- last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT
Realize that while it is effing fast, it isn't practical and has problems. Every generation of cards bring new features [new pixel shaders, lighting technologies, etc.], that must be supported at the hardware level. Ex., any ATi card before the X1K series did not support HDR and did not support pixel shader 3.0. They just couldn't. So, what happens when you sink thousands into a quad-sli rig, and then in six to eight months the technology is already outdated?
It's great, but its a little excessive and beyond practical. Besides, if sli only gives a 50% advantage over one card...well, quad-sli is not four times the power. In fact, it's not even twice the power.
You can read this review of quad-sli as it would be implemented in almost any system. The list of problems:
-Drivers are unstable
-Only a 2.5% gain over a single GX2 [one of the dual-PCB cards] in 3D Mark 06 - still slower than two X1900XTX's
-Two X1900XTX's absolutely annihilate quad-sli in Serious Sam 2
-In FEAR, quad-sli beats two X1900XTX's by...3 fps
-In Quake 4, an nVidia-favored game, two X1900XTX's -blam!- quad-sli by 25fps
-In Far Cry, two X1900XTX's are still a pinch better than quad-sli
-Quad-sli is currently incompatible with Oblivion
One could argue that it's an early driver release, but with these babies already shipping, that's not much of an excuse. They rush it to market, and what happens? It gets raped by two X1900XTX's, which are both less expensive and easier to obtain.
Unless this is an driver issue, quad-sli is just a gimmick.
[Edited on 5/1/2006]