BF2S Forums Dual Video Cards - Is It Really Worth It?

imho not worth it unless you are an avid benchmarker.

The general consensus is that a single $330 7900GT 256MB (I prefer BFG Tech's particular OC distribution myself) will hold anyone till the next batch of hardware upgrades establish themselves as must-haves (i.e., when DX10 is widely taken advantage of in gaming software, you might want to get a new NVIDIA/ATI).

And if you're thinking about spending money for two GT cards for SLI, just get one fatboy GTX card. However, should you get a single GT card now, you always have the option of popping in another at some point in the future should prices drop significantly. I'm willing to bet that with the pricing/availability of GTX, their prices will never drop by a significant margin.

Last edited by unnamednewbie13 (2006-04-29 19:16:30)

im gonna get another 7900gtx for my dell 24", o and to extend my e-penis of course to make up for rl

BlackLegion42 wrote:

I think one good gfx card is sufficient for my use. I can assure you that one gfx card is enough for all your video needs.

Unless, of course, you drive a high resolution on a huge monitor...like a 30" Dell.

I was thing about buy a new compy, today i could have got one with
2 gb or corsair ram (2x1gb=2gb)
dual 7800 gt 256 supprt together =512
dual 250 sata hard drives
nvidia x16 pci express mother board and a sound bvlaster audigy zs for about 1,500$ i was like yea but then i decided not to get it

Stealth42o wrote:

Just pick up and SLI board and 1 PCI card.  If you run into a game in the furture that you need more power.  Pick up a second card.

Good to at least have the option.

i think it would be best if u pick up the second card within 2 months would be a lot worth it though. But i would say one 7900gt is enough read this article and u would know... http://www.vr-zone.com/index.php?i=3437

Even though the motherboard supports SLI that doesn`t mean that the graphicards do that just yet because they dont.

Like someone posted earlier u get just 5% increase in power from two cards, in some near future there will be made cards that will take full advantage of SLI but as of now its money down the drain to install two cards.

But buy an SLI motherboard now so u are ready for whats coming cause it will be good, real good :-)

another vote for single.

I didn't check my FSP when I was running full "high" settings, but I've turned down shadows and lighting (not really a cheat, but a minor advantage), and I'm pulling 99FPS everytime I look with a single 7800GT, and the 7900GT is supposed to smoke my card.

I'm ALWAYS first into a map on a new load.  Might help that my little $160 CPU is running almost 3Ghz. 

-101-InvaderZim wrote:

I have to agree with Janus. Not really worth it. Performance gain is only 5% (or so i have heard).
Most games will run on hi/ultra hi with just 1 7800 and look just as nice.

well not necessarily 5%, it can be a lot more than that... people running my system with SLI cards would be getting 8000+ in 3dmark06, but I can only pull ~4200.  So right there is a very large increase.  I would say that depending on the rest of your system and without having any bottlenecks then having 2 cards in SLI or xfire can be worth it.  But as others have said, only if you are running a nice large monitor (I would agree with the Dell 24'' or 30'' - which can even make dual 7900gtx cards choke when running at all high etc) at a high resolution.  Since my monitor only does 1280x1024, it isn't worth it to me, but for others it can be.  But personally, I would think to get a nice dual core processor, 2gb of ram, etc, then go off and get a second card if you want/need it for what you do.

And for who said to buy one card now and another later when they are cheaper:

I do not believe that it works that way.  The cards (at least used to, I dunno if firmware/driver updates can fix this) that they need to have the same BIOS.  And since gfx cards bios are updated fairly frequently (probably every few months or so) it would be pretty necessary to get both cards within a small amount of time.

I used 2 x 6600gt before i bought my 7800gt and to be perfectly honest the 2 smaller cards outperformed this one big card. 
They played everythin maxed out and ran like a charm.
Review websites may say otherwise on some games but the only thing i have gained from buying this one is a noisier system.

Hm.

Well, i'm still kind of in between on this one, i think i'm just gunna leave it at if i have enough money by the time I finish building it then maybe i will invest in dual. thanks for your help guys!

Dual cards worth it?  Probably not, in an abstract bean counter sort of way. 

But, I have to tell you, when I'm playing BF2 at 1920x1080 all settings on high 4x AA/16x AF on my 37" Westinghouse LCD, I'm damned glad I have two Crossfired X1900's under the hood keeping my FPS from ever dipping below 60.

Was it worth it to me?  I was able to play the game just fine with a single 6800 GT at 1680x1050 on my 20" Dell monitor and medium/high settings and enjoyed the hell out of it.  But the gameplay I have with the new hardware is just so much more immersive it's hard to describe.