ATI Multi-VPU offers high flexibility

ATi‘s answer to nVidia’s SLI-technology is closing in on its releasedate and the latest information on ATI’s Multi-VPU solution is on the flexibility. One of the bigger issues with nVidia’s SLI-technology is that you have to use practically identical graphic cards for it to work, something that can become quite a problem when you want to upgrade your system. At exactly this aspect ATi’s solution seems to be quite a lot better and according to CoolTechZone ATI’s technology will allow users to use not only cards from different manufacturers but also graphic circuits from different series.

 

“The source further revealed that ATI’s Multi-VPU technology would be superior to NVIDIA’s SLI, as it will not be limited to two of the same graphics adapters from the same manufacturer to ensure compatibility. ATI’s Multi-VPU technology will not be limited to this criterion, so you can have a card from Sapphire and another one from Powercolor and both will function perfectly fine in a Multi-VPU setup.

Additionally, the company’s Multi-VPU technology would be able to support multiple cores and still function well. For example, you would be able to operate both an X700 and an X850 card in a Multi-VPU setup if you would like. In other words, you should have three different categories for ATI’s “SLI”: low-end, mid-end and high-end. The combination of each of the three categories can be taken care of by various GPU cores.”

Everything isn’t as sweet as it may sound though as you have to make the different cards work together at the best possible performance. This is done by lowering the speed (frequency?) of the fastest card to the stock speeds of the slower card. It seems to be only the frequency of the core that is affected and how ATi will solve the difference in arcitecture (pipelines etc) is uncertain. What is certain though is that the drivers will handle all compatibility since you won’t require any form of physical connection between the graphic cards when using ATI’s Multi-VPU technology, as you have to with nVidia’s SLI-technology.

To us it seems that ATi is going for a wider SLI-solution that perhaps may not offer the same potential increase in performance but a wider spectrum of upgradeability. If this information is correct and what technology will end the winner remains to see.

Source: CoolTechZone