Should I go SLI 670's?

JeffyB · 10 Mar 2014 at 14:49

no_1_dave said:
Sell you 670 and get a 780
Same cost, same performance, no worries about SLI working right away on new releases, more vram.

Not sure on your math for the cost (I got a pair of 670's with waterblocks, backplates and multi link on the MM for £270) but SLI 670's give the same performance as a GTX690 which is much quicker than a 780.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/827?vs=765

opethdisciple · 10 Mar 2014 at 15:12

arc@css said:
Out of interest, how are you finding one 670 for 1200p?

Very good. I dont really need SLI, but work colleague has me tempted as he is looking at SLI 660's....

For example BF4 at 1200p all ultra runs great! I get a little slow down when things go ultra crazy and suddenly a heli copter crashes and there is a massive explosion, whilst trying to rambo three enemies... but other than that it runs great!

----

I wont have any problems mixing a KFA2 card with a Gigabyte?

arc@css · 10 Mar 2014 at 15:21

If you fancy trying out SLI then why not, though as others have said, one card will have less potential draw backs.

opethdisciple · 10 Mar 2014 at 15:42

I do wonder tho, for next gen games such as Witcher 3 and Watch Dogs will 2Gb vram be a problem at my resolution...

arc@css · 10 Mar 2014 at 16:14

I can't really comment specifically on the next Witcher game / Watchdogs, though I am looking forward to them. Personally, I don't expect 2gb of vram will be obselete for a while yet on 1200p or lower.

jh30uk · 10 Mar 2014 at 16:17

If I already had a 2GB card I would not run out and change it but I would not buy one today and 1200p is pushing it IMO.

Mr. May · 10 Mar 2014 at 16:26

Gripen90 said:
One GTX 780 certainly doesn't match 2x GTX 670 SLi performance at all - been there done that !. That's why I later upgraded to 2x GTX 780 SLI to get the additional boost

2x GTX 670 2GB for 1920x1200 is superb ! I even had 3x 670 for 1200p lol. So you will be fine for at least another year.

I echo this but going from 670 sli to 290 pro didn't like loosing power so had to upgrade again. lol

no_1_dave · 10 Mar 2014 at 17:06

JeffyB said:
Not sure on your math for the cost (I got a pair of 670's with waterblocks, backplates and multi link on the MM for £270) but SLI 670's give the same performance as a GTX690 which is much quicker than a 780.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/827?vs=765

Not everyone gets a good deal like that.
The OP already has a 670, so approx £130 - £150 for another. Or sell the one he has and get a 780. Either way, the outlay would be about the same.

As for performance.
SLI is very CPU intensive (game dependant), the OP only has a 3570 @ stock.

Playing at 1920x1200 the performance difference would be minimal, however the benefits of more vram and a single card would negate that small difference in performance. I am speaking from experience, going from 670s to a 780. There are games where SLI doesn't work, or barely works (Titanfall, Company of Heroes 2). There are also times when an SLI profile is delayed (Alan Wake for example, took at least 2 weeks).

Don't get me wrong, I like SLI, however when you can get a single card solution for the same price and performance there really is no contest.

spankingtexan · 10 Mar 2014 at 17:26

Another vote for a 780, it'll give you a nice boost probably not as much as 670's sli but if what people on here say is right about bottlenecks with 2 or more cards and i5's then I'd go 780, more vram too.

setter · 10 Mar 2014 at 17:34

Having come from sli wf 670 to the gtx 780 in sig i have few regrets of doing so. At 1920x1200 670 sli has the gpu grunt and enough vram to cope for the time being. However the single 780 uses less power, 350w ono vs 550w ono total system draw when gaming. Less heat issues too as my cards were non ref models, 15c temp difference between them.

Max fps are down a bit which i expected, minimum and avaeage are fine though and not too far off 670 sli. As the op is running a 3570k, there are some games like the bf series, crysis 3 where the cpu will bottleneck an sli setup, found this when i had a 3570k @4.5ghz, cured by switching over to a 3770k @4.5ghz. A single 780 wont be bottlenecked by the 3570k in theese games.

PaulyD · 10 Mar 2014 at 18:55

I was going to say setter would be the perfect person to respond and I was literally going to post what he typed.

murah · 10 Mar 2014 at 19:56

I can tell you I bought 4GB models, and while the 670 can't use all of that 4GB due to limitations in the hardware I have seen it used upto 2.5GB ! so i felt it was worth while.

JeffyB · 10 Mar 2014 at 23:54

no_1_dave said:
Not everyone gets a good deal like that.
The OP already has a 670, so approx £130 - £150 for another. Or sell the one he has and get a 780. Either way, the outlay would be about the same.

As for performance.
SLI is very CPU intensive (game dependant), the OP only has a 3570 @ stock.

Playing at 1920x1200 the performance difference would be minimal, however the benefits of more vram and a single card would negate that small difference in performance. I am speaking from experience, going from 670s to a 780. There are games where SLI doesn't work, or barely works (Titanfall, Company of Heroes 2). There are also times when an SLI profile is delayed (Alan Wake for example, took at least 2 weeks).

Don't get me wrong, I like SLI, however when you can get a single card solution for the same price and performance there really is no contest.

I believe the anandbench results use a stock cpu and has results for resolutions ranging from 1080p all the way upto 3x1200p which the sli setup comprehensively wins.

I have come from a single card to sli can't say i've noticed any issues even at native 1440p resolution of my monitor.

@1200p the gap is 25% at 1600p it's 30%, that's a decent chunk more performance in favour of the sli setup.
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/NVIDIA/GeForce_GTX_780/26.html

3t3P · 10 Mar 2014 at 23:57

SLI 670's will be tasty my friend

no_1_dave · 11 Mar 2014 at 02:29

JeffyB said:
I have come from a single card to sli can't say i've noticed any issues even at native 1440p resolution of my monitor.

I know for a fact that you can not run BF4 on ultra settings with SLI 2GB 670s @ 1440p without stutter due to vram limitations.

Titanfall apparently uses 2GB even at 1080p when running max settings without AA.

This alone shows investing in 2GB now is a bad idea when for the same price you can get a smoother, less bottlenecked experience.

Also, the reviews dont state if they used i7 or i5.
i5 struggles with SLI 670s, i7 handles them a lot better. The OP is using an i5

JeffyB · 11 Mar 2014 at 07:55

I don't play bf4, it's rubbish. Titanfall is not much better either.

llamadal · 11 Mar 2014 at 08:09

Get it, you will be fine, too much paranoia over vram limitations - worst case you drop some settings on some later games - its still an upgrade.

Getting a single 780 is also a good suggestion and then making that sli later on down the line if needed

wunkley · 11 Mar 2014 at 10:02

As someone who's most recent card history was one 670 2gb, then 2 for SLI, then one 780ti and now 2 for 780ti SLI....

If it was a year ago I'd deffo say just get another 670. Now though, with some of the newer and soon to emerge GPU taxing games, and creeping VRAM usage which is happening, I think I would sell your 670 and get a 780.
Clock the **** out of it for now, to almost get 670 SLI performance, then buy another 780 for SLI when witcher 3 comes out :-)

(Get overclocking that CPU though!)

Dyewitness · 30 Mar 2014 at 22:29

good read this!

ive went from a single 670 to a single 780, but i have now upgraded my cpu from a 3770k to a 4930k and i ordered a second 780.

will i get a good performance boost on a single monitor?