4 9800GTX2? What mobo can run four of those suckers? Thought the most you could run was 2, which was like running 4 GPUs since each card has 2 dies onboard.

How comes the GTX SLI (x3) configuration sucks so badly? And i'm really surprised at the performance comparison between the 8800GT SLI and 9800GTX SLI, when there's such a huge price gap between them.

I just have one 8800GT, but it's got 1 GB DDR3, and it run everything pretty freaking sweet.

I've never played Crysis though. I only do video editing.

Where is my 8800GTX?

What about the 512mb 8800GTS single and SLI configurations? From what I've seen and personally experienced, they're not only better than the 8800 GT and GT SLI configurations, but when you SLI them they are actually better than the 9800GX2. Which by my estimates would put it close to the number 2 spot, performance-wise, on this list for under $600. Easily the best bang for your buck.

SLIx3 Probably sucks because of the drivers. Gotta love how products that barely work correctly are rushed to market these days.

@mikecoscia: I'm pretty certain the x4 means two cards running two GPUs each, ie x4 SLI.

The quad GX2 SLI setup only gets in between 35 and 40 FPS? WTF?

Poor x3 and x4 Sli performance (relatively speaking) is generally due to games not being optimised for it. We've only just gotten round to seing the base Sli give benefits :)

At LONG FUCKING LAST a price-performance graph. I don't know what's wrong with all the publishers who just show a list of cards sorted by performance, draw a bar by each name and call it a 'graph'.

and again the 8800gt shows that it is STILL the best bang for buck card

so... $1000 gains me 10FPS?

screw crysis.

@sharpfang: Totally agree. Out of all the computer gear I find selecting a new video card the most exasperating out of all of them.

@mikecoscia: when they reffer in (x4) they do mean the cores in the setup since the 9800 GX2 has two cores the setup has two video cards... btw, Crysis has to render all does frames per sec: the 9800 GX2 is no big deal for me the only thing is the Price tag, just wait on the teraflop that Nvidia is bringing then do sum benchmarking.

@lilaliendog: in single card config yes. i think the 9600gt in sli is probably the best deal as far as price / performance, which makes me glad that is what i chose for the rig i built last month.

I'm still so confused by this game, WTF kind of computer did they write it on when today's cards can't pull out a full 60 fps.

Okay, my disclaimer is that I haven't read the original article, but with the graph showing this many different cards bunched together so closely in performance, it just screams out that the tests were CPU bound. If that's the case, this graph is worthless for choosing a video card.

"On our 1 GHz Celeron platform, no video card managed better than 10 fps in Crysis. These cards must all be equal in performance!" LOL.

DANG...most of these cost more than a console...no wonder I can't even get close to the pc game world....I got an 8600 for zoo tycoon and the sims. ;)

Yeah, I too feel the graph is incomplete. I think the best "bang for the buck" is a 2x 8800 GTS 512Mb (g92)SLI configuration.

Shader performance and price seem to be the best mix there.

I mean "half" of these.... :P

Kinda reminds me of the Forrester Wave or Gartner Magic Quadrant. Cool.

@Daniel_Voegelin: I just got a 512mb 8800GTS for my latest upgrade project. I would have liked to know where it fits on this graph too.

"The Tech Report has assembled a very straightforward bang-for-your-buck video card graph." ...for really expensive video cards.

Only 4 sub-$200 cards?! How about a graph like this for cards ranging from $0-$200 ONLY. I think that's where the majority of the "real world" lives anyway. I'm actually looking at the 8600GTS 256MB. Would be interesting to see that vs. the 8600 GTS 512MB and the others. Personally I'm not going to spend anywhere near the price that most of these cards are going for. Where's the love for the bargain hunters?

@ninjamurf: bargain hunters don't play crysis

the test is using a 2.93ghz dual core cpu, no OC btw

This cake (chart) is a lie!

@ninjamurf: I agree. I picked up my card for just a hair over $200 after a mail-in rebate. I'm just not comfortable spending more that around $200 for a video card.

How do I graph my 6600 GT on there?

they all work in the MacBook Pro

HAHAHAHAHAH

@tonyn84: A Cray supercomputer.

"the top performer can't even break 40 frames per second"

jeeze guys, thats already almost twice the frame rate of theatrical release motion pictures. how much more do you need for a computer game?!

8800gt sli ftw

The NVidia boards are going CRAZY, though, with Vista driver issues. NVidia has totally fallen asleep at the wheel, and there are many of us considering chunking our cards for ATI cards that will actually work with Vista, an operating system that NVidia has ignored.

@matto: But it's low for video card benchmarks. 24fps is not the gaming sweet spot.

i have 2 8600gts 256mb sli'd and crysis will play on high, but it is choppy
on medium its plays smooth as butta

I use an 8800 GT Alpha and it runs World of Warcaft in 1600x1200 at 60fps no matter what I do with all video options maxed out. If you need to do more than that, you're a madman.

The rule of thumb is buying more video card than you need if you upgrade yourself, if you buy a whole new system that's prebuilt, then don't upgrade video, just wait for your next system.
Also if you go SLI, you're in for a much more complicated system than with one very powerful card. Also they pair or quad of them will be obsolete for an even bigger loss someday.

Just get one powerful single card without these SLI reindeer games and compatibility issues and be done with it. One top end card that costs the same as two SLI versions will cost a few frames per second you'll never notice, and work with every game instead of chasing down titles to take advantage of it and the rest suffers.

More isn't better, better is better. Compatible and simple is better.

@Hello_Newman: Dude, WoW is hardly pushing the limits of graphical tech.

The 8800GT and 8800GT SLi really cleaned up here, no contest.