making motherboard chipsets? It would make sense that they would attempt to get their tech to work on as many platforms as possible.
Apparently wizard is not a legitimate career path, so I chose programmer instead.
And what exactly was that snork for? The "bang for the buck" has been firmly in the AMD side of the aisle for quite some time, as you can see here on this handy chart. Thanks to the Intel socket roulette it has gotten to the point that depending on the socket one can build an AMD quad complete for less than a dual Intel and motherboard alone, that is how much extra you are paying for all those ads (and the kickbacks to OEMs of course).
Since it came out that Intel was rigging their compiler and bribing OEMs (where the hell is the antitrust bust anyway?) I've been selling AMD exclusively and my customers couldn't be happier. The lower price of AM3 boards and CPUs means they can get better features and more options for less money and having those extra cores helps to future proof a system. I mean how can you complain when you can get an AMD triple OEM PLUS a good ASRock motherboard for under $100, or that I can deliver a fully loaded AMD quad WITH a Geforce 210 AND a wireless keyboard/mouse combo and Win 7 HP X64, all for $550 while still making a decent profit? I certainly can't and my customers couldn't be happier with the performance. Not everyone is only worried about ePeen benchmarks you know.
As for TFA this isn't really surprising and the only shock is that Nvidia didn't do this sooner. Intel in their usual douchebag manner killed the Nvidia chipset business (again WTF? Where the hell is the antitrust already?) by refusing them the right to build on anything past LGA775, thus forcing everyone on Intel boards to have a craptastic Intel IGP whether you wanted it or not, so working out a deal to have SLI on AMD seems only natural.
To me the bigger question is why the hell don't they sell a 1x GPU board designed for PhysX. There are many of us I'm sure that don't have dual x16 boards that would be happy to buy an Nvidia chip just to add PhysX but screwing us over by disabling PhysX support if it detects an AMD GPU is just stupid, especially since that pretty much kills any point of having Nvidia on AMD with nearly all AMD boards having Radeon IGPs now. If they want to sell more GPUs a 1x board dedicated to PhysX would probably sell like hotcakes for those of us on AMD platforms.
Personally until they quit screwing us with the drivers I'll keep using Nvidia for strictly HTPCs (you can get a Geforce 210 for like $20 after MIR) and for those that want to game on the cheap sticking with the HD4850 (can't beat 256 bit pipeline for $60 refurb, and makes a cheap crossfire monster) or the HD5770.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
In fairness to Intel, if you need pure bang, particularly if it is necessary that said bang be delivered to a single-threaded application, AMD has nothing on them.
However, as you say, AMD has plenty of more-than-fast-enough offerings that are dirt cheap, and tend to be supported by slightly cheaper motherboards. Given that many modern games tend to be GPU bound much of the time, gamers on budgets are generally pretty well served by cheaping out a bit on the CPU and going up a model or two on the GPU side. Since NVIDIA sells no CPUs(barring Tegra, which is irrelevant here) and no longer has a chipset business worthy of note, they'd be fools not to try to scoop up the "good enough AMD rig and enough cash left over for a slightly ludicrous video card" demographic.
Now, given Intel's strength, they aren't about to cancel SLI support on intel, despite being fucked over on the chipset side; but ignoring AMD doesn't make much sense.
Look at effective real world transfers. DDR3 RAM at 1333MHz gets in the realm of 16-20GB/sec when actually measured in the system. It transfers more than 1 bit per transfer, and the modules are interleaved (think RAID-0 if you like) to further increase transfer speeds.
PCIe does transfer 1-bit per transfer per lane. Hence a 16x PCIe 3 slot gets 16GB/sec of throughput.
I thought that since Windows Vista introduced the kernel mode code signing requirement, hacked drivers required the user to reboot into "Test Mode", which places an always-on-top banner at all four corners of the screen. What am I missing?
Exactly, and I'd add that since most games are multiplatform even those that have PC enhancements are not really gonna slam the CPU enough to justify the huge price difference.
I like to game and looked at both sides when I built my machine, but for just $600 I got an AMD Phenom II 925 quad, dual 500Gb HDDs, a nice ECS business class motherboard with solid caps and plenty of USB headers, an HD4650 1Gb,8Gb of DDR 2 800Mhz, DVD burner and a nice black case with 8 USB ports. I just recently had my HD4650 replaced with an HD4850 and frankly the amount of bling bling "ooh purty!" I get on my 1600x900 monitor is just nuts and if I went Intel I'd have had to sink closer to $1000 or went with a shittier CPU like a Pentium or a dual core.
As I said after the Intel bribery and compiler scandals came out I switched my shop to AMD only sales (because i believe in free markets and putting my money where my mouth is) and my customers couldn't be happier. You can pick up 2.8Ghz-3.2GHz AMD chips chips cheap and unless as you said your needs are strictly single core performance (and even then I'd argue most folks wouldn't "feel" a difference in the chips) there just really isn't a point in using Intel unless you are like my two gamer customers and care about nothing but benchmarks.
