No more super fast high end cards?

[Nanobaud]

You know, as a community, we are pretty good about spouting-off in grand chorus about what we don't want. But in thinking about all the comments I've read over the years, I'm not sure I could determine what we reasonably do want (myself included, though admittedly I only spend infrequent brief, but highly focussed, periods thinking about how graphics cards fit into the scheme of things I want). We generally lament that high-end consumer graphics cards cost $500 or $600 (though the guy forking out $2500 for a Quadro using the same GPU isn't going to be too sympathetic), yet we all know that no matter how good a graphics card you can sell for $250, you could always make a little better, even if you have to charge more, and why stop there... . We don't like the immaturity and awkwardness of multi-card solutions, and when two cards are bonded into a single unit to make it somewhat easier to apply, that is somehow cheating.

Frankly, I think a modular approach to graphics/physics/multistream coprocessing power. Naturally there is huge room for improvement in packaging (multiple modules on a single unit), efficiency (work better together in more situations), etc... , but a little more pressure on these types of configurations would probably be a good thing. On the other hand, maybe we should continue to encourage the graphics companies to wring everything they can from designing end executing the most onto single chips and be content that the modular approaches will come out of the CPU-focussed organizations soon enough.

I am more amateurish than average on this board and don't have much more to add than this overly-simplified, high-level view, but if any of you that have invested more into your understanding of graphics card technology and applications would care to talk about what you would like to see and why, I would be interested in following the discussion.

nBd

 

[BadRobot]

Originally posted by: BadRobot

Originally posted by: BadRobot
Dumb

Let me clarify. The current multi graphics card setup is dumb. If they forced mobo companies to use a completely redesigned stucture for how it currently handles video cards, then it is possible for it not to be dumb.

Then the problem is the same as the one we are having right now with the quad/dual core not being supported by the software that is being released.

For example, having multiple slots to stick gpu's and having the option of sticking in our own RAM for those of use that need/want higher resolutions.

 

[PingSpike]

Originally posted by: aka1nas

Originally posted by: SniperDaws

Originally posted by: munky
The day a single card can not play my games well will be the day I quit PC gaming. Until 2 cards can guarantee me close to 100% performance improvement in every game, I will not buy into this marketing gimmick and primitive performance solution.

My sentiments exactly.

That's rather silly. If they push multi-GPU solutions that hard and get the SLI/Crossfire limitations(mainly multi monitor) sorted out, there's not really any reason why multi-GPU setups are any better or worse than ultra-high single card setups. All the things people are complaining about in this thread(power consumption, space, price) are all valid complaints of current top-end models, too.

How many Dells come with SLI capable motherboards?

 

[jonks]

Originally posted by: PingSpike

Originally posted by: aka1nas

Originally posted by: SniperDaws

Originally posted by: munky
The day a single card can not play my games well will be the day I quit PC gaming. Until 2 cards can guarantee me close to 100% performance improvement in every game, I will not buy into this marketing gimmick and primitive performance solution.

My sentiments exactly.

That's rather silly. If they push multi-GPU solutions that hard and get the SLI/Crossfire limitations(mainly multi monitor) sorted out, there's not really any reason why multi-GPU setups are any better or worse than ultra-high single card setups. All the things people are complaining about in this thread(power consumption, space, price) are all valid complaints of current top-end models, too.

How many Dells come with SLI capable motherboards?

I'd imagine that if the graphics manufacturers declared there would be no more revolutionary releases but only small performance and feature related upgrades that Dell would produce more SLI capable boards in it's performance systems than just it's top of the line gaming rigs.

 

[Munky]

Originally posted by: aka1nas

Originally posted by: SniperDaws

Originally posted by: munky
The day a single card can not play my games well will be the day I quit PC gaming. Until 2 cards can guarantee me close to 100% performance improvement in every game, I will not buy into this marketing gimmick and primitive performance solution.

My sentiments exactly.

That's rather silly. If they push multi-GPU solutions that hard and get the SLI/Crossfire limitations(mainly multi monitor) sorted out, there's not really any reason why multi-GPU setups are any better or worse than ultra-high single card setups. All the things people are complaining about in this thread(power consumption, space, price) are all valid complaints of current top-end models, too.

