Is SLI worth doing anymore? (opinions)

[Mick Naughty]

4 hours ago, Hiitchy said:

I feel like there were just some people buying two graphics cards at once for A E S T H E T I C more than actually having a proper use for all that VRAM. In any case, I still think it was just as useless as it was to me when I first found out what SLI and Crossfire was used for lol.

How would one use all that vram in sli?

[pas008]

9 hours ago, mrchow19910319 said:

unless 2 1080Ti only cost you a few days of work, you shouldn't do SLI.

especially since you are using a 1080Ti.

gtx 260  out performed 295 and was cheaper and but had 216 core version

 

460s out performed 480 in all games I played by far and was cheaper

 

its all on the games you play

[Stefan Payne]

15 hours ago, Macslayer29 said:

Hello I just wanted to know if SLI is worth doing. I have a 1080 TI and I was thinking about adding another one to my rig. But as I read up on SLI it seems it comes with mixed reviews and it would seem like it is on the decline and not many game, very few it seems, even benefit from it. Just want to get every ones opinion on it.

No, because it doesn't work most of the times.

And in the last WAN Show it was said that the newet Assasin's creed runs like shit when SLI is active.

 

So chicken egg problem: Because nobody uses it, nobody cares about it. And because nobody cares about it and it doesn't work on most games, nobody uses it and should use it.

I think it only works in the AAA Shoters like Battlefield, CoD and similar. But besides that not so much.

 

The last game I tried with CF was NIER Automata. Second card stuck at 300/150MHz. You know what that means, do you?

 

 

Oh and if you see something like "VULKAN", you know that multiple GPUs aren't supported. Because Vulcan doesn't support multiple cards (well, Until recently I think)...

[Wakes Inc]

I remember when the tech was first introduced.  It seemed like such a cool concept at the time and it was going to take over gaming.  Such promise, but they've never really worked out the kinks.  You're almost always better off going with the highest card you can afford - the usage case for sli/crossfire is so narrow to a few extreme examples that it will never be mainstream.  Which means support will never be great.

[DildorTheDecent]

16 hours ago, pas008 said:

 

Yup. SLi is very much reserved for enthusiasts. Too many kids think "plug and play" will work just fine.

 

BF4 was rather good to me for SLi performance. Fallout 4 is also quite good when you find a profile that works. F1 2017 just doesn't like it and tuns into a glitchy mess.

[Mk7-Golf-R]

I like it because it pumps up your 3dmark score

[pas008]

5 hours ago, Stefan Payne said:

No, because it doesn't work most of the times.

And in the last WAN Show it was said that the newet Assasin's creed runs like shit when SLI is active.

 

So chicken egg problem: Because nobody uses it, nobody cares about it. And because nobody cares about it and it doesn't work on most games, nobody uses it and should use it.

I think it only works in the AAA Shoters like Battlefield, CoD and similar. But besides that not so much.

 

The last game I tried with CF was NIER Automata. Second card stuck at 300/150MHz. You know what that means, do you?

 

 

Oh and if you see something like "VULKAN", you know that multiple GPUs aren't supported. Because Vulcan doesn't support multiple cards (well, Until recently I think)...

oh wow the WAN show is all knowledgeable huh the end all right?

metal gear survive hasnt even came out yet and has a profile

its all on the game engine, developers, and nvidia what is not hard to understand

if you want a list of nvidias sli profiles extract them from your drivers

and many can use other profiles depending on the engine

 

and kronos has said sli and mGPU will be supported like a year ago

[Mick Naughty]

Been stated 100 times. Depends on use/games. 

 

Most people have never tried it so they parrot people on here or you tubers. 

 

If it didn’t work why would peope use it and boards continue to support it?

 

Why lower yourself to a single card when another can help drastically? 

[KarathKasun]

Ive seen the FPS counter differences, but the game still feels like its running slower from an input perspective.  Im not sensitive to micro-stutter, but I am fairly sensitive to input latency.

 

Ive used X800 CF, HD 3870 X2 (single card mGPU), GTX 470 SLI, GTX 670 SLI, and R9 280 CF.  Every dual card setup got split up shortly after purchase because it was never worth dealing with the problems.

[pas008]

4 minutes ago, KarathKasun said:

Ive seen the FPS counter differences, but the game still feels like its running slower from an input perspective.  Im not sensitive to micro-stutter, but I am fairly sensitive to input latency.

what?

never had issues with input lag and I have used plx chip on my ws boards

[KarathKasun]

2 minutes ago, pas008 said:

what?

never had issues with input lag and I have used plx chip on my ws boards

Its not "input lag", its more like input responsiveness with SLI or CF does not directly follow the FPS.  Single card with lower details "feels" better at the same FPS as a mGPU setup with higher IQ.

[Not_Sean]

Sadly for me I see it as not worth it, Yes I can prob get another 980 for pretty cheap and go SLi but from where I stand I'd actually be better off selling my 980 and getting a 980 ti or hell a 1070 as vram will become my issue moving forward now just raw performance. 