BTW for those that look at benchmarks? Might want to keep in mind Intel has rigged their compilers so that anything you compile on them looks for the Genuine_Intel flag and if it detects it runs the SSE and above code and if not drops the thing to x87 even though AMD has supported SSE and above for half a decade now. So unless they say they compiled the benchmark with a non Intel compiler ANY and ALL benchmarks should be seen as suspect. It would be like saying a Mustang consistently destroys a Camaro on top end while conveniently neglecting to mention you tied a boat anchor to the Chevy.
So in the end since switching I haven't for a reason for using Intel in anything except for those wanting an ePeen or a money is no object workstation. everyone else, including gamers like me, will run great on AMD and will be able to use the savings to bump up graphics or RAM. I've even been going AMD on the laptop route, going so far as handing my oldest one of the new Turion X2 laptops and selling AMD netbooks, and again folks couldn't be happier. The new Radeon IGPs mean that when my oldest isn't in class he and his friends sit around a break room in college and have frag fests or play their MMOs, they get pretty good battery life, and the Radeon IGPs make video smooth as butter thanks to hardware acceleration of most formats.
Sorry about the length, I just hope this gets some of my fellow /.ers to take another look at AMD. I'm an old enough greybeard to remember what it was like to have an Intel without competition and it wasn't pretty, with assraping prices for even their shit CPUs. If you believe in free markets and fair competition you really need to support AMD after the Intel compiler and bribery bullshit, and with the money you save you can crank up the graphics or add an SSD for more performance.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Your entire rant about Intel has been rectified. First AMD sued Intel, that case was settled over a year ago. Then the FTC gave Intel an anticompetitive smack down on top of that, which was settled nearly a year ago.
http://download.intel.com/pressroom/legal/AMD_settlement_agreement.pdf
http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2010/08/intel.shtm
Under the settlement, Intel will be prohibited from:
conditioning benefits to computer makers in exchange for their promise to buy chips from Intel exclusively or to refuse to buy chips from others; and
retaliating against computer makers if they do business with non-Intel suppliers by withholding benefits from them.
In addition, the FTC settlement order will require Intel to:
modify its intellectual property agreements with AMD, Nvidia, and Via so that those companies have more freedom to consider mergers or joint ventures with other companies, without the threat of being sued by Intel for patent infringement;
offer to extend Via’s x86 licensing agreement for five years beyond the current agreement, which expires in 2013;
maintain a key interface, known as the PCI Express Bus, for at least six years in a way that will not limit the performance of graphics processing chips. These assurances will provide incentives to manufacturers of complementary, and potentially competitive, products to Intel’s CPUs to continue to innovate; and
disclose to software developers that Intel computer compilers discriminate between Intel chips and non-Intel chips, and that they may not register all the features of non-Intel chips. Intel also will have to reimburse all software vendors who want to recompile their software using a non-Intel compiler.
I do not know why this myth keeps getting spread, only the 64 bit versions of Vista and 7 check for signed drivers, and they give you an option to install the driver if it is not signed. In fact, you can disable the driver signing check quite easily, if you wish.
Unfortunately, according to people looking at the compiler, things haven't changed
Chris Mesterharm
I do not know why this myth keeps getting spread, only the 64 bit versions of Vista and 7 check for signed drivers
On which PCs, other than Atom-powered subnotebooks, does the 32-bit version of Windows 7 still come preinstalled?
and they give you an option to install the driver if it is not signed. In fact, you can disable the driver signing check quite easily, if you wish.
As I understand it, the option to disable the driver signing check is exactly what places the computer into "Test Mode".
Sorry but it is YOU that are wrong. As you can see from the post below me Intel's latest compilers still use the "AMD is evil" flag, and it gets worse from there. That ruling gives Nvidia a PCIe slot after Intel had already driven them from the market so that is about as useful as saying Commodore should be given free shelf space now, as the fabs are shut down, the devs pink slipped, the lights turned off.
So that one is completely pointless and in fact rewards Intel for rigging the market as it doesn't give compensation to Nvidia nor does it give Nvidia license to the new sockets so they have no incentive to reopen the chipset division. It also doesn't specify WHAT kind of PCIe, so Intel is offering a lousy 1x lane on the Atom chips, big whoop.
And as for the compiler not only is Intel ignoring that ruling but they ALSO were not ordered to have a recall NOR were they ordered to offer previous buyers a non rigged compiler for free. Again this rewards Intel for douchebaggery as they get to have all those customers with previous Intel compilers cranking out AMD is evil code, while at the same time letting them flip the bird and continue to do so with the current compiler.
So I stand by my statement. Intel bribed competitors, rigged the market, rigged their compiler and got less than a slap on the wrist. Allowing their payoff of AMD to effectively shut down the case simply let Intel win, as making sure AMD chips weren't in OEM machines for nearly a decade certainly cost AMD more than 1.25 billion in sales, not to mention cutting Via almost completely out of the market and killing the Nvidia chipset division dead.
This just shows me how corrupt the current system is, and if the MSFT antitrust were to happen today they would probably be ordered to give customers a 10% off coupon on their next Windows purchase.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
I installed a Wifi card last week on 64-bit Windows 7. It came with unsigned drivers on CD. Windows refused to install them and I didn't see any option to work around that. We had to move the PC to another room to plug in an Ethernet cable so I could download signed drivers.
There is no force, however great/Can stretch a cord, however fine/Into a horizontal line/Which is absolutely straight.