PC Gaming Renaissance on the Horizon?

Tigerblade said:
Just to add fuel to the 'PCs are getting too expensive/out of hand' fire, check out Nvidia's new offering....

http://www.vr-zone.com.sg/?i=2927

Now this is insane. Dual core 7800GT's in SLi. The card is HUGE, its just about the size of the motherboard and I don't even wanna know what PSU you need to run that rig :eek:


OMG :eek: They are massive!! They take up the entire motherboard :eek: . I also dread to think of the power that a rig like that would take to get stable, probably need 2 PSU's!
 
Would it possibly need its own industrial sized air-conditioning unit should you even dream of trying to put a case round it?
 
I knew this would eventually happen. Surely if you have a dual core Graphics card theres no need for SLI?

If these dual core cards come out ill probably just get one of those and expect to see the same sort of performance we can get now from single core SLI.
 
That's what the link is showing. Dual core cards in SLi. There is no bridge connector between them altho with that amount of power who cares if you see a slight drop in performance.

All this dual core gfx card stuff is old news tho tbh, ATi was at it about 6-7 years ago with the Rage Fury MAXX. Again BIG cards for the time and the first card with 64mb if I remember correctly. Still got mine :)
 
Well, for me the next card I buy will be a 512mb card with 2 cores.

That with a 64bit dual core CPU and a 64bit OS like Vista.

Hopefully then we will see some real 64bit computing and some sort of real change in performance and graphics.

Once developers start using 64 bit for gaming then im sure we will see something.

Till then, stuff like SLI is just a waste of time and most of all money.
 
You'd buy a dual core gfx card yet you think SLi is a waste of money :confused: Dunno what you think dual core is but it in essence a 'space saving' SLi setup......

At the end of the day by using that philosophy why bother buying a dual core cpu now because only a handful of games use them at present...

why stop there? no use buying a 64bit cpu because there is nothing to use that to it's full potential yet....

Your logic confuses me.. :confused:

Why buy a Ferrari when the speed limit is 40mph? I'm guessing your a 'The glass is half empty' type of guy ;)
 
You mention that HL2 (the best selling PC game so far) sold 1.7 million copies and then compare that with Halo2 which sold...6.4 million copies
...and I don't dispute that console games sell more at all. All I am saying is that whilst a product is selling as well as some PC games are there is no question of developers opting out the market. Indeed the PC gaming market is bigger now that is ever has been - it is enjoying the same/similar growth that video gaming as a whole it.

As the original article states - the release of the next-generation consoles has inevitably brought with it the doomsayers who say the death of PC gaming is nigh [but] we can see from this report that some of the industry's heavy hitters continue to see the PC as a viable gaming platform and worthy of continued support.
 
Rasczak said:
...and I don't dispute that console games sell more at all. All I am saying is that whilst a product is selling as well as some PC games are there is no question of developers opting out the market. Indeed the PC gaming market is bigger now that is ever has been - it is enjoying the same/similar growth that video gaming as a whole it.

As the original article states - the release of the next-generation consoles has inevitably brought with it the doomsayers who say the death of PC gaming is nigh [but] we can see from this report that some of the industry's heavy hitters continue to see the PC as a viable gaming platform and worthy of continued support.

According to that article I posted the PC market did decline by 14% last year compared to 2003. When you consider that Farcry, HL2 & Doom 3 all came out in 2004 then that is concerning as the drop wasn't caused by a poor selection of games. The console market dropped by less than 1%.

I'm sure we'll have PC gaming for as long as there are PC's but perhaps with small companies not with mainstream developers producing games.
 
AML said:
Well, for me the next card I buy will be a 512mb card with 2 cores.

That with a 64bit dual core CPU and a 64bit OS like Vista.

Hopefully then we will see some real 64bit computing and some sort of real change in performance and graphics.

Once developers start using 64 bit for gaming then im sure we will see something.

Till then, stuff like SLI is just a waste of time and most of all money.

Not sure how 64 bit will help games. 64 bit generally helps applications that use over 4 gb of Ram. Such as databases.

32 bit can't efficiently address memory above 4 gb as it doesn't have the address space without some memory swapping techniques.

Extra wide buses 128 and 256 bit can help with memory transfer between gpu and cpu, but this has nothing to do with 64 bit computing. :lesson:

If you;ve got more than 4gb of ram then I'm in awe! :smashin:
 
CAS FAN said:
OMG :eek: They are massive!! They take up the entire motherboard :eek: . I also dread to think of the power that a rig like that would take to get stable, probably need 2 PSU's!

Or one 360 PSU! :devil:
 
I'm sure we'll have PC gaming for as long as there are PC's but perhaps with small companies not with mainstream developers producing games.
That is rubbish - and if you don't mind my saying is clearly just meant to be an inflamatory statement. Are the major games companies going to 'drop out' of PC gaming? Of course not - as discussed above the profit margins are just too huge. The cost of a game just doesn't justify single platform release unless it that particular consoles 'killer game' (Halo 2 for example for the XBox) - even if the 'second platform' isn't as profitable as the original that doesn't mean it won't be released. If anything the PC is in the best possible position: it gets the best of all the consoles - take Call of Duty 2 for example which is getting a PC and XBox 360 release only. So hard luck for those with Sony or Nintendo consoles.

All the time their are PCs in mainstream useage then there will be mainstream developers and studios pushing to get their games into the PC gaming market.
 
ain't 64bit athlons kinda standard now? and don't u need xp 64-bit edition anyways to use any 64 bit features?
 
