NVIDIA inks deal for SLI support on Intel Core i5, i7 systems
By Donald Melanson 
posted Aug 10th 2009 3:32PM
posted Aug 10th 2009 3:32PM
The relationship between the two companies may have descended to the level of a schoolyard fight at times, but it looks like NVIDIA and Intel are now doing their best to get along -- in public, at least -- united, in part, by AMD's entirely in-house CrossFire graphics solution. This latest gesture of goodwill comes in the form of an announcement that NVIDIA will indeed be licensing its SLI graphics technology to Intel and various motherboard manufacturers for use in upcoming Core i5 and Core i7-based systems, which Intel describes as the "perfect complement" for each other. Intel further goes on to say that "NVIDIA and Intel share a combined passion for furthering the PC as the definitive platform for gaming," while unconfirmed reports also have NVIDIA holding up its fingers in a comical gesture behind Intel's head during the announcement.
[Via Electronista]
[Via Electronista]
What is that beast in the picture?
GTX2xx Tri Sli
6x SLI?
nvm x1500 beat me to it.
Its a Borg cube under construction.
That's just plain sweet...
3X GTX295
Only the bottom card would be well cooled. the other 2 would pull air of the card below them - leading to HOTness.
Or at least I have that problem with my 4850s, and they dont even touch.
GTX 285 Tri-SLI.
If it were three 295s, shit would be roastin, 'specially the slightly older ones. I have the single PCB version, and it gets to about 60-75 celcius under load, in a pretty damn well aired case. I don't think you could actually stay in the same room as this though.
It's actually an incubator.
The beast is not important because it is unnecessary and a waste of money both Intel and Nvidia are assholes and this statement:
"furthering the PC as the definitive platform for gaming" is actually contrary to what they are doing... i7's and 3xGTX295's are the problem that is killing PC gaming.
That picture is giving me a chubby.
(wants macbook pro with core i7 and high end mobile graphics with hybrid SLI)
And yet you will have to install Windows to actually take advantage of it. : D
@ Nerdy
And that's one of the bad things of a Mac. D:
What's apple's reason to not support it? They could've supported it on the Macbook pros with dual graphics.
Probably didn't due to heat issues (everyone know it would drain power faster).
Do yourself a favor and just buy a PC.
Not only are Macs perpetually playing catchup in terms of hardware (for example, such a tri-SLI option does not even exist for a Mac whereas on PC's, one would've been able to build such a setup a couple of years ago), but the Mac OS doesn't take advantage of this kind of hardware either.
Macs = pay more to do less and with fewer options.
@WindowsFTL
Funny part is, I've never owned a Mac and I'm using a PC.
@Fan-of-iTech
I think Macs are terrible and PCs are the best. Of course, my opinion is completely unbiased this because I've never used Windows or Linux and I've only used Mac OS X on real Macs.
@Cool: I understand the comparison you're trying to make, but I think it goes with saying that someone can want something even if they don't have it.
I think most here would want a Macbook Pro with Core i7 and high-end mobile graphics with hybrid-SLI if it operated correctly - especially if one was offered to them. This, simply because the raw power it would have and the technology going into it.
A lot of us simply love technology here, I don't think there's anything wrong with that. Would you be drawing the same comparison if I said I wanted a Symbian phone and only ever owned a Windows Mobile?
Its too bad that the P55 and i5 will have less bandwidth than X58, I believe if an i5 mobo has 3 PCI Express slots, it will be full X16, X4 and X4 speeds. How much of a bottleneck will there be for X4?
Yep, the 3rd PCIe 16 slot comes form the chipset not the DMI(limited to 20 lanes), and is really not meant for graphics use.
Though, considering how useless 3x SLI is, I don't really see this as a problem.
I'd go x8, x8 for dual SLI, but that's me.
they should merge
but then we'd have a graphics monopoly. and nobody would like that.
Oh good! More hard drives to sacrifice in the name of space.
WOW.. I understand wanting some horsepower but buying 3X GTX2 cards at what $250 each? I concede that PC is beyond the 360 or PS3 (especially when gfx cards are outdated every other month) but I'd much rather buy a dedicated game system, couple of games and a princess Leia outfit for my lady friend and keep the rest. What?
Wow, I am getting warm just thinking about hot much heat those bad boys would put out.
