NVIDIA releases Quad SLI for the masses

If you've got the cash to wrangle your very own Quad SLI setup, you're probably not far off from one of those snazz Alienware or Voodoo PC boxes, which give you all that graphic muscle with none of the hassle. But if it's DIY or bust, NVIDIA has just released the necessary Quad SLI drivers to the public, meaning you can finally have the joy of putting four horrendously expensive graphics cards into that trusty homebrewed box of yours. So, if you're thinking of taking such drastic action -- the necessary pair of GeForce 7950 GX2 SLI cards will cost you almost $1200 -- PC Perspective has the low-down on what to buy, and how to make it all work. Though you might want to peep their benchmark scores before you take the plunge, because 4x time video cards sure doesn't mean 4x the frames per second.

[the T!AN @ Aug 9th 2006 4:02PM]

Geez, overkill...

[AJerman @ Aug 9th 2006 4:09PM]

Now that's an expensive room heater if I've ever seen one!

[Finished.Law.School @ Aug 9th 2006 4:25PM]

Oh my! Where have all of the PCI slots gone to??

[Ryan @ Aug 9th 2006 4:37PM]

Well, the sound card is in one. :)

[Poopmaster @ Aug 9th 2006 4:37PM]

This is for geeks who have more money than brains. This will be the talk of wanna-be nerds trying to spend themselves into geek status and middle managers everywhere.

[rokorre @ Aug 9th 2006 4:59PM]

looks like there might be one pci slot on that bored under all the pci-x
honestly i would need atleast 2 or 3 pci slots

[cmspaz @ Aug 9th 2006 5:02PM]

What do you think'll win in a space heater competion... those, or a MacBook?

[iceblade @ Aug 9th 2006 5:19PM]

Holy... I have no idea how good that is, but thats alot more money than I have. Looks big :p

[noname989 @ Aug 9th 2006 5:30PM]

Yeah but will it run Vista :) j/k

[drew @ Aug 9th 2006 6:18PM]

F*ck all haters -- Dual 30" Gaming anyone? Don't tell me it's a waste because you know you'd enjoy it.

[Oktobr @ Aug 9th 2006 6:56PM]

noname989, funnily enough these cards won't be terribly useful when Vista comes out. They don't support DirectX10.

[Toe TagR @ Aug 9th 2006 7:15PM]

I think I am going to hold off for a bit on that investment ($1200 + CPU + Motherboard) I have a feeling ATI is preping for a comeback and this time with AMD's support.

If I didn't know any better I'd say AMD & ATI will be coming into the market with a Motherboard that includes the perfect AMD cpu paired with the perfect ATI gpu and an even more perfect ATI chipset.

My crystal ball also says they will have an assortment of 5 turnkey boards that will start from basic to Xtreme Gamer.

That's not far fetched when you consider the option of buying them from different MoBo makers like Lanparty, MSI, Chaintech, even ASUS & Gygabyte (Now that they are merging.

[Toe TagR @ Aug 9th 2006 7:21PM]

Nvidia is milking their SLI technoligy while it lasts. I think they are going to have to consider another architecture soon. Technoligy always progresses. I would not put all my eggs in this basket yet until we've seen what ATI and AMD can come up with.

I mean I still have a 5700FX ULTRA card that I bought only 17 months ago when it was the $h!t. AND MAN IS THAT SUCKER HUGE!

[stingraze @ Aug 9th 2006 8:01PM]

How many watts does that consume???? I think it will blow out my power supply LOL !!!!!!

[Aaron @ Aug 9th 2006 9:54PM]

Whoa, yeah, that is totally not necessary. I agree with the colorfully-named "Poopmaster"; this is for people with more money than brains.

[Tweak @ Aug 10th 2006 2:00AM]

I wonder if it will be Vista ready :-)

[BobTurbo @ Aug 10th 2006 5:54AM]

Will this make the porn look better or what?

