CF on a card OR SLi on a card- poll inside

[nRollo]

I'm curious. My first AFR card was an ATi Rage MAXX, and I loved it a lot, even though the drivers were lacking. (ATi even gave up on that one quick)

We've come to a point in the PC gaming industry where we're down to two enthusiast graphics card producers, and one has stated their business model is to compete with cards of this nature at the high end.

I personally like multi gpu in general, be it SLi or Crossfire. (even Voodoo5, loved that as well)

So if you were posting in the 6600/6800/7800/7900 eras, did you support those "SLi on a card" efforts?

Do you support the current CF/SLi cards now?

If you like post your reasons in the thread.

This seems like timely subject as ATi will likely be taking the single slot graphics lead in the next month or two with an AFR based product, and roles will be reversed from previous situations. (E.G. X800XT PE was the overall fastest card, but a dual 6800GT board could best it by a good margin)

 

[BassBomb]

No. I don't reccomend to anyone multi-gpu or multi-card solutions.

 

[AmberClad]

What an odd series of questions.

And where's the poll option for "I didn't support either SLI-on-a-stick or CF-on-a-stick cards back then, but I support both concepts now"?

 

[nRollo]

Originally posted by: AmberClad
What an odd series of questions.

And where's the poll option for "I didn't support either SLI-on-a-stick or CF-on-a-stick cards back then, but I support both concepts now"?

Hey- it's tough to write polls.

Done, thanks.

 

[Tempered81]

I prefer polls like, " do you like CF & sli on a card? "

a. yes
b. no

however, this poll is nice as well. I chose the "did not support back in the day, but i like both now" option. If the poll was simple, I'd definitely vote FOR CF & SLI sandwich cards. They are making progress & seemingly becoming the wave of the future for PC Graphics options.
It's either this or wait til the 300mm Geforce 25 takes up an entire wafer.:laugh:

 

[BFG10K]

I don't care about either, I don't like multi-GPU.

 

[ViRGE]

Originally posted by: BFG10K
I don't care about either, I don't like multi-GPU.

^^ What he said. If the tech was there like it is for CPUs, it would a valid strategy (graphics is pretty damn parallel, after all) but it's not. AFR is a joke.

 

[SilentRunning]

Where is the answer:

I don't like multi-GPU but I like AMD's product positioning.

I personally think the $200-$300 price point is the sweet spot. AMD's choice to design for this price range and use multi-GPU for the enthusiast range seems like a good business strategy.

 

[seemingly random]

Very odd poll. Makes me wonder what the ultimate agenda is. Seems almost as if this is a poll created by a marketer for an individual company.

 

[bunnyfubbles]

Never cared for it, don't mind it now because it seems to encourage more of a focus on the midrange level...more gamers with more capable video cards = win for PC gaming

 

[nRollo]

Originally posted by: seemingly random
Very odd poll. Makes me wonder what the ultimate agenda is. Seems almost as if this is a poll created by a marketer for an individual company.

There's no agenda- just curious. A topic that's getting a lot of play lately, I thought the board would be interested in the results.

I had five Voodoo2 Sli sets and coveted the Obsidian Multi GPU on a card. I've been about multi GPU since day one.

 

[nRollo]

Originally posted by: bunnyfubbles
Never cared for it, don't mind it now because it seems to encourage more of a focus on the midrange level...more gamers with more capable video cards = win for PC gaming

I agree with this largely.

 

[seemingly random]

Originally posted by: nRollo

Originally posted by: seemingly random
Very odd poll. Makes me wonder what the ultimate agenda is. Seems almost as if this is a poll created by a marketer for an individual company.

There's no agenda- just curious. A topic that's getting a lot of play lately, I thought the board would be interested in the results.

I had five Voodoo2 Sli sets and coveted the Obsidian Multi GPU on a card. I've been about multi GPU since day one.

Are you surprised by the results - that nobody cares or likes multi-gpu? I personally think it's one of the greatest of marketing scams.

 

[nRollo]

Originally posted by: seemingly random

Originally posted by: nRollo

Originally posted by: seemingly random
Very odd poll. Makes me wonder what the ultimate agenda is. Seems almost as if this is a poll created by a marketer for an individual company.

There's no agenda- just curious. A topic that's getting a lot of play lately, I thought the board would be interested in the results.

I had five Voodoo2 Sli sets and coveted the Obsidian Multi GPU on a card. I've been about multi GPU since day one.

Are you surprised by the results - that nobody cares or likes multi-gpu? I personally think it's one of the greatest of marketing scams.

In a way I am.