My main concern is not the multi monitor limitation, since I only use 1 anyways. My concern is that you almost never get 2x the performance for buying 2 cards. In many cases you only get about 50% improvement, and in some games SLI/Crossfire just don't work at all. I refuse to spend that kind of money and hope that maybe, just maybe, SLI works well with every new game released, or hope that it gets fixed in a future driver update.

If they can come up with a multi-gpu solution that's more efficient and works all the time, then I have no problem with it. But currently, neither SLI nor Crossfire are an acceptable solution.

 

[SniperDaws]

Originally posted by: aka1nas

Originally posted by: SniperDaws

Originally posted by: munky
The day a single card can not play my games well will be the day I quit PC gaming. Until 2 cards can guarantee me close to 100% performance improvement in every game, I will not buy into this marketing gimmick and primitive performance solution.

My sentiments exactly.

That's rather silly. If they push multi-GPU solutions that hard and get the SLI/Crossfire limitations(mainly multi monitor) sorted out, there's not really any reason why multi-GPU setups are any better or worse than ultra-high single card setups. All the things people are complaining about in this thread(power consumption, space, price) are all valid complaints of current top-end models, too.

Youll end up paying through the nose, are they going to sell them in twin packs for the same price as the GTX? or do you think they will sell em at 1.5x the price of the GTX?

But who cares right cos theres always dickheads that will pay top whack for the latest and greatest.

 

[NanoStuff]

Originally posted by: m0mentary
Can't imagine there being any PCI slots with 4 Video Cards in one MB. I can also see difficulties with cooling. I myself like to keep my system as quiet as possible, and I can't imagine 4 passive coolers keeping my system cool, or 4 GPU fans operating quietly.

What makes you think 4 cards will run hotter than 1 card of equivalent performance? 4 passive coolers are better than 1 passive cooler by my calculations. As for the noise, 4 fans are only 6dB louder than 1 fan. Not exactly an insignificant amount, but keep in mind one fan on a card 4 times hotter would have to work harder anyways, potentially exceeding even 6dB.

I don't think you people have thought this over very well, scaling out rather than up is a smart investment, ask Google.

 

[NanoStuff]

Without a doubt the most important point here would be that nobody is forcing you to get more than one card. One card works today and will continue to work in the future. If you have a problem with SLI, simply wait until a faster model is available.

 

[yacoub]

Most people don't want multiple peripheral graphics cards. This is just marketing so people will buy into that expensive proposition while they work on the next generation of single-card solutions. Whether that is more than one GPU core on the card or not remains to be seen, but processes advance and R&D will come up with something smaller, faster, and better and we'll hear about it before June '08.

 

[PingSpike]

Originally posted by: sirjonk

Originally posted by: PingSpike

Originally posted by: aka1nas

Originally posted by: SniperDaws

Originally posted by: munky
The day a single card can not play my games well will be the day I quit PC gaming. Until 2 cards can guarantee me close to 100% performance improvement in every game, I will not buy into this marketing gimmick and primitive performance solution.

My sentiments exactly.

That's rather silly. If they push multi-GPU solutions that hard and get the SLI/Crossfire limitations(mainly multi monitor) sorted out, there's not really any reason why multi-GPU setups are any better or worse than ultra-high single card setups. All the things people are complaining about in this thread(power consumption, space, price) are all valid complaints of current top-end models, too.

How many Dells come with SLI capable motherboards?

I'd imagine that if the graphics manufacturers declared there would be no more revolutionary releases but only small performance and feature related upgrades that Dell would produce more SLI capable boards in it's performance systems than just it's top of the line gaming rigs.

You'd think so. But then I have to think back to when your average PC with onboard graphics didn't even have an AGP port to save 5 cents on plastic I find it hard to believe most dell motherboards would start being released with 4 PCI-E 16x slots any time soon considering how much greater cost SLI motherboards seem to incur. Its hard to even find a motherboard with true dual 16x slots these days, outside ones made by nvidia.

I'm not saying this is a terrible idea or it won't be the way...but given how long we've had SLI and how it still scales poorly with many games and has driver issues on release, coupled with the slow and uneven adoption of motherboards with multiple graphics card slots I'm not sure if its really going to happen. Most of these last issues are actually nvidias own fault.

