Just thought I'd chime back in since I started this post a couple of days ago. My main aim with this change of cards from 2x 560ti in SLI to the 680 was to hopefully gain some slight performance in FSX whilst atleast maintaining the performance of my SLI'd cards in BF3 etc as my top card in SLI had been running a little hotter than I would have liked in my confined case.

 

I've already sold one of my 560 Ti's and hopefully the other one will sell for me soon so I'm on the way to getting that 680. Hopefully the stocks are ok here in Australia once I have the cash ready.

 

Not sure of the implications to FSX but in this review comparing 2 SLI'd GTX 480's the key thing I could see was that the minimum frame rate when running the single 680 was higher than the minimum frame rate when running the 2 480's. Surely this would have to benefit and reduce any stuttering.

http://www.evga.com/forums/tm.aspx?m=1511766&mpage=1

 

Whilst I'm certainly no expert and this isn't necessarily my opinion, I've also read elsewhere on a couple of sites/forums (cant remember exactly where), that the GTX 680 isn't currently saturating the PCIE2.0 bus providing your running at x16 so that PCIE3.0 really shouldn't factor in performance wise for a single card, but if you're running in SLI and this drops down to x8 then you may notice a difference.

 

Personally, when I get my card it will be runing on PCIE2.0 at x16 for the time being.

it has been said over and over: FSX does not make use of dual SLI / GPU's, save that GTX 680 money for higher clock speed and better CPUs instead. for anyone interested check the facts instead of "believing" in magic PCI 3.0 medicine:

 

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5699/nvidia-geforce-gtx-680-review/

For me the card won't be purely for FSX so I'm happy to spend the money on it.

 

On another note, as far was warranty from ASUS, MSI, EVGA, PNY. What's are peoples opinions/experiences with these?

 

I'm probably looking at going EVGA or ASUS but just wondering what others think.

for anyone interested check the facts instead of "believing" in magic PCI 3.0 medicine:

 

http://www.anandtech...gtx-680-review/

 

Hi fly_like_an_eagle,

 

looking at your previous posts i don't really get your point regarding PCI 3.0 performance.

 

First of all, test at anandtech does mean / prove nothing. Have you noticed their testbed setup - x79 chipset - and since Sandy Bridge E doesn't support PCI E 3.0, you can't say nothing about its performance impact (SAAB 340 already quoted that too).

 

All you can say now is that gtx 680 is faster than gtx 580 in modern games - both at PCI E 2.0.

 

Like Barnstormer1 said, FSX is different story.

 

We don't know yet, what kind of performance we can expect from PCIE 3.0 vs. PCIE 2.0 - we have to wait for Ivy Bridge and Z77 chipset - and it's at least a month ahead.

 

Second thing we all have to keep in mind, is that we also don't know how (if at all) change in gfx card architecture will influence FSX performance. GTX 680 is totally different than GTX 580 - tripled number of Stream Processors, doubled number of Texture Units, higher Core and Memory Clock - in favour of GTX 680, BUT (there is always one, isn't it?) GTX 680 has smaller Memory Bus Width and number of ROP. So, without decent tests in FSX, you can't state what kind of performance we can expect / get.

 

Once again, we must pe patient and have to wait for Ivy Bridge and Z77 chipset.

 

Anyway, personally i will jump in Ivy B and GTX680 bandwagon as i'm leaning toward prepar3d. Ver. 1.3 looks really good and people at Lockheed Martin listen to community and adress step by step issues we got with original FSX. What's also important, more and more dewelopers get their products comaptible with prepar3d and there is a new price list.

 

cheers, P.

Hi fly_like_an_eagle,

 

looking at your previous posts i don't really get your point regarding PCI 3.0 performance.

 

First of all, test at anandtech does mean / prove nothing. Have you noticed their testbed setup - x79 chipset - and since Sandy Bridge E doesn't support PCI E 3.0, you can't say nothing about its performance impact (SAAB 340 already quoted that too).

 

All you can say now is that gtx 680 is faster than gtx 580 in modern games - both at PCI E 2.0.

