NVIDIA gets official with 3-way SLI for "extreme gaming"

It's taken a bit longer than expected, but NVIDIA has finally announced that it's extended its SLI technology to allow for three-way setups, in addition to the usual two or four-way ones. That, the company says, should give you a 2.8x performance increase over a single GPU system, letting you crank up all the settings while accepting nothing less than a full 60 frames per second. That will come at a pretty hefty cost, of course, as you'll need three GeForce 8800 GTX or GeForce 8800 Ultra graphics cards, not to mention a PC capable of accommodating them. If that's not an impediment for you, however, you should soon be basking in the glow of 384 stream processors, a 110+ gigatexel per second texture fill rate, and no less than two gigabytes of graphics memory.

[Blacksheep @ Dec 13th 2007 3:17PM]

That's insane, I have one GeForce 8800 GTS 640mb version and that is all I can afford. One day I might be able to afford a second, but three? Forget it!

Not to mention I don't have the space in my case, I would have to change my mobo as well and my 620 watt power supply wouldn't be near enough.

[Sam @ Dec 13th 2007 7:23PM]

Only the GTX and Ultra support it

[coolbho3000 @ Dec 13th 2007 3:20PM]

But will it play Doom...






...at 6 million frames per second?

[RANDY @ Apr 12th 2008 6:29PM]

The biggest question of them all is.........


WILL IT BLEND?

[Ryan @ Dec 13th 2007 3:29PM]

http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=495&type=expert

benchmarks of the top games and such - seems to do pretty well actually

[MojoKid @ Dec 13th 2007 3:30PM]

Here's a full review and performance profile at HotHardware with a Maingear system:

http://www.hothardware.com/Articles/NVIDIA_3Way_SLI_Performance_Preview/

[parr @ Dec 13th 2007 3:32PM]

Damn it, Engadget! That last sentence made me drool on my keyboard!! =[




....=D

[Jor @ Dec 14th 2007 4:56AM]

I read that Nvidia recommends an 1100 Watt PSU for the setup. A german hardware site (http://www.pcgameshardware.de/?article_id=624620) tried it and they got as high as 819W during their test.

[Kris S. @ Dec 13th 2007 3:34PM]

I say that game developers start better optimizing and coding their games instead of relying on high powered, highly expensive hardware.

[makishima @ Dec 13th 2007 4:17PM]

*sigh* Do you know anything about making games at all? Theres is only so much optimization you can possibly do. And "code better" ? Really? Please don't try to pretend like you know what your talking about.

[Technex @ Dec 13th 2007 4:49PM]

I have a 8800GTS 640mb/Quad core etc. But I couldn't agree any more than with your comment. Look at Crysis for example, it runs like crap on my main computer like medium/high at 30-40 fps. Pft, it doesn't even look that special I also agree that they're just using it as a excuse to become lazy...

[makishima @ Dec 13th 2007 5:08PM]

And can you tell me what NVidia letting us do 3 way SLI has to do with lazy programming? Crysis is one of the first true DX10 games, of course its going to run mediocre on current hardware. Give it another 6 months and things will pick up. This is just a marketing ploy to sell more cards. This happened at the beginning of DX9 as well. It's not the programmers faults the hardware cant keep up quite yet. Besides Crysis is just a piece of eye candy for other developers so that they license Cryengine 2.

[Paul @ Dec 13th 2007 6:47PM]

@makishima

Actually, if Crysis is true DX10, then DX10 is a joke. Apparently it is really easy to set Crysis up to enable its highest setting on a DX9 system and if you are comparing screenshots the difference is pretty hard to see.

http://common.ziffdavisinternet.com/util_get_image/17/0,1425,sz=1&i=174785,00.jpg

And, not only is the difference nearly impossible to see, you take about a 20 FPS hit using DX10.

Full article:
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2222414,00.asp

[MangaMan @ Dec 13th 2007 8:59PM]

This reminds me of 10 years ago when C&C Tiberium Sun was coming out.

All of my friends are shouting at the gamer mags, "Who the eff needs 16 MEGABYTES of VIDEO MEMORY???" - especially since it was the only game coming out with such a high requirement.

But thinking back, you have to realize that game developers are ALWAYS trying to push the envelope and use the latest and greatest technology. Not just for the early adopters, like Engadget readers, who will buy the newest card as soon as it hits the shelves.

