Overall Thoughts and Conclusion

As a Single GPU: The Geforce GTX 295 is an interesting piece of hardware. Much of its performance can be gotten the same way as SLIing 2 Geforce GTX 260s or 2 Geforce GTX 280s. However that doesn't make it a bad card. This opens the performance level of dual Geforce GTX 260's too the masses without SLI motherboards or the newest intel platform. I am very happy to see the inclusion of the full GTX 280 shader and TMU's. This will allow for the GTX 295 to stay competitive as the more shader intensive games come out. Not to mention PhysX and CUDA acceleration. As seen in some tests the GTX 295 even as a single board is only marginally slower than a Geforce GTX 280. Onto the issue of slower memory bus and ROPS. After taking a close look at the performance differences between the Geforce GTX 280 SLI and Geforce GTX 295. The huge ROP/Bandwidth deficit doesn't seem to be effecting performance that much. The performance difference is very small. I do not believe that bandwidth is a limiting factor in the GT200 design. At least not at these levels of performance. However memory amount does have 128 megs cut off compared to Nvidia's old high end offering. For the most part this should be a non issue to most users. However the rougher settings at 2560x1600 with 8x multisampling will undoubtedly notice performance drops offs compared to a 280 SLI setup. . At said resolution 8x or 16x CSAA might prove a better experience. The final point to consider is that this "is" a multi GPU setup. So it will have some of the same flaws and benefits inherited by all multi GPU setups. For those who don't want to deal with SLI. A single GTX 285 might be more up your alley. More on this card later..

As Quad SLI Multi GPU: Quad SLI is as always a high end Niche product. However in comparison to 3 Way SLI. It is far easier to set up and much friendlier on your power and heat management. That being said. Those with dual GTX 280's looking to boost their performance might just consider buying another 280 card. As the performance differences here wont be enormous. The downside to this upgrade path is the heat and power requirements compared to the GTX 295 and will likely lag behind performance slightly. For those who just want to use 2 PCIE slots. Two Geforce GTX 295 cards are extremely fast and are much easier to manage than your typical 3 way SLI setup. For those buying Quad SLI please keep in mind your performance results will vary greatly on the GPU load. Unless you are trying to achieve the best framerates at the higher IQ settings or using a super high res monitor. You will not see the performance benefits right away. Before committing to Quad SLI. Make sure you understand what games you currently play and how GPU limited you actually are. Despite being easier to setup. Quad SLI is just like 3 way SLI in regards to your scaling being very dependent on your current bottleneck.

Pros

- Very Fast Single Slot Multi GPU product
- Can be Quad SLI'd easily for super high end performance
- Quiet in 2D mode. And very low power usage while browsing desktop or watching DVDs.
- Uses same profiles as a normal SLI setup. Scaling should work well dependent on how GPU you limited you are

Cons

- Under extreme load it can be a little louder than your typical single GPU. Comparable to 9800GX2
- 896 megs of memory compared to 1 gig can be a bottleneck under certain extreme circumstances such as 2560x1600 with 8x Multisampling.

Extra Comments: I know the resolutions I tested were not exactly "The best" in the industry. And I'm well aware of this. As such I strongly urge people to look at other websites doing tests on these resolutions as well. The reason I couldn't provide them is my HDTV is having serious compatibility issues with most games under DirectX 10. This is a problem I am looking into but I simply could not come up with an effective workaround in the mean time. I do apologize for this but please keep in mind that I do what I can with what I have. And I dont get paid big money for these previews so a big new shiny monitor just wasn't in the budget.

Chris