Is SLI worth it for graphic cards? And is ATI x1650PRO PCI-E 512MB good for 129.99?
System Info:
2GB RAM
Windows Vista Home PRemium
Dual Core 2 @ 1.8 Ghz
Answers:
Thats significantly overpriced(a 7600/8600 gt can be had for less and significantly outperform it) and 512 mb is useless on that kind of graphics card and its overkill for San Andreas SLI isn't really that good as buying 1 high end graphics card and a non SLI mother board is cheaper and a fair amount faster in most cases and they have compatibility problems on some games and is only useful if the graphics cards price has significantly lessened and serves as a upgrade.
Bus speed seems to not effect a graphics card that much as in most cases PCI-E 4x performs as well as 16x in mid to low end graphics cards.
Its effectively the same argument for Dual Core processing: You can run much more simultaneously. The SLi bridge also means the 2 cards dont have to spam the Motherboard bus to communicate with eachother, and effectively they will have a faster response time than that of a single card, in terms of maximum Bus Speed - cos instead of 1 card that can send 800Mhz of Bus data, you have 2 cards that can send 1600Mhz. This actual value will vary though Dependant on the system configuration.
You got a good machine either way. And yes I'd consider that a good price for that 512 card.
Keep in mind ATi also has a SLi equivalent called Crossfire ;)
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