Developers are also thinking of the "regular joe" that waits 12 months before buying Crysis. They want the game to still look sick, even 12 months later when regular joe's new Best-Buy-bought-Sony-Vaio has a GForce 8800.

It's not that the code is bad... it's that they don't have enough horsepower to do what they really want in a game.

[T-Bone @ Dec 14th 2007 12:44AM]

How do you propose to create realistic water, particles, textures, and optical effects with just a 125MHz processor? You don't even have to bother with creating characters or a story. My computer is an order of magnitude faster and takes from minutes to hours to render a single highly-realistic image using a highly efficient algorithm.

Optimizing code will only get you so far. It takes a lot of processing to generate a realistic game. That's what these cards deliver.

[Stanto @ Dec 14th 2007 9:14AM]

I'd like to know what happened to the 3dfx technology of Hidden Surface Removal that appears to have been swept under the preverbial carpet by nVidia.

[thethirdmoose @ Dec 13th 2007 3:34PM]

These people are really behind. I have a 9200 in my computer. But it's made by a different company. Some dudes named ATI. Same thing, right?

[Dan @ Dec 13th 2007 4:51PM]

Yes, but the underdogs aren't allowed to prosper at all. Sony, Creative, DAMMiT - read anything good on them lately, and if you have, was it peppered with snide remarks about immortal vices?

[Yoshi Likes Boys @ Dec 13th 2007 3:37PM]

You're right, engadget, three-ways are extreme.

[giantenemycrab @ Dec 13th 2007 3:37PM]

So the 8800GT isn't applicable? bummer..

[Kalen @ Dec 13th 2007 3:37PM]

3-way SLI? Sounds hot

[EngadgetFanBoi @ Dec 13th 2007 3:39PM]

Way to not thank anyone (me) for the tip, so say goodbye to EngadgetFanBoi everybody. I ought to switch to giz....

[Mort @ Dec 13th 2007 3:52PM]

Adios!

[matt @ Dec 13th 2007 4:10PM]

oh, you mean *you're* the one who submitted it? you're so freakishly cool that we should all stop for a moment, and give mad props to EngadgetFanBoi for his amazingness.

Get over yourself.

[Gadgie @ Dec 13th 2007 4:42PM]

No, as I said in my comment, "way to not thank anyone..." I realize this is a popular news article, but they usually say, "thanks to everyone who sent this is" or something to that effect.

I don't see where I acted as though I was "so cool" either. I've just lost my fanboi appreciation of Engadget, that's all.

[Dan @ Dec 13th 2007 4:53PM]

You're still here?

[Gadgie @ Dec 13th 2007 4:55PM]

Yeah, I like Engadget.

[L.Rawlins @ Dec 13th 2007 3:47PM]

No amount of quad core CPU's or GPU's will get me back into the wealth incinerating world of the modern day PC gaming market.

It is, quite literally, not worth it.

[4honor @ Dec 13th 2007 3:51PM]

ONLY "two gigabytes of graphics memory"? Weak... I will get back in pc gaming when they reach 2TB of graphics memory... with a SINGLE card the size of a business card.

[Kaminix @ Dec 13th 2007 4:02PM]

I am not impressed. Things are getting bigger instead of better.

[James Cameron @ Dec 13th 2007 4:18PM]

Don't forget about the heat. With 3 video cards, who needs a heater in the winter?

[dkffiv @ Dec 13th 2007 4:28PM]

To be honest, I don't turn the radiator on during the winter (NYC).

I don't run an SLI configuration, but I do have an 8800GTX, 6 hard drives, an overclocked Quad Core, and 2 large LCD monitors. If its too cold in the morning, I load up a game at 2560x1600 resolution and take a shower. 15 minutes later the room is a comfortable warm temperature.

[James Cameron @ Dec 13th 2007 4:14PM]

How about just give us 1 kickass video card instead??

[Justin @ Dec 13th 2007 4:25PM]

They already have that. It's called the 8800 Ultra. But now you can have three of them at once.

If you want one card that can do the same things that three of those tied together can do, I'm afraid you'll either have to wait a few years or die and go to PC gaming heaven.

[James Cameron @ Dec 13th 2007 4:38PM]

They are just milking us with this 2,3,4-way SLI technology. It's not that they can't make one wicked card. They don't really want to because it's not part of their marketing plan since ATI aren't giving them any competition.