 

Not true Piotrek. SB-E is fully PCIe 3.0 compatible. The early news got me confused too, but it is.

 

Like Barnstormer1 said, FSX is different story.

 

We don't know yet, what kind of performance we can expect from PCIE 3.0 vs. PCIE 2.0 - we have to wait for Ivy Bridge and Z77 chipset - and it's at least a month ahead.

 

Second thing we all have to keep in mind, is that we also don't know how (if at all) change in gfx card architecture will influence FSX performance. GTX 680 is totally different than GTX 580 - tripled number of Stream Processors, doubled number of Texture Units, higher Core and Memory Clock - in favour of GTX 680, BUT (there is always one, isn't it?) GTX 680 has smaller Memory Bus Width and number of ROP. So, without decent tests in FSX, you can't state what kind of performance we can expect / get.

 

Once again, we must pe patient and have to wait for Ivy Bridge and Z77 chipset.

 

Anyway, personally i will jump in Ivy B and GTX680 bandwagon as i'm leaning toward prepar3d. Ver. 1.3 looks really good and people at Lockheed Martin listen to community and adress step by step issues we got with original FSX. What's also important, more and more dewelopers get their products comaptible with prepar3d and there is a new price list.

 

cheers, P.

 

But then again, the GTX680 shader clock runs now at half the speed, and it has less ROps than a GTX580 (32 vs 48). Memory bandwidth is pretty much the same

My reading is that TXAA needs to be coded into each game.

So FSX misses out again.

 

gb.

My reading is that TXAA needs to be coded into each game.

So FSX misses out again.

 

gb.

 

Correct. Confirmed by Timothy Lottes himself in his blog

I was curious if any one has tested the GTX680 with FSX in surround yet? What kind of fps drop are we seeing going from one screen to three?

Not true Piotrek. SB-E is fully PCIe 3.0 compatible. The early news got me confused too, but it is.

 

 

 

But then again, the GTX680 shader clock runs now at half the speed, and it has less ROps than a GTX580 (32 vs 48). Memory bandwidth is pretty much the same

 

Hi Dazz,

 

got to that information too, but there is a still a lot of confusion with X79 and PCI-E 3.0 support - I'm following a thread regarding this matter on computer forum and so far, you can use PCI-E 3.0 on X79 but have to tweak it / force it to work properly.

 

Initial reports show significant improvement over PCI-E 2.0 in Battlefield 3 - but again, it's too early to say we can state it's 100 % true and it's not FSX. Again, we have to wait ...

 

Any way, sorry if I got someone confused or someone felt offended by my post.

 

greets, Peter

Any way, sorry if I got someone confused or someone felt offended by my post.

 

I am indeed (perpetually, some might say) confused, and very occassionally offended, but I see nothing in your post that would do either.

 

Kind regards,

Well my GTX 680 got delivered to work today so I can't wait to get home to try it out.

 

It actually worked out cheaper for me to order it online from the US than it was to buy at a store here in Australia.

 

Hopefully I'll see a performance increase in FSX, but if not I'll still be happy to go from an SLI system to one with a single powerful graphics card which is going to offer me the same if not better performance.

Ah, so you had a sent to work so your wife won't know you've just spent $500.00 on a videocard, eh? Don't worry bro...done it and know exactly how you feel!...lol Let us know how it works out in FSX.

 

RH

Lol. Well I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who does that! haha

 

Luckily I also have 2 PC stores close to work in case I'm in need of supplies. lol

 

Didn't get a chance to install and test it last night so hopefully tonight will be the night.

We men are all alike...lol! Let us know your results. Take Care

 

RH

Well I still haven't had a chance to test FSX but I did install the card and do a quick run of BF3. I have to say I was impressed. Compared to my SLI'd GTX 560 Ti's it was a much smoother experience. With the SLI setup I'd get stutters even though fps were high.

 

I should have time this weekend to test out FSX and report my findings. Now I'm wondering what the benefit of the 4GB model of the 680 would be. lol. (What can I say, I like new shiny toys haha). Since I'm only running one monitor at 1920x1080 I'm guessing it wouldn't really be much benefit to me though.