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SLI GTX680

elrasho

elrasho

elrasho

Soldato
Joined
12 Jan 2009
Posts
6,524
Was very tempted to get one of thise XFX 290X cards OCUK had on sale but after chatting to a friend he suggested I go SLI with my current GTX680.

So looking at the motherboair manual my PCI-E slots will drop gfrom 16X to 8X

P7P55DProPCIExpress1.png


I already have a Sound Blaster Z card in the third PCI slot so the second GTX680 will go into the Grey slot. Will I see a big improvement in getting a second GTX680. I have no plans in gaming above 1080p. Will I also need a better PSU?
 
Running 2 680's at 8x will not hinder them at all really. The only problems i see looking forward is that I assume you have the 2gb version 680 which in some instances at 1080p is already becoming a limiting factor.

Its also worth looking if your processor will hold you back, I seen people write saying an i5 Sandybridge OC will bottleneck 2 cards in SLI but I noticed no difference switching from an i5 to an i7 with SLI 680's.

I did ditch them though for a 290 as SLI wasnt smooth enough for my liking and the 2gb Vram limiting
 
Finners said:
Running 2 680's at 8x will not hinder them at all really. The only problems i see looking forward is that I assume you have the 2gb version 680 which in some instances at 1080p is already becoming a limiting factor.

Its also worth looking if your processor will hold you back, I seen people write saying an i5 Sandybridge OC will bottleneck 2 cards in SLI but I noticed no difference switching from an i5 to an i7 with SLI 680's.

I did ditch them though for a 290 as SLI wasnt smooth enough for my liking and the 2gb Vram limiting
Click to expand...

Thanks for your input something I'll consider. How is your single 290 compared to the SLI 680s performance wise, did you notice a steep drop in FPS?
 
Ultimate performance is certainly down, I went from SLI 680's back to a single 680 for a few months in between as my dad needed an upgrade for his PC and I wasn't really utilizing the second 680 as I only really play BF4 atm.

I would wait for other opinions as I have played limited games in the last year so my view is kind of narrow.

with BF4 in mind SLI 680's really didn't work for me as I run out of Vram even though I had the power to run the game at higher settings it would stutter. Thats why I switched round.

All other games I've played lately have been small indie games which need hardly any of the power of either set up.
 
I upgraded to twin GTX 670 4GB's, overclocked them both to 1202 core, 7008 memory.

My fps has improved substantially , I can run any game at max settings, and it cost less money than getting a 780 or above.

The downsides are more heat (And a PSU upgrade IF you don't have a decent PSU), more noise (More fans = more noise). But ultimately it's a decent upgrade.

As above someone ran out of Vram, never happened on my cards . ok so I have 4GB's but the 670 cant use the whole amount of that Vram anyway so it's comparable.

Never stuttered for me so I guess it's always depends on what games you will be playing, drivers you are using and other hardware you pair up to the twins.
The i5 750 is getting on a bit but should still run these babies nicely, however will slightly bottleneck both the cards (from running 99%) as the i5 3570k still does this, but in the real world it's not noticeable for me.
 
Single 290/780 can boss 1080p while at the same time is more a plug and go experience than dual cards.

Vram debate aside, twin 680's can hit higher and generally be faster, but the single 290/780 will get you higher minimums when it counts.
 
By going to a single 290/780, yes you will see a drop in max fps. But you gain slightly better minimum fps, less heat and power use. I moved from 670 sli that were clocked on a daily basis beyond stock 680 speeds to a single 780. But gone 780 sli since.
 
Lol, I went from a 2GB card to a 3GB card for 5760x1200 :D

I feel as though I may have underestimated the VRAM I'll need. :p
 
I'm leaning more towards a 290 now for these two reasons, 4GB of VRAM
and I won't need to get a more powerful PSU. I'm tempted to wait and see how the new nVidia 9x cards pan out and in turn these may bring the GTX780 prices down to 290 level. I'm not an nVidia fan boy but felt their drivers are better, or have things changed since the days of my dual 5850s?
 
elrasho said:
I'm leaning more towards a 290 now for these two reasons, 4GB of VRAM
and I won't need to get a more powerful PSU. I'm tempted to wait and see how the new nVidia 9x cards pan out and in turn these may bring the GTX780 prices down to 290 level. I'm not an nVidia fan boy but felt their drivers are better, or have things changed since the days of my dual 5850s?
Click to expand...

First of all do not expect 780/780ti prices going down. There is no stock to sell, and you are lucky if next week there is any for sale at any prices.

Grab a 290 or a 290X and try to sell those 680s. You will be fine with one of them, at resolutions up to 2560x1440, possibly 3440x1440 also with some overclock.
 
elrasho said:
I'm leaning more towards a 290 now for these two reasons, 4GB of VRAM
and I won't need to get a more powerful PSU. I'm tempted to wait and see how the new nVidia 9x cards pan out and in turn these may bring the GTX780 prices down to 290 level. I'm not an nVidia fan boy but felt their drivers are better, or have things changed since the days of my dual 5850s?
Click to expand...

I used to have crossfire 5850's and the current AMD drivers are in another league these days.
 
Good idea re: waiting til the NDA.

As for the upgrade I can certainly recommend moving from the 680 to something like a 290. I moved to one from a 670 PE (680 performance essentially) and the ability of the single card to play modern games at pretty high res (I'm gaming at 2560x1080) and essentially top settings is very impressive.

The extra memory hasn't made all that much difference yet but I can see the next batch of game releases pushing past the 2gb frame buffer of something like your 680 in the near future. Been playing Crysis 2 with high def textures and top settings recently and despite being an older game now memory usage still gets close to 2gb on occasion.
 
setter said:
By going to a single 290/780, yes you will see a drop in max fps. But you gain slightly better minimum fps, less heat and power use.
Click to expand...

Imo with sli 4GB 670s or 680s I highly doubt your minimum fps will be lower than a 290 unless you're not scaling.

You are looking to be up there with 7990 performance with 4GB 680s sli.
 
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Don't hotlink images - Rilot

A GTX 690 is 24% faster then a reference R290 at 1080p, a stock R290 is clocked at 947Mhz so running one at 1200Mhz ( Which is easy, especially the Sapphire cards ) is a 26% overclock.

So in reality it won't be as far behind as one might think.
 
Glad I waited the 970 looks like the card for me. What do you guys think? I could always SLI them in the future but I'm sure a single card will last a few years at 1080 resolution.
 
From the little i have read so far i believe 970 is the best value gpu to get and the 4gb ram is nice as well. I recently bought a 680 KFA2 OC Limited and though i am very happy with the boost i got the 2gb ram i see will be a limiting factor (titanfall wanted 3GB? really?!). But i game on 1080p on a 775 platform so i am really glad with that.

In your case i think one 970 is the best option. It might cost you a bit more than getting a used 680 to go sli but you get a brand new 4GB gpu with warranty and no stress about the SLI issues that might occur in some games.

Thumbs up to the PC master race!
 
Looking at benchmarks I'd be getting an extra 35fps in BF4. Hmmmm... Is it worth the extra £180 odd I'd need to spend after selling my GTX680?
 
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