Installing SLI:

   So here I am. Two 7800GT's. A fully SLI-capable ASUS A8N-SLI Motherboard. There's nothing left to buy. It's time to get serious and see how those claims from Nvidia stack up for "easily transform your system from one card to dual SLI cards".

    My new system was running perfectly with the one XFX 7800GT. I mean perfect. I was having a blast tearing it up in 1680x1050 in HL2, Running Quake 4 in 1024, and F.E.A.R in 1152x864. (Really bothers me neither game has 1680x1050 resolutions...wtf!)

   Anyway, As with any new hardware installation on a perfectly good system, you just hope that it doesn't screw something up. I know I do anyway.

   However before I could get to the worrying stage, I had to go ahead and prepare for installation. I needed to gather not only to the two new cards, but also some required accessories in order to make the two 7800GT's play nice together once installed.

   It certainly wouldn't do much good to install $800 worth of graphics cards and not even realize I was only utilizing one of them because of incorrect installation.

   I dug out my ASUS A8N-SLI Premium Motherboard box (with the seemingly 15,000 extra cables and gadgets inside!) and located the included SLI Connector Bridge and the PCI SLI Bridge Brace. These are MANDATORY items if you're looking to go SLI in your system.  

   Now that I've got the required pieces, let's take a look at where the twin video cards are going to be installed on the motherboard. If you're not sure if you're motherboard is SLI compatible, you can look for a similiar looking dual PCI-e setup on your particular motherboard. Also it would be imperative to check your motherboard manufacturers homepage for supported features.

   Installing the two video cards is physically just as easy as installing one, or at least it should be and was for me. My particular motherboard had plenty of room all around for installation. One thing to note though, and this is the case with my setup, getting at the DDR memory once the first video card is installed is impossible. Meaning the video card, when installed, sits in such a position to effectively lock the DDR brackets in the upright position. It's not a big deal, but remember to install your memory first before installing these beasts (in most situations  anyway I'd imagine).  

Two 7800GT's Installed	SLI Bridge Installed
SLI PCI Bracket Installed	Ready to Run

    Ok here I have the two XFX 7800GT's installed. Once the cards are installed, installing the SLI bridge is as easy as lining it up and pushing it gently on to the two SLI connections (one on each card). This bridge ensure that both cards work together, so to speak. It's really only half the process as the other half is software based. However without this SLI bridge, no amount of software will make them work correctly. I'll get into the software here shortly.