As noted, I've been a proponent of all multi GPU through the ages, I guess for the same reasons I was a "gear head" when I was a kid. Used to go down to the speed shop and talk about intake manifolds and carburetors, now I go down to the forum and discuss video cards.

I realize multi GPU is a niche market and people have their reasons to be against it, but it's become a lot more mainstream with NVIDIA making it very convenenient, ATi and NVIDIA offering great value, and ATi saying "This is the way forward, period.".

Will be interesting to see what the public in general thinks, my vote was for "I support both."

Scaling may not be 100%, but it gives more than anything else and at high end it's the only way to get what it gives, so it's not a scam to me.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Instead of SFR or AFR, I would much rather see some work done on supertiling. I think that would be a superior solution to both. It would have the speed benefits of AFR, and the image integrity benefits of SFR.
If you've seen the YouTube video on real-time raytracing with the PS3, then you would see how it can be done. They divide up the screen, and each cell sub-processor gets to render one chunk. Essentially that is SFR, but why is it with three PS3 consoles and a gigabit ethernet network, that some hobbiest can get SFR rendering to work better than ATI and NVidia can.

 

[bryanW1995]

Originally posted by: seemingly random
Very odd poll. Makes me wonder what the ultimate agenda is. Seems almost as if this is a poll created by a marketer for an individual company.

:laugh:

I don't like the nvidia sandwich solutions as much as ati simply because ati has been saying for 9 mos that it is their long-term strategy to use these solutions while nvidia only does it when/if ati temporarily pulls ahead. It seems that ati is devoting much more energy to this solution, both in the hardware side and the software/drivers side.

 

[will889]

Rollo I think truly dedicated pure gamers just want a good/fast/stable mobo, a relatively fast HDD, decent sound card and a very decent single GPUs, smaller cards with less power draw with better stock fans. I agree with an above poster hat said the $200.00-$300.00 is where the real sweet spot is and we want something that will drive current typical 16*10 ~ 19*2 LCDs with decent frame rates with that single card im modern games. Not monkey with proprietary only tech and games that 'might properly support it' like SLI or CF, and on top of that the added power draw/PSU that has to go with it. I think the days of the $600.00 video card need to end myself.

 

[CP5670]

I don't care about any multi GPU solutions, at least with current SLI and CF implementations. Way too many quirks and hassles for my liking.

However, the concept could in theory work well if they somehow managed to get it to work like the quads in a single GPU, without the use of driver level AFR.

 

[bunnyfubbles]

Originally posted by: will889
I think the days of the $600.00 video card need to end myself.

I don't think that's the issue, I'd have no problem with an approach that includes a $600 flagship, as long as that flagship is a multi GPU solution derived from a still very potent ~$300 part...

 

[bryanW1995]

no, what we need is a flagship that's actually WORTH $600. unfortunately, nothing like that in a single core has existed since 8800gtx...

 

[biostud]

I support it as an option for those needing it, but that is not me. I just prefer a good solution for around $200.

 

[Hajpoj]

Seriously, if $600 delivered proportionately what $150-200 gives us in performance we would be at the end of the market...think about it...

 

[will889]

Originally posted by: bunnyfubbles

Originally posted by: will889
I think the days of the $600.00 video card need to end myself.

I don't think that's the issue, I'd have no problem with an approach that includes a $600 flagship, as long as that flagship is a multi GPU solution derived from a still very potent ~$300 part...

Sort of, but as you see the 4870 makes that $600.00 card worth about $$370.00 at best. I get your point though, there's likely always going to be that super expensive card until the competition comes along and puts out a card that gets within range for less than half the cost.

 

[extra]

Sooo nRollo makes a good thread and people try to derail it *grumbles*. I think AFR is great there is nothing wrong with the idea or technology? I don't get why people don't like it because it seems clunky to them or something. It's worked fine since the voodoo days.

 

[deadseasquirrel]

I jumped on SLI 6800GTs back when they first came out. Messing around with profiles was the big thing at the time because default drivers didn't have widespread profile support. I had no issues or problems with the 6800GT SLI, other than the aforementioned driver support, but I got pretty good at making my own profiles, so no biggie there.

At this point, with my current setup, I am limited by-- case size, PSU wattage, and pin connectors. I cannot easily fit a 10.5in card in my case. My PSU is only a PCP&C 510 with 2x 6pin (though I suppose I could get an 8pin adapter). I don't plan on upgrading any of these components, so I will buy whichever card fits those requirements best for the price. Right now, that's the 4870. If the 4870X2 is 10.5in long (like its older brother the 3870X2) and has power reqs that exceed what I have, I'll have to pass even though I would be interested in trying out an AMD multicard like I tried out SLI in the past.