[Ypocaramel @ Aug 10th 2006 6:04AM]

There will be a bottleneck elsewhere. Often the CPU. That's all.

[T0E TAGG3R @ Aug 10th 2006 8:13AM]

Ypocaramel:

That's why with AMDs acquisition of ATI the CPU,GPU, and Chipset will be paired accordingly, thus no bottleneck.

you can buy a Honda civic and put a 4 turbos in it but unless the car can handle it (motor mounts, tranny, axels) its useless like a bottleneck. However you buy a Dodge Neon SRT-8 (designed by Mercedez and Dodge) where every part is made to handle the power and you have a FAST A$$ car for just over $20,000

That is engineering at work, when companies work together and colaborate to make something FAST & STABLE.

[Chris @ Aug 10th 2006 8:42AM]

No thanks. I'll just wait until one card contains the power of those 4 cards...which should be in about a month.

[Derrick @ Aug 10th 2006 9:33AM]

T0E TAGG3R:

I believe that you are referring to the Dodge Neon SRT-4 as there is no 8 cylinder model of the Neon available.

[Citizen Insane @ Aug 10th 2006 11:32AM]

@T0E TAGG3R - hint, don't talk about cars if you have no idea what you're talking about. 4 turbos on a 4-cylinder engine is always useless no matter what your setup looks like. I also believe you were refering to the SRT-4...which is a piece of crap.

[ishtar @ Aug 10th 2006 12:17PM]

I think the bigger issue is that no benchmark (that I have seen, and I have been looking around) shows any gain from the quad setup. Even worse is that in tom's latest benchies (http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/08/07/get_quad_sli_before_it_is_hatched/index.html) 2 7900GTX in SLI is better then quad SLI.

This could, hopefully for nvidia, only be a driver problem. But otherwise, paying more for less is just plain bad google-ing! ;)

[greg @ Aug 10th 2006 1:23PM]

Well, there will be a botleneck in this gaming computer, and that is the hard drive. This technology is so far behind and is the reason for many things that run slow. We got fast CPUs and GPUs, but once we get like 50k rpm hard drives, all of my dreams will have come true

[T0E TAGG3R @ Aug 10th 2006 1:47PM]

@ Citizen Insane:


First off I do know about cars since I took 3rd place at the Nopi Nationals in my POS civic setup. SRT-8 was a typo (thanx Derrick for pointing that out)I meant SRT-4.

I'd like for you to elaborate on why you think the neon is a POC, but actually that's not important. I was merely pointing out that for just over $20k you can buy a car that is built to go fast and IS fast rather than trying to make something go fast that isn't made to handle the power.

Your right about 4 turbos being useless AND THATS WHY QUAD SLI IS USELESS!!!

listen to ISHTAR and oh...i dont know...EVERYONE ELSE in this forum, When we say IT'S OVERKILL in every sense of the word and a bottleneck and inefficient engineering.

P.S.

[rmd_nick @ Aug 10th 2006 4:10PM]

This is very useless. I can see the point of 2, but not 4. The gains aren't worth the price.
As far as the SRT-4 comment, I'm sure that whoever thinks it is a piece a crap, a) doesn't know anything about the car, b) has never ridden in one, and c) isn't the intended market for the car. It is marketed to enthusiests. If you want a nice interior, buy an Acura. It is a very fast, and reliable car. So much so, I bought two of them. Also to correct an error, it was designed and built entirely by the SRT engineers, not Mercedes(Daimler). If that were the case, it would have had an AMG engine, i.e. the Crossfire SRT-6 and incorporated other mercedes traits, which it does not have.

[Erik Szpyra @ Aug 11th 2006 3:17PM]

This won't run games much faster than two cards for now. Maybe the games two or three years from now will benefit from this, but you are just wasting your money if you do this. Anyway in two or three years GPUs will be better so I dont see any reason for 4 cards at any time, unless you are a graphic designer or movie editor.