Tri-sli 250gts.

What performance should I expect with TRI-SLI 250GTS? I'm gaming at 1680x1050 and want to know if TRI-SLI will be enough to run Farcry2 , crysis and other gfx demanding games?

would it be similar performance to say a 5870?

i realise setups like 2x 260gtx would be a better option etc.. but I like to play around with stuff and see what i can get with what i have.. i already have a 250 GTS and it plays everything i want it too fine.. so really buying another 2 is just for me to have a laugh.. there actually isnt any game i "need" an upgrade for.. just wanna kinda pimp my system out and see how i go.. and wonderin what performance im lookin at.. but basicallly if 3 x 250gts isnt going to run everything at the present time on max I probably wont bother doing it..

thanks

 

well im gonna be honest i have no idea what kind of performance ur gonna get with GTS250 Tri-SLI but u wont see the diff in that resolution.If u want to go for that set up i suggest u to get a bigger monitor with a bigger resolution or borrow one from a friend if u can find one (i can suggest a relatively cheap monitor if u want lol). Most games with most cards will do great in 1680x1050 reso but only in higher resolutions (1920x1080 and above) u will really see what kind of performance u will get from that set up (and yes a gtx260 SLI sounds better )

 

when u say u wnt see a diff in my reso do u mean i wont see a difference from a single 250 GTS vs's SLI 250 GTS or TRI 250GTS?

surely id see a difference with SLI 250 GTS .. id assume that adding the 3rd would be where i wouldnt see as much as a improvement compared to a single and 2x

 

The whole you wont see a difference with SLI at lower rez is a myth.
You will see an improvement if the game is coded to take advantage of multiple GPUs.
FC2 you should see a 50-80% gain going from 1 to 2 GTS250s, and possibly another 25-40% going from 2 to 3 cards.
The problem is at lower rez you should get high FPS any way, so if you get 80fps with 1 card, going to two and getting 140fps is kinda silly, thus getting a third for 200fps is not worth the cost.
Alot of people like Vsync wich limits your FPS to your monitor refresh rate, and most have a max of 60Hz, so you would not see any difrence in FPS getting that 3rd card.(you would gain some fps on the min side I would think)

 

He most certainly will see a difference, you guys are freaking crazy. I play at 1680x1050 and there's no way I could get along with just one 5770, which is more than his GT 250, it just doesn't max most games out on its own.

 

Dual SLI would be sufficient. Spend that money on CPU/RAM (DDR3)

 

generally sli is enough for gamers, tri sli is for benchmarks. I have 2 295`s. I have 1 in each rig I own. I could put 2 in my main rig, but its a p45 m/b and dont know how stable the cracked drivers are for intel motherboards, plus I would need a new PSU, plus I game at 1680x1050 and 1 295 is plenty enough.

 

Heres some figures you can use:

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3658&p=6

Basically 1 GTS250 gives around 35.7 fps with 1680x1050 4xAA and Ultra High in Farcry 2

And the game seems to scale around 1.8x from 1 5770 to 2x5770.. so decent scaling atleast with xfire

So with 2xGTS250 you may right 50-55fps and with 3.. near 65-80fps would be my guess.

So yes its comparable to a 5870 which gets ~70fps

But if you're to choose between tri250 and a 5870 you'd be folish not to pick the 5870.. (unless its a cost issue where you already own 2x 250's or something.. but you could sell the old ones and buy a 5870 instead)

5870 is less power than 3x250's, less heat, less slots taken up in the pc, compatible with more games .. (the ones where sli bugs a bit) and future proof DX11

 

Takes up a lot of room compared to a single card so you can't fit a sound card plus a wifi card if you wanted to..
The cards don't scale too well between 2x and 3x but you should still get an increase in FPS in many games...
If possible I'd go with a 5870... They run about $375 and are really powerful...

 

I wouldnt do that. I'd buy a single gpu card with equivalent power. But with another 2 cards, if you want to do that, you could just crank up the anti aliasing in the control panel. Thats what you could get, fancy anti aliasing modes.

 

Definitely agree with that. If you can even get a 5850, its powerful for gaming and supports DX11...
Don't think the GTS 250s are the best bang for your buck right now.

 

Keeping in mind that im not really having performance issues atm and cant see why i would be anytime soon.. Im not considering buying an extra 2 cards for TRI sli for max performance.. Im thinking of doing it since its a new experience... havent done it before.. something to play around and configure.. some games / apps to test see how it all works etc..

the only reason I posted asking about a general idea of performance is because I dont want to be flat out playing Farcry 2 with TRI-SLI... I mean if I am going to test all this out I do want to do it with something half decent.. but seeing as though I have a Palit 250GTS E-Green 512mb .. it might just be better off to get a 260GTX and begin my TRI sli adventure with them?

would my 700W thermaltake PSU be enough? has 52 amps across two 12v rails.

 

Here's a comparison if you are still interested, in 3DMark Vantage I scored P8900 on a single GTS250 GPU, upgrading to 2X SLI I bumped up the score to P14.900. SLI really makes a big difference. BTW a 500W PSU won't run SLI, you'll need at least a 750W.