Crossfire Vs SLI

[bunnydas8888]

Hi, i'm going to build myself a computer before i go off to uni & i've want to get either a crossfire or SLI rig.

So i was wandering which you guys think is best & why its the best, and also, what are the pros and cons of each?

Cheers
bunny

[Taxation]

Well ATM SLI is looking best
But with the new ATI R600 chipset coming out soon, it will be hard to choose.

how long can you wait, and how much do you have?

A new nvidia board with SLI for conroe should be coming out soon.
But the ATI R600 is a while off.

Answer the questions above and that will give us an idea of what range of pc you would be able to buy.

[bunnydas8888]

well i could wait untill december....but i would much rather have it by mid-late september at the latest.

And my system would have to have:
compatible mobo (if crossfire then probs the Asus A8R32-MVP Deluxe 939 Radeon Xpress 3200 DDR400 PCI-E)
AMD 64bit processor (at least 3200)
1gb ram (at least)
& the other stuff i already got (hdd, cdrom etc)

as for the gfx card i would like a high end one.....maybe not the best one out atm, but somthing good...i've been looking around & i mite be able to fork out for sumthing such as a ATI X1900 chipset card, but i don't think i would be able to buy both at the same time, would have to buy the second at a later date. But at the moment i would say i have around £300-£400 for the graphics card(s)

so i want a pretty high end system :)

[Taxation]

Whats the total cost of the system allowed to get to
1K
750
500

[Nox]

Remember there will always be new stuff just around the corner.

Nox

[bunnydas8888]

would be looking for the system to cost around £750-£800ish. Thats just for the system, i have all the other stuff like monitor, mouse, keyboard, speakers & if need be i already have a case, but would prefer a nice shiney new one :)

[Taxation]

I dont know about intel ,so im not going to spec you an intel machine.
AM2,only SLI at the moment
939 has sli and crossfire.

There are some cheap crossfire 200 boards, but i would spend the extra money on a 3200 chipset, they offer better performance.
motherboard- http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/spec ... ASU-A8R32M (http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?ASU-A8R32M)

power supply :roll: - http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/spec ... ?HYP-4M580 (http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?HYP-4M580) (to my knowledge u can use this with crossfire aswell, all u need is a 6 pin power connector)

graphics card- http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/spec ... C3D-X19XTX (http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?C3D-X19XTX) great performance and very cheap *wonders if it was a typo*
but you need a crossfire edition to do crossfire mode (unlike nvidia's simple set-up)

processor- http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/spec ... l?AMD-X242 (http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?AMD-X242)
novatech dont do the rest of the 939 X2 range :?
(or buy big beere's X2 3800 for £90 :lol: )

Thats about £600 so far.
£200 left for case and RAM

RAM- http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/spec ... CSR-VS402G (http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?CSR-VS402G)
Thats 2GB,but it is value, but 2GB will let you run games maxed out without any fps lagg.

Now just the case left.It is normally down to what style you like. So you can have any, but here are some suggestions.
Thermaltake tsunami
thermaltake shark
thermaltake armour
But it is down to your own personal styling.

[bunnydas8888]

nice one thanks :D

But heres the big question....is it realy worth it? & would SLI be better?

Would you suggest one single uber graphics card, or would you suggest an SLI or Crossfire rig?

[Taxation]

Think of it like this
1 card does everything u need
2 cards is a show off

If you get a single card,then you can downgrade the board to a non SLI/crossfire board, and get a better cpu/gpu or even more RAM

Plus u can save money and not go sli/crossfire and pay off some uni debt :D

tbh,i have a SLI board,but i could of just gone for a cheaper board,and gotten a better card.

SLI is slightly better than crossfire, because SLI has been around for longer.

[bunnydas8888]

Good point, i think what i might do is go for a single card rig & then maybe expand later down the line, mainly because my student loan got fucked up & now i'm gettin less money than i thought i was :(

Thanks for all your help though :)

[Nox]

go intel :D

Nox

[Taxation]

If your not going to go multi gpu,then i would go intel (thanks nox) and get a conroe setup

[bunnydas8888]

hate to be a noob, but....conroe?

[Taxation]

Dont worry about it
conroe is intels new flag chip (haha :roll: )
conroe is its nickname, the actual name of the chip is "core 2 duo"
It is basically cheaper and better than AMD's top chips, and overclocks very well,but as of yet, doesnt support sli (because intel doesnt want to make a big thing out of it)

Even a 2ghz conroe (when slightly oc'd) can run a game almost and sometimes faster than AMD's FX62, for a fraction of the price.

But there are memory compatibility problems with it.
as some will know

Edited

[Lustral]

doesnt support crossfire or sli (because intel doesnt want to make a big thing out of it)


Eh ?

My P5W DH supports Crossfire , fact all 975X chipset supports Crossfire as standard :P

Lusty

[Taxation]

sorry dude, im not an intel fan boy

but this does SLI
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/spec ... asu-p5n32s (http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?asu-p5n32s)