Looking at those dual 7800s it seems like they should start making motherboards designed specifically for GPUs, and have the CPU on a PCI-E board :p The amount of transistors in those 4 GPUs must outnumber the amount in the CPU and bridges 2 fold
 
Tigerblade said:
You'd buy a dual core gfx card yet you think SLi is a waste of money :confused: Dunno what you think dual core is but it in essence a 'space saving' SLi setup......

At the end of the day by using that philosophy why bother buying a dual core cpu now because only a handful of games use them at present...

why stop there? no use buying a 64bit cpu because there is nothing to use that to it's full potential yet....

Your logic confuses me.. :confused:

Why buy a Ferrari when the speed limit is 40mph? I'm guessing your a 'The glass is half empty' type of guy ;)

I realise that dual core systems will be one possible way in to the future. Its just pointless at this time to spend so much for such minimal returns.
Ive seen single cards being compared to SLI and even though SLI may have performed slightly better, it hardly warrants spending money for 2 cards.
At this time you dont get twice the performance.

Im saying that in the future once software is optimised to use Dual core CPU's and GPU's then we will see a boost in performance. I didnt say I would buy any of this stuff now did I ?

I said once Vista comes out. And once DUAL CORE GPU's come out.
Im not paying money for 2 cards just to satisfy NVidia.

I only want one card with 2 cores. Thats very different from SLI and probably much cheaper. Read my posts carefully mate.
 
AML said:
I only want one card with 2 cores. Thats very different from SLI and probably much cheaper. Read my posts carefully mate.

I'd put money on there being minimul difference between an SLi setup and a dual core gpu setup. Cheaper maybe, who knows.....but I don't think I'm far off it being a space saving solution for those who whould like a SLi rig. A friend of mine for example has a shuttle, he can't fit 2 cards in his pc but he reckons that the dual core GT will fit. This opens up another segment of the market, for those who can only have one card but can now have SLi performance, and those that have SLi motherboard's that can link 2 dual core card's up for an even bigger performance increase.

Like it or not that is the way of the pc hardware market....
 
True that space, or lack there of for shuttle users, may open a market for SLI type set ups using smaller single cards.

(whatever hapened to BTX? :confused: )

I still feel that buying 2 sepparate high end cards will be more expensive than a single card with 2 cores.

Lets not forget that SLI requires a special mother board with 2 slots, while a dual core card should fit in any single slot PCI-E mo bo.

Its similar to the way dual core CPU mo bo's dont need 2 individual slots for 2 CPU's

Wouldnt that save more space?

One thing that bothers me about SLI is that it leaves no room for any other kind of card to fit next to the graphics cards.
I mean, they take so much space, that Sound cards and any other kind of card wont fit in there.

Anyway, I dont see anyone talking about XFire. (ATi's dual card solution.)

In theory XFire should work better than SLI.
 
Tigerblade said:
I'd put money on there being minimul difference between an SLi setup and a dual core gpu setup. Cheaper maybe, who knows.....but I don't think I'm far off it being a space saving solution for those who whould like a SLi rig. A friend of mine for example has a shuttle, he can't fit 2 cards in his pc but he reckons that the dual core GT will fit. This opens up another segment of the market, for those who can only have one card but can now have SLi performance, and those that have SLi motherboard's that can link 2 dual core card's up for an even bigger performance increase.

Like it or not that is the way of the pc hardware market....

TigerBlade are you getting/have COD2 on your pc? Can you get a demo, and put it on your max settings. We can then compare a screenshot to 360?
 
JayList said:
TigerBlade are you getting/have COD2 on your pc? Can you get a demo, and put it on your max settings. We can then compare a screenshot to 360?

Yep got it, I'll sort a ss out in a bit :)

Full size shots or cropped?
 
1280x7200vg.jpg


Thats full everything ingame, hdr enabled etc, 1280x720 (360 res) forced 8xS aa, 16x af, High quality, vsync enabled in Nvidia control panel.

I'll get some more when I get time later, if required :D

EDIT - same kinda shot ish, same settings but at 2560x1024

2560x10246to.jpg


Probably looks stretched as it is spanned across 2 19" monitors, may look more in proportion on a widescreen monitor.
 
Probably looks stretched as it is spanned across 2 19" monitors, may look more in proportion on a widescreen monitor.[/QUOTE]

Thanks.

Now we just have to wait for 360 to get out and I'll post the same shot.

Then we can compare side by side.

Two 19inch monitors!! :smashin:

I have just ordered a Sparkle GF 7800GT 256MB DDR3, PCI-E, Dual DVI, VIVO.

To upgrade my ICE q 2 turbo 800xt.

I need dual DVI for my screens. Can't wait to see it on the sharp lcd.
 
is that cod2? graphics are knida disappointing, nowhere near as relistic as hl2 or fear, the trees look totally 2D
 
Those shots look dark - would it be possible to post some lighter shots?
 
Tejstar said:
Those shots look dark - would it be possible to post some lighter shots?

I'll do some later tonight :thumbsup:

Personally I think HL2 looks better aswell, but this isn't the best ss of cod2, it is an awesome looking game :)
 
Tigerblade said:
I'll do some later tonight :thumbsup:

Personally I think HL2 looks better aswell, but this isn't the best ss of cod2, it is an awesome looking game :)

From my 10 mins in Game I'd say it may look slightly better on your pc. till we get a screenshot of the 360 it's an unfair comparison however.

:confused:
 

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