nVidia - 2x GTX295 vs 3x GTX285

[Aberto]

hi,
i am looking for video card options are 3 GTX 285's in TRI SLI vs 2X GTX295's in Quad SLI. I know the 3x will be the more costly option by a bit but I am more concerned by which will perfrom best at 1920 X 1200 and 2560 x 1600 resolution.Any recommendations and suggestions are appreciated.Thanks in advance for your help.

[Team Leader]

This are difference between 3x GTX285 --- 2x GTX295

3DMark Vantage, Performance:

32473 --- 30297

3dmark Vantage, Extreme:

16287 --- 15139

Crysis Warhead, 1920x1200, fps AVG

--- 56 fps 58 fps

Crysis Warhead, 2560x1500, AVG fps

--- 42 fps 56 fps (!)

Far Cry 2, 1920x1200, AVG fps

--- 161 fps 168 fps

Far Cry 2, 2560x1600, AVG fps

--- 146 fps 145 fps

Stalker Clear Sky, 1920x1200, fps AVG

--- 78 fps 73 fps

Stalker Clear Sky, 2560x1600, AVG fps

--- 50 fps 55 fps

High AA / AF test, Far Cry 2, 1920x1200, 8xAA, AVG fps

--- 135 fps 130 fps

3DMark Vantage Extreme

~ ~ 43% --- 65%

Stalker CS, 1920x1200, fps AVG

~ ~ 41% --- 46%

Stalker CS, 2560x1600, AVG fps

~ ~ 53% --- 55%

Conclusion:

3x GTX285 is preferable 2x GTX295!

Advantages:

1.) similar performance, because SLi Quad badly scaled, often is 3x faster GTX285
2) There are less MR to be expected since there are only 3 GPUs
3) More Ram

Disadvantages:

1.) currently pay a little more
2) For air cooling, 6 chassis slots needed (Quad: 4)
2.) 3 PCI Express slots are needed (Quad: 2), therefore Mobo selection smaller, almost always no extra physics card longer possible

Future speculation:

Unlicensed benefits by Quad-SLI, because drivers could possibly begin the 4th Better use of GPU

What is faster in the end, will depend on:

1) the drivers

2) the Overclocking potential:

The base of 285 cycles are 12%, 18% and> 20% higher than the base of 295 cycles!


At the core may also include a tool 295 with over 700, which means The 285 would have 850 to keep the distance between them.

It may therefore well be that the RELATIVE overclocking the GTX295 could be better than the RELATIVE overclocking the GTX285, which means that the above scores could be even more closer and / or a slight plus for Quad-SLi could arise.

Much will be the two solutions do not, this much is clear.

[kiLLer]

Here I have a scaling test in 3DMark2006, Pixel Shaders, 1920x1200, 8xAA, 16xAF:
1 GPU: 313 fps
2 GPU: 540 fps (= +72%, +100% at best -> Rate: 72% of ideal)
3 GPU: 744 fps (= +37%, +50% at best -> Rate: 74% of ideal)
4 GPU: 911 fps (= +22%, +33% at best -> Rate: 67% of ideal)

At the end, of course not 400% out and you see that more cores always get less. The 4th core stinks a bit, which probably is also the problem a little bit of quad-SLI is ...