[Zeus the God @ Dec 13th 2007 5:14PM]

Guys, its also about bandwidth. 2 graphics cards gives you more video bandwidth than 1 card. Look at the 7950GX2 and the 7950GT SLI.

[James Cameron @ Dec 13th 2007 6:16PM]

@Zeus the God

If you are talking about the SLI vs single GPU bandwidth or benchmark, it's not even worth the price you're paying for.

[James Cameron @ Dec 13th 2007 6:20PM]

If it's doubling or tribling the speed of a single GPU, then yeah it's totally worth it. But it's not giving you that with this waste of money and space technology. I'm not going to spend $1000 for 2 8800GTX Ultra for another 5 extra frames.

[Tavis Veighey @ Dec 13th 2007 4:23PM]

I recently got a fancy new Toshiba gaming laptop... It came with dual NVIDIA GeForce 86000M GT video cards.

When I run them in SLI mode... I can't get a single damn 3d game to run at ALL!!!! However whe they are NOT in SLI mode, games work alrigt...

So I do not see the point of having 2 high powered video cards, when they do not work!!!

[James Cameron @ Dec 13th 2007 4:44PM]

That's Nvidia and their crappy drivers problem at the moment especially for SLI.

[Tavis Veighey @ Dec 13th 2007 4:47PM]

I thought that I might be able to play Crisis on high... But NOOOO.

I'm going to harass NVIDIA and Toshiba about this problem!!!

Man I wish I could have chosen an ATI card insead. :(

[wixostrix @ Dec 13th 2007 4:25PM]

hmm...this is getting pretty redunkulouse. 1 card already takes up enuf from in a standard case anyway. but hey if u really need all that gaming power to get ur electric bill through the roof, who am i to stop you.

[palehorse @ Dec 13th 2007 4:27PM]

My questions...
Is this limited to 8800 GTX/Ultras? And if that's the case right now, are there any plans to expand coverage to GTS and GT series cards? what about the older 7 series? etc.

The articles are a little vague with that info...

[palehorse @ Dec 13th 2007 4:32PM]

nevermind.. found this:

"You might then wonder what happens to all the NVIDIA GeForce cards that do NOT have two SLI bridge connections on them. The answer: you don’t get 3-Way SLI. This technology is being limited to users or buyers of 8800 GTX and 8800 Ultra graphics boards as they are the only ones that have the dual bridge connections on them."

[Mayank Agarwal @ Dec 13th 2007 4:59PM]

Basically, if you already shelled out the money for a top-of-the-line 8800 Ultra, they assume you have the money to max out your l33t system again by buying more Ultras. Consider yourself poor in the eyes of the Nvidia if you can't spend $700 on a video card.

[Dave @ Dec 13th 2007 5:40PM]

I didn't even know we added a third PCIe slot. So the inevitable question is: When can we get 3 SLI-on-a-card's for a total of 6 GPU's? Because my old 7600 just isn't keeping my feet warm enough this winter.

[kojo87 @ Dec 13th 2007 5:11PM]

looks like Nvidia is playing catch up to ATI now. im really excited about the AMD Spider platform and running four graphics cards at the same time. and if you had four dual GPU boards...you might be able to play Crysis on medium!!

and then you need a 4000 Watt PSU...

[tau zero @ Dec 13th 2007 5:20PM]

What i want is for them to introduce power saving modes for these GPU's.

I have a 8800GTX and I'm also the kind of person who leaves his computer on 24/7. If i had 3 graphics cards, my electricity bill would probably be more than my rent. They should implement technology where only one card is on when you aren't gaming (and possibly in a pwoer saving state, sort of like core2 speed stepping), and once a game loads, then the other 2 GPU's turn on. This would really save electricity and make for quieter systems. Surely vista doesnt need 3 gpu's to render aero?

[JC @ Dec 13th 2007 5:21PM]

Well that was quick, Alienware already released it too.. http://www.alienware.com/product_detail_pages/Area-51_ALX_SLI/area-51_overview.aspx?SysCode=PC-AREA51-ALX-R6&SubCode=SKU-DEFAULT

[Wobbly @ Dec 13th 2007 6:17PM]

any1 who actually goes for this will be kicking themselves early next year when Nvidia releases the 9 series. Besides, the 8800GT or the g92 8800gts 512 are better values than the older gtx or ultra - this just seems like a huge waste of cash.