I had 1 GTX 295 and hot damn was it warm.
it would be a warm winter if you ran those things triple SLI'd.
Too bad it doesnt get that cold in SoCal :(, would be a great excuse to pick 3 of these up
you need one of these :
http://www.koolance.com/water-cooling/product_info.php?product_id=778
mine is at 40c
@OneLove
... and where exactly do you think the heat is going?
I guess i dont understand your question seth. its a gpu waterblock so the heat goes into the coolant and out to the cooler?
I admittedly know nothing about SLI, so excuse my ignorance, but I have a few questions:
With 6 DVI ports on the back of your rig, which one (or 2) do you use to hook up your monitor(s)?
Will it actually push 6 monitors? If so, is this config ideal for gamers?
How much wattage does your PSU need to push in order to properly power 2 of those monster cars?
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3183
From the looks of the article, 1100W+
I think you can only use the primary card's slots, the rest aren't used.
As for power, I think people recommend 650-700 for dual high end graphics cards, so I guess 800 - 1000. :S
According to the reading I've been doing, with SLI or Crossfire turned on to boost graphics, it kills output to all other dvi ports, so even though you have 6 ports there, you would only be able to have one monitor functioning. Deactivating the SLI/Crossfire Acceleration will give you back functionality of those 6 DVI ports. If you wanted to have SLI/Crossfire active AND have additional monitor outputs, you would need a separate video solution to power the secondary monitors.
It is possible that there has been an update to SLI which makes my answer outdated, but I recently contacted AMD about this, and this is the current state of Crossfire.
Fortunately my mobo had some onboard video (HD 3300 w/ SidePort) and a setting for something ASUS called "Surround View" that lets me use the onboard for secondary and PCI-E as the primary. I'm sure most modern mobo's that have onboard video would have similar settings.
So dual/triple video cards can still be an option for those with multiple monitor setups. (I am talking about those who want to have a game on one monitor, and can use the second for access to the desktop, web browsing, etc. Not people who want to span one game across multiple monitors. I don't know how to do that.)
@gamechild:
Not any more. SLI now works on multiple monitors. My two 8800 GTX's prove that.
There was a driver update sometime last year I believe that finally enabled it.
Turns out I may have been misinformed about what I said regarding Crossfire as well.... Because I said Crossfire instead of CrossfireX when I emailed AMD.
Random web searching seems to indicate the CrossfireX and version 8.3ish Catalyst drivers fixed this issue a while back...
I'll post again if I confirm.
This is a way late update, but yes, I was wrong. CrossfireX does allow for two monitors to be hooked up to the primary card for Extended Desktop configurations.
Looks like it would be a bitch to hook up the front usb and power switch wires too. Must suck to have to turn off everything else in the house so you don't pop breakers when you fire up your computer. What am I saying, that would be freaking awesome...
i7 920 CPU ($200) -- Quality i7 motherboard ($300) -- 12GB DDR3 ($180) -- Tri-SLI GTX 260's ($450) -- 750W PSU ($100) -- Hard Drive ($80) -- DVD Burner ($20) --- Case ($100)
Cheap and powerful!
just get one 295 off ebay.
I'm doing a similiar build in a Blackbird case with an EVGA Classified mobo. Using a 285 for my graphics until the 300 series is released. I'll either trade up when that happens or use the 285 for physx.
Can you really power that build with a 750w PSU? Think you would be getting pretty close to the limit of that PSU if you throw in some overclocking and enough fans needed to deal with tri sli.
And of course a 10K RPM HD [or a SSD], cuz why the hell would you build something that meaty and use a plain old drive XD
"Cheap"
What, are you high?
Eh, my bad. My case came with a 1.1 kw power supply.
Itd be suicide for either of them to not at least play in the same ball field...... Either of them going away from each other now without having fully developed and trusted hardware would just be stupid.....
Jeez, they should just build a video card that requires you to snap in a motherboard, CPU, and memory to it.
I've been saying this for a while, someone needs to redesign the motherboard and case factors to account for these gigantic video cards.
Stop blocking all my sluts! :)
...or create a self powered & cooled external video card blade rack for gamers. :)
Nvidia cockblocking your sluts? With a pimp named Bloomfield.
forget about putting a good RAID controller or audio card. probably a pain to reset the bios settings or connect to the sata ports even with l-shaped connectors. still way cool though.