How important is it that the 2 cards in an SLI set up be EXACTLY the same??

[Locut0s]

I currently have an EVGA 8800 GTS 320MB card that I got last year and I'm thinking of getting another one for SLI. How important is it that the 2 cards be exactly the same. For example would another 8800 GTS from another manufacturer work fine so long as the other specs were the same? Same clock speed, same amount of RAM. Or should they really be from the exact same manufacturer?

The other thing is it seems to be hard to find an original GTS clocked at stock with 320MB of ram, the web store I usually use doesn't have any listed. They have lots of 8800GTSs that are over clocked and or have more RAM but no originals. And the prices seem the same as when I bought mine a year ago!? Are they no longer being manufactured? How hard would it be to get one? At what price point?

 

[Sylvanas]

You would need to find another 320mb 8800GTS in order to SLI that with you're current card- NOT an 8800GTS 512, that will not work. For SLI, cards that are the same model but different manufacturer will work in SLI but different models will not. You would probably be better off selling the current 320mb GTS and putting that money towards a 4850 or something anyway.

 

[ther00kie16]

Yeah, SLI doesn't scale well and sometimes it doesn't scale at all so better to just get a single, better card.

 

[magreen]

I'm guessing that you haven't kept up with the latest in video cards. Those 8800gts cards with "more memory" that you're seeing are actually the newer 8800gts 512mb based on the g92 core, whereas your 8800gts 320mb is based on the old g80 core. Basically, an 8800gts 512mb is about as fast as an 8800gtx from the same generation as your card.

And I agree, sell what you've got and buy a faster single card. Although I saw some decent deals on the zotac 8800gts 320mb over in the Hot Deals forum recently.

 

[mhouck]

Originally posted by: ther00kie16
Yeah, SLI doesn't scale well and sometimes it doesn't scale at all so better to just get a single, better card.

Most of the newer games are scaling pretty well that I have seen except GRID. However, I do agree that with that card falling towards the back of the pack (the newere 8800 GTS 512 is being phased out and replaced by the 9800 GTX) you would be better served with upgrading your GPU than SLIing.

 

[aka1nas]

Originally posted by: Sylvanas
You would need to find another 320mb 8800GTS in order to SLI that with you're current card- NOT an 8800GTS 512, that will not work. For SLI, cards that are the same model but different manufacturer will work in SLI but different models will not. You would probably be better off selling the current 320mb GTS and putting that money towards a 4850 or something anyway.

IIRC, you can enable SLI if the cards have the same model string. So, any 2 8800GTS cards should work in the sense that the driver will allow you to SLI them. AFAIK, that was the entire reason behind keeping the 8800GTS model scheme, to preserve SLI compatability.

I wouldn't want to try get such a setup to actually work reliably, though.