Nvidia is its own worst enemy when it comes to SLI. They haven't prioritized its functionality with recent card releases. They've insisted on keeping it a proprietary interface only available on their own expensive motherboards, hobbling the install base. And...most importantly, they stop supplying last generations cards as soon as a new generation rolls out. This is understandable, you want to sell the new products...but the side effect is that the often toted "I'll buy another 6800 when they're cheap and SLI them" plan has never really worked. Nvidia releases a new product, leaving you with a single video card and no reasonably priced mate for it since they stop producing the old ones. At that point it makes more sense to sell the old guy and buy a new faster card then it does to try and find a suitable used SLI mate and deal with driver headaches.

Since SLI has only made sense financially as a "ultra high end" performance solution, its no surprise people have largely developed an aversion to it. Its a rip off in most cases, especially when you add the extra cost for the motherboard. And until it gets better adoption, game developers and even nvidia apparently don't seem to put a lot of focus on squeezing all the power out of it.

 

[Skunkwourk]

Originally posted by: NanoStuff

Originally posted by: m0mentary
Can't imagine there being any PCI slots with 4 Video Cards in one MB. I can also see difficulties with cooling. I myself like to keep my system as quiet as possible, and I can't imagine 4 passive coolers keeping my system cool, or 4 GPU fans operating quietly.

What makes you think 4 cards will run hotter than 1 card of equivalent performance? 4 passive coolers are better than 1 passive cooler by my calculations. As for the noise, 4 fans are only 6dB louder than 1 fan. Not exactly an insignificant amount, but keep in mind one fan on a card 4 times hotter would have to work harder anyways, potentially exceeding even 6dB.

I don't think you people have thought this over very well, scaling out rather than up is a smart investment, ask Google.

Well you're right, it all depends. My potentially flawed logic stems from current setups where effective quiet aftermarket coolers for GPUs, fan or passive, take up 2 slots. If they were single slot I wouldn't be as concerned. I haven't seen comparisons for multiple passively cooled SLI cards vs a single card solution. But yes, obviously if they make improvements in cooling, maybe 2 slot coolers will no longer be practical.

 

[nitromullet]

Originally posted by: yacoub
Most people don't want multiple peripheral graphics cards. This is just marketing so people will buy into that expensive proposition while they work on the next generation of single-card solutions. Whether that is more than one GPU core on the card or not remains to be seen, but processes advance and R&D will come up with something smaller, faster, and better and we'll hear about it before June '08.

Yep, exactly. NVIDIA wasn't able to come out with a new high end card in time for xmas, so they want to make sure that you are comfortable putting money down on an 8800GT instead. It doesn't hurt them either if you're open to the idea of picking up a 780x SLI motherboard as well.

 

[ConstipatedVigilante]

The problems with multi-GPU solutions are as follows, and the reasons why I've stayed with single cards:

1. Lots of extra heat, power usage, and noise
2. The second card is never utilized to near a 100% gain in performance
3. Driver support has always sucked - some games benefit and others don't, multi-monitors/oc'ing is iffy
4. Buying 2 cards is quite prohibitive cost-wise

The 1st problem can be corrected with die shrinks, the 2nd and 3rd can be corrected with better drivers, but the 4th is tricky. They could decrease the cost of cards if they become cheaper/easier to make (die shrink), but how low are they willing to go? Will we ever get new mid/high-end cards at $100 apiece, which would maintain the current $200-250 tag?

 

[Munky]

My 1920x1200 monitor is forcing me to upgrade. I'm hoping there would be 1 card fast enough to run new games on it with high quality settings, not 2 cards.

 

[vhx]

Would be nice, if SLI gave more than 30% performance. Honestly how much should we expect from a 3rd card? Another 20% on top of that?

 

[imported_Shaq]

You could always get a cheap 720p HDTV and not have to upgrade video cards so often.

 

[nachovidal2]

I can hardly seeing SLI solutions coming standard for lower high end systems. Costs get up easy, psu, motherboard, loud, heat, etc..., not to count performance increments in SLI are irregular at best.

