Editing Scalable Link Interface (section)

==Caveats==
* Not all motherboards with multiple PCI-Express x16 slots support SLI. On August 10, 2009, Nvidia announced that Intel and other leading motherboard manufacturers including ASUS, EVGA, Gigabyte and MSI have all licensed Nvidia SLI technology for inclusion on their [[Intel P55|Intel P55 Express Chipset]]-based motherboards designed for the upcoming Intel Core i7 and i5 processor in the [[LGA 1156]] socket.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.nvidia.com/object/io_1249876351744.html |title=NVIDIA SLI Technology Now Licensed For INTEL Core I7 And Core I5 Platforms}}</ref> Older motherboards using the P55's predecessors [[Intel P35]] or [[Intel P45]] do not support SLI.<br /> Recent motherboards as of October 2017 that support it are Intel's Z and X series chipsets (Z68, Z77, Z87, Z97, Z170, Z270, Z370, X79, X99 and X299) along with AMD's 990FX, X370 and X399 chipsets.<ref name="Board-Support">{{cite web | url=http://www.geforce.com/hardware/technology/sli/motherboards?field_manufacturer_value=&field_socket_type_value=All&field_sli_support_value=All| title=Motherboards | access-date=2016-05-16 | work=NVIDIA}}</ref> Earlier chipsets, such as the [[Intel X58]], could support 2-way SLI over 16 lane PCI-e.  In order for motherboards of that generation to support more than two GPUs they were required to implement Nvidia [[nForce]] chipsets.
* In an SLI configuration, cards can be of mixed manufacturers, card model names, BIOS revisions or clock speeds. However, they must be of the same GPU series (e.g., 8600, 8800) and GPU model name (e.g., GT, GTS, GTX).<ref name="FAQ">{{cite web | url=http://www.slizone.com/page/slizone_faq.html#c3 | title=SLI FAQs | access-date=2008-12-04 | work=NVIDIA}}</ref> There are rare exceptions for "mixed SLI" configurations on some cards that only have a matching core codename (e.g., G70, G73, G80, etc.), but this is otherwise not possible, and only happens when two matched cards differ only very slightly, an example being a differing amount of video memory, stream processors, or clockspeed.  In this case, the slower/lesser card becomes dominant, and the other card matches. Another exception is the GTS 250, which can be paired with the 9800 GTX+, as the GTS 250 GPU is a rebadged 9800 GTX+ GPU.
* In cases where two cards are not identical, the faster card – or the card with more memory - will run at the speed of the slower card or disable its additional memory. (Note that while the FAQ still claims different memory size support, the support has been removed since revision 100.xx of Nvidia's Forceware driver suite.)<ref name="FAQ" />
* SLI does not always give a performance benefit – in some extreme cases, it can lower the [[frame rate]] due to the particulars of an application's coding.<ref>{{cite news | title=Performance Comparison Between Single Configurations And SLI Setups | work=[[Tom's Hardware]] | url=http://www.tomshardware.com/2005/12/02/vga_charts_viii/page20.html | first=Tino | last=Kreiss |author2=Töpelt, Bert |author3=Schuhmann, Daniel | date=2005-12-02 | access-date=2007-06-01}}</ref> This is also true for AMD's [[AMD CrossFireX|CrossFire]], as the problem is inherent in multi-GPU systems. This is often witnessed when running an application at low resolutions.
* [[Analog television#Vertical_synchronization|Vsync]] + [[Triple buffering]] is not supported in some cases in SLI AFR mode.
* Users having a Hybrid SLI setup must manually change modes between ''HybridPower'' and ''GeForce Boost'', while automatically changing mode will not be available until future updates become available. Hybrid SLI supports only single link DVI at 1920×1200 screen resolution.<ref>[http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/01/22/NVIDIA_hybrid_sli_preview_part_2/2 Bit-Tech interview] (page 2), retrieved January 23, 2008</ref>
* When using SLI with [[Alternate Frame Rendering|AFR]], the subjective framerate can often be lower than the framerate reported by benchmarking applications, and may even be poorer than the framerate of its single-GPU equivalent. This phenomenon is known as [[micro stuttering]] and also applies to CrossFire since it is inherent to multi-GPU configurations.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.pcgameshardware.com/aid,631668 |title=Video proof: Micro stuttering may destroy the performance gains from current multi GPU technologies |author=Raffael Vötter |date=2008-02-08 |publisher=PC Games Hardware Online |access-date=2009-11-03 }}</ref>
*With the new RTX 20xx series of graphics cards as launched in 2018 the interconnect is no longer SLI HB. These newer cards are using [[NVLink]] as its communication base and require either a three-slot-long or four-slot-long NVLink bridge - reasoned partially by thermal considerations and by socket availability. As of now only two GPU cards can be connected with NVLink; three-way, four-way and quad are not possible using NVLink bridges even if NVLink by principle is a very versatile interface.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|url=https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/graphics-cards/rtx-2080/|title=NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Founders Edition Graphics Card|website=NVIDIA|language=en-us|access-date=2018-08-31}}</ref>
* As of the GeForce RTX 3000-series, SLI has been effectively replaced with [[NVLink]].<ref name=rtx3000>{{Cite web|url=https://techreportarticles.com/news/nvidia-drops-sli-support-for-its-geforce-rtx-3000-series-graphics-cards/|title=nVidia drops SLI support (multi-GPU) for its GeForce RTX 3000-Series graphics cards|date=6 Sep 2020|website=TechReportArticles}}</ref>