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SLI Question !

Sh3rlock

Sh3rlock

Sh3rlock

Soldato
Joined
20 Nov 2006
Posts
6,928
Ever since i started gaming i have always used a 17" but over the weekend i finally decided to upgrade and came home with a nice 22" one. So far so good, i love the difference and am disappointed I didn't do the upgrade sooner.

Anyway, due to the increase in resolution, I have noticed that some games have taken a severe hit to the FPS I'm receiving. So the reason for my thread, I already have a 280 GTX but I am thinking of SLI'ing it and getting another because there quite cheap these days.

What sort of performance difference should I expect or would it be worth me selling the current card and just getting a 295 GTX ?
 
Don't bother with the 295 - if i were you i'd consider either tracking down a cheap 2nd hand 280 or selling the 280 and getting a couple of 260's which should closely match a 295.

Performance increase for SLi is pretty good. Most games will return a 50-80% increase in performance. In fact there were a few games that manage even higher.

Plus any games that don't natively support SLi can still have SLi options applied. In fact i played many non-SLi games in the past using NV's AFR (alternate frame rendering) setting with excellent results! :)

Finally - what res is the 22" you have bought? I only ask since the standard 22" res of 1680x1050 should be pretty easy for a single 280 to manage.

gt
 
Thanks for that, looks like im going to opt for another 280 GTX, that should see me through the next couple of month and its probably the most cost effective for performance increase option.

The res is what you said, 1680X1050. Some games are fine but others make me worry that my card is under performing. For example FPS drops to around 25/30 when playing Lost Planet in DX10 mode with everything maxed, I was under the impression the 280 GTX should eat it or am I expecting abit much ?
 
lost planet is one of "hose" games, afaik. As in, poorly coded/puts extra strain on your gpu for no real visual improvements...like original crysis.

But I havent read much about it, so i could be imagining this lol
 
In all fairness Lost Planet and Call of Juarez are the only games ive tried so far. The performance increased on Lost Planet by about 15 FPS when I turned off DX10 fur but i guess im a little greedy because I want the game to look its best.

With Call of Juarez in DX10 mode, the FPS dropped to 20 at the very start when the camera pans over the city and he's mumbling on about something.

Im going to install the new drivers tonight, see if that makes much difference.
 
Ch3m1c4L said:
lost planet is one of "those" games, afaik. As in, poorly coded/puts extra strain on your gpu for no real visual improvements...like original crysis.
Click to expand...
Yeah - i'd heard the same re: Lost Planet.

TBH if i was in the same situation i's probably do the same (in fact i am just as soon as i can track down a well price 192sp GTX260 :D) so go for it!

Try the driver reinstall and see what happens! :)

gt
 
280 GTX SLi @ 1680x1050 would be a bit of a waste of cash IMO. You're not going to see a huge improvement. These games are poorly coded.
 
I suspected they were just poorly coded games.

That said if I see a 30% performance increase in general, that would justify the upgrade for me.
 
You do have an SLI motherboard yeah? (just checking)...

One thing to make sure with SLI is that both cards are actually running the correct clockspeed especially if you overclock (GPU-z or everest should show this correctly - a lot of utilities don't) in the past I've even had to BIOS flash both cards to ensure overclocks were running on both. In some cases one card will stick on 2D clocks or stock clocks instead of the correct clock.

1680x is of dubious worth for 280 SLI but it would give you a reasonable degree of future proofing. I'm currently running a single 260 maxcore at 2048x and most games run fine - tho I'm gonna get another for SLI soon.
 
Getting a 295 would be the easier option tbf.

Also consider that 280 SLI will use more power and require a slighty better PSU. What PSU do you have?
 
What's the rest of your rig like? I'm playing at 1920x1080 at the moment and my 280 hasn't struggled with anything yet.

I haven't tried either of those games though so can't comment on that.
 
Is this a case of needing the 2 280's or a case of money burning a hole in your pocket?

I had the issue a couple of months ago when I had crossfired 4870's.
 
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