 

[Munky]

Comon, I didn't just spend a grand on a monitor to have to buy a TV for gaming. If I go that route, I might as well buy an Xbox360 and never upgrade again.

</shakes fist at Nv...>

 

[deizel]

I can understand the move to multiple card setups. It should help nvidia and ATI lower the cost of production and it should have some advantages for us. If you run games at low resolutions and dont need over a 100 frames per second in every game just get 1 card, if you do need more performance get 2. But this won't be very successful unless we start seeing a consistent 50+% performance boost out for each additional card. The reason you won't see 2x the performance is because obviously the cpu is not being doubled.

I don't remember too often in the past having a flagship $500 dollar card giving you 2x the performance across the board over the mid range $250 cards. Usually you would get a nice chunk of performance, like 50% or more but not 100%.

 

[nitromullet]

Here are a few reason why the shift to mid-range multi-gpu setups instead of single high end cards is a bad idea...

http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3151&p=10

Case in point would be the two other games that we wanted to include here: Quake Wars and Call of Duty 4, both gave us lower frame rates with CF enabled than without. AMD's release notes for the Radeon HD 3800 drivers informs us that some applications may show a performance decrease with CF enabled, so we're not too surprised.

While it'd be nice to be able to purchase two cheap cards and get better performance than the best out there, there are simply too many caveats to really embrace the idea.

http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3140&p=12

It will still be quite a while before we see multiGPU solutions provide the stability and consistency of a single GPU.

http://www.hardwarezone.com/ar...php?id=2408&cid=3&pg=3

while the benchmarks do return higher scores with SLI enabled, the actual game play is adversely affected by random stutters and jerks, making SLI not suitable for anything but the benchmarking flyby.

...at this moment, the drivers from NVIDIA don't seem up to the mark, with our 3D games experiencing horizontal flickering bands that seriously disrupted game play.

...don't get me wrong, I like the idea of being able to SLI/Crossfire two cards together (I've owned both an SLI and a Crossfire rig), but I really don't like the idea of multi-card setups replacing, the faster, more stable (albiet more expensive) high end gpu.

I know, I know... We need to wait for driver improvements... For a tech that was re(introduced) over three years ago now, it's starting to become a long wait IMO.

 

[bfdd]

These cards will have to have a LOT more ram because the current way SLI and XFire work doesn't count the ram from the secondary card. Having all this process power and 512mb of ram is going to hinder performance in tri/quad card setups.

 

[nitromullet]

Good point. I'll be curious (in a science project sort of way) to see how well Crossfire X equipped with four HD3850s with 256MB RAM each stacks up against a single 8800GTX in games running at 1920x1200 with a little AA/AF.

 

[Peelback79]

Originally posted by: nitromullet
Good point. I'll be curious (in a science project sort of way) to see how well Crossfire X equipped with four HD3850s with 256MB RAM each stacks up against a single 8800GTX in games running at 1920x1200 with a little AA/AF.

Exactly! And would the performance be worth the cost ratio and stabillity of 4 cards vs. 1? I guarantee that 4 3850s + a mobo that can handle them (probably need a psu upgrade too) isn't going to be cheaper than a 680i + gtx setup any time soon. And would a few more fps be worth it?

What's the point of coming out with midrange cards to help "budget-minded" people when the only way to get performance boosts is by doubling the amount you were originally going to spend by buying two, three, FOUR? In the land of the free, home of the gold-medal-mentality; less for less is still less, and more for less is king. All ATi would've had to do to cap a victory would have their new 38's outperform the 88GT's by 10% for 20 bucks cheaper.
No one hands out trophies to the Nascar racer who runs 80% of the race @ 75% of the cost.

 

[bryanW1995]

um, let's try to remember that these are still midrange or, at most, lower high end cards for both camps. 3870 just seems high end b/c amd hasn't had a good release since 1950xtx, while 8800gt sounds good at 230-250 but is really not that much of an improvement in price/performance over 8800gts at 300+.

 

[AzN]

Not exactly. 4 3850 has roughly have power of 2 gtx. Frame wise 4 3850 with 256mb ram would win over a single gtx. Maybe not gtx sli.