EVGA goes Quad-SLI

Possibly in response to ASUS' Mars card, EVGA has introduced the world's first 4-way (quad-SLI), GeForce GTX 285 graphics card, the GTX 285 Classified. Quad-SLI allows the power of four GT200 chips to be bundled. Not every motherboard is compatible with four high-end graphics cards, let alone the required bandwidth. EVGA seems to have taken care of that as well and simultaneously introduced its new X58 Classified 4-Way SLI Edition motherboard.

It's clear that EVGA's latest creation isn't meant for the casual user. During the Motor City Overclock event, famous overclockers Shamino and k|ngp|n worked their way with the configuration, breaking the 3DMark Vantage world record in all four categories.

The specifications of EVGA's X58 Classified 4-Way SLI Edition motherboard are quite similar to the company's 'regular' X58 Classified. The PCI-Express x1 and PCI expansion slot have been replaced by three additional PCI-Express 2.0 x16 slots. To provide enough bandwidth for all those graphics cards, it's likely that EVGA has added two additional NF200 chips, though that hasn't been confirmed yet. Given its X58 chipset, there's the conventional LGA1366 socket for Intel's Core i7 processors, as well as six DDR3 memory slots. An ICH10R southbridge provides the board's connectivity and a large cooling construction keeps the temperatures low. EVGA's new X58 motherboard has dimensions of 345 x 264 mm, which means it's an XL-ATX form factor board that won't fit in every chassis.

The GTX 285 Classified has also been specially designed for the demanding user. Though EVGA has kept the reference clock frequencies and 1 GB of GDDR3 memory, the company did implement a digital 8-phase power design, powered by three 6-pin PCI-Express connectors. There's also an X-Cool switch for extreme overclocking, a connector for EVGA's EVbot overclocking gadget, and several contact points to read voltages from.

As of yet, both products can only be pre-ordered from EVGA. They don't come cheap however; the graphics card and motherboard bear respective pricetags of US $379,99 and $449,99

Tags: corei7 ddr3 overclocking sli x58 socket-1366 3dmark

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