(2)8800GT SLI Vs 9800?

Planning on building a new rig and need to decide on the latest and greatest video cards. I've read a lot saying that it's better to just get one great card and avoid the hassles of SLI.
What do you guys think?

Thats a true point. Going with one card also opens up your motherboard choices, you can jump onto a Intel chipset bandwagon. If you go with a SLI motherboard with the single card, it saves for future expanision.

So go 9800, and possibly SLI later when price drops?

yes but make sure to take a nvidia chipset based motherboard for sli compatibilty. do you plan on overclocking? because intels chipsets are way better overclockers.

my opinion on sli is that; alot of games are not supporting it very much and the drivers are begining to get in the right path but their not quite there. the performance are far from being doubled. So at this moment sli is just a power heating, not very much performing way to go... maybe in a year or so, drivers will get mature enough and more games will realy support it fully. but as it is now you wont see much benifit from it.

That was very true in the past up to the 680i chipset but the nvidia chipset has come along way with the 780i/790i chipsets.

If you look around the "extreme Ocing" forums you will see people
running 5.7GHz+ chips in them. (Quads on top of that )

Current Nvidia chipsets are now in the realm of competing "Pi" boards with Intel chipsets.

case in point...

My Q9450 on a
DFI LT P35 3200MHz OCCT stable-3500MHz max
Asus Maximus Formula 3500MHz OCCT stable-3800MHz max
Asus P5K Deluxe 3300MHz OCCT Stable-3450MHz max
Xfx 780i 3800MHz OCCT stable-4100MHz max

I was also running an E8400 at 550+FSB on that board.


edit*

Check out how dinos22 did with his E8500 on a nvidia chipset--------------------------------------------->nvidia>intel

so you are saying that nvidia is now a close competitor? is it true even compared againts the x38 and x48?

i heard much saying that i780 was still behind intel as of overclocking. i unfortunetly do not have the hardware to test so i was basing my statement from others. but tanks to point it out

Personally I would go for the 8800GT SLI set up........if I was going for a 2 card system.
The thing I don't like about the GX 2 is,if 1 card srews up your out a comp while RMAing.
Not to mention all games won't even recognize SLI or Crossfire

Looking here
8800GT SLI vs 9800 GX 2
The performance gain is not all that great...in some games yes and some no.
Just my 2 cents

The GX2 is so far ahead of the curve right now imo and unless you have a monitor that carries a very high resolution there is no need for it.

Heck I have a GTS320 SLI setup that still kicks ass.

@Finch

Intel is still greater than nvidia imo but nvidia has made leaps and bounds since their last chipset.

I would write more but I am on the side of a road now somewhere in Savannah and the wifi is hanging on for dear life...

I think I'm going to end up with a 9800 GTX, and a 780i or 750i mobo. Then in a few years I can upgrade to SLI 9800s for cheap. Then if the technology takes off I could even tri SLI, or if that still isn't really supported well I can just upgrade a series.

My only question now is whether to get the 790i mobo so I can have ddr3. But from what I've read that's a waste. So either 780i or 750.