8800 GTX SLI and CPU scaling

[Redox]

After scanning quite a few reviews and benchmarks, I am still somewhat confused about the impact of CPU speed on 8800 GTX SLI performance with AMD X2 vs. C2D CPU's, ESPECIALLY AT HIGHER RESOLUTION (1920x1200 in my case).

Although it is clear that lower resolutions (10x7 or 12x10) are CPU limited, it looks like the higher resolutions are GPU constrained.

I had been thinking about going to a new C2D system with the upcoming price drop but now I'm starting to wonder whether it is worth it or whether I could still get by with the X2 4400 if I'm at 1920x1200 all the time, generally with 4xFSAA and 16xAF and even SS transparency enabled at times. Would I see a big difference with the C2D E6850 or Q6600 vs. my current CPU? I already have an 8800 GTX so adding a second (plus a bigger PS) would still be much less than a new system.

As an example of what I'm talking about, check out this link (looking at the 1920x1200 data):

Anandtech link

also this one:

Legion Hardware link

Quoting from the Legion Hardware article ...

"Therefore, after having run a number of tests on the GeForce 8800 GTX, we believe that it is not as CPU reliant as first thought. Of course at lower resolutions with lower quality settings enabled, the CPU would have much more of a strangle hold on performance. However, by testing at 1600x1200 with maximum FSAA and Aniso settings enabled, the CPU performance is not nearly as important."

And finally:

Guru 3D link

On the other hand, I don't know how many times I've read on various forums that 8800 GTX SLI will be grossly underutilized unless you have a very fast processor (including these forums IIRC).

So what do the AT guru's think?

Thanks for any advice ...

 

[Redox]

No response from anyone?

I was hoping someone would have info on Intel C2D vs. AMD X2 performance with 8800 GTX single or SLI at high resolutions (1920x1200 and above). From all I've read the CPU seems to make little or no difference at high rez but I keep seeing opinions expressed on these and other forums that the 8800 series is cpu limited.

I would like to know as I don't want to unnecessairly upgrade my CPU/MB/memory if the existing CPU will still perform well.

Appreciate any comments ...

 

[aka1nas]

I'm not sure why you find those articles conflicting. It depends very much on the game and settings whether a faster CPU will increase your framerate. Most games are GPU-limited at higher resolutions. Another thing to think about is that most of the benchmarks don't show minimum framerates.

Games like Oblivion are evidently more GPU-bound(Oblivion is very shader-heavy) with modern systems so they don't show much of a gain as you increase CPU speed. Other games, like X3, have a lot of background processing going on and show a decent speed-up with a faster CPU.

 

[Redox]

Thanks for responding ...

It's not the articles I find confusing but the general discussion on forums that seem to suggest that if you don't have the latest and greatest C2D, you won't see the benefit of the 8800 GTX, especially in SLI. However, from what I've read, this only seems to hold true at lower resolutions. At 1920x1200, it seems that pretty much everything is GPU limited.

The question is what is a minimum CPU requirement required to get this "flatline" and whether the X2 4400 is sufficient. Most reviews and benchmarks are being done with high end C2D's or with only X2 series (like the Anandtech article) and it is hard to compare these results apples to apples.

Would be interested to hear from others running X2's with one or two 8800 Gtx's or results of upgrading from X2 to C2D with these cards.

Thanks again ...