[pas008]

20 minutes ago, KarathKasun said:

Its not "input lag", its more like input responsiveness with SLI or CF does not directly follow the FPS.  Single card with lower details "feels" better at the same FPS as a mGPU setup with higher IQ.

what are you talking about lol

 

typical propaganda like @Mick Naughty stated

wow

[KarathKasun]

5 minutes ago, pas008 said:

what are you talking about lol

Crap frame pacing causing inconsistent input response.

Larger gap between FPS minimum to FPS maximums.

All of the other problems with mGPU as implemented by SLI and CF.

[pas008]

1 minute ago, KarathKasun said:

Crap frame pacing causing inconsistent input response.

lol

been like I said been using sli from 8k series  almost every gen and multiple times per gen

never had real big issues besides a game not having any support

 

guess we can all it user error on your part

[Mick Naughty]

Works flawless for me. Destroy people like normal. But I could do that one a crappy amd laptop with 35FPS. 

 

Everyone always sticks by what they say though. Without any input from the op all of this is typical internet bs anyway. 

[KarathKasun]

23 minutes ago, pas008 said:

lol

And?  I'm not the only one who has problems

 

http://www.guru3d.com/articles-pages/geforce-gtx-1070-ti-2-way-sli-review,1.html

 

As I suspected from using SLI setups here and there, frame time variance is still a problem in most games.  The results for BF1 highlight what I am most sensitive to, rapid changes in FPS.

[Mick Naughty]

Bf1 runs great. Prolly just an inadequate setup. But that’s how it goes with the internet. 

[pas008]

10 minutes ago, KarathKasun said:

And?  I'm not the only one who has problems

 

http://www.guru3d.com/articles-pages/geforce-gtx-1070-ti-2-way-sli-review,1.html

 

As I suspected from using SLI setups here and there, frame time variance is still a problem in most games.

as you see most are slightly better but in line with single card just a few spikes

[pas008]

5 minutes ago, Mick Naughty said:

Bf1 runs great. Prolly just an inadequate setup. But that’s how it goes with the internet. 

funny thing I been running surround since they allowed it, dabbled in the soft th world before that

and I deal with more issues on that by far

but i keep going back to both because I always find my gaming experience better with both

and I run a phsyx card too lol but thats really to drive 4th and 5th 60hz monitors for monitoring temps/voltages/chat/etc

[Squilliam]

23 hours ago, Macslayer29 said:

Hello I just wanted to know if SLI is worth doing. I have a 1080 TI and I was thinking about adding another one to my rig. But as I read up on SLI it seems it comes with mixed reviews and it would seem like it is on the decline and not many game, very few it seems, even benefit from it. Just want to get every ones opinion on it.

Not at all. 

 

Even the LTT crew are against it now. 

Support for it has dried up.

[Lathlaer]

It depends where you are talking about the SLI.

 

If in Graphics Cards section, then everyone will tell you it's dumb and not needed.

 

If in Build Logs section, then everyone will drool and be amazed.

 

By the way, there is a very informative topic about SLI on these forums, I'd read that first ;-)

 

 

Try to find actual people who run SLI on daily basis instead of relying on "opinions" of people who never run it and never planned to.

 

[Mira Yurizaki]

20 hours ago, pas008 said:

I run 5760 x 1080 @144hz show me single card that handles that well

That's less than 4K. A GTX 1080 Ti can handle that "well"

 

14 hours ago, Goildzy said:

The question is, was SLI worth it in the past or was crossfire?

And the answer was it depends on the time you were considering it and how much you were willing to put up with either side's quirks. The first implementation of CrossFire required a Master CrossFire card, you couldn't do it with just any card. AMD did away with that later and opened up CrossFire so it was possible to do it on more systems than SLI. SLI's problem at first was it needed nForce boards, then whatever chipset NVIDIA decided was worthwhile to license it on.

 

There were also more complaints on microstuttering CrossFire than SLI. Or at least, it was bad enough AMD specifically addressed it.

[Mick Naughty]

Lol a 1080ti could do it, so could a 660ti. The point it FPS, frame time and settings. 

Not gonna settle with 60 frames on ultra with a single card when I can see 100+ with two. Trying to take advantage of what’s available currently. But a single better card would be a titan v so that would fit into the parrot phrase of “a single better card”.  

[pas008]

55 minutes ago, M.Yurizaki said:

That's less than 4K. A GTX 1080 Ti can handle that "well"

 

And the answer was it depends on the time you were considering it and how much you were willing to put up with either side's quirks. The first implementation of CrossFire required a Master CrossFire card, you couldn't do it with just any card. AMD did away with that later and opened up CrossFire so it was possible to do it on more systems than SLI. SLI's problem at first was it needed nForce boards, then whatever chipset NVIDIA decided was worthwhile to license it on.

 

There were also more complaints on microstuttering CrossFire than SLI. Or at least, it was bad enough AMD specifically addressed it.

1080ti can't max 1440p at 144hz 

Believe there ate some games at 1080p too