Native NVIDIA SLI Support Coming to AMD Platforms

The moment all of you all AMD fans some AMD fans have been waiting for has finally arrived: native SLI support on AMD platforms. Similar to the SLI transition that occurred on Intel platforms in 2008, the native likeness of AMD’s SLi support means that no special nForce chips will be required for SLI to function. All that will be needed is an AMD-based motherboard using  the 990FX, 990X or 970 chipset.

Though licensing fees are sure to be involved, the fact that no special chip will be required for SLI means that motherboard vendors can begin producing more natural solutions, rather than continue to use older nForce chips that have just been updated by name over the years, and were never “designed for” an AMD platform in particular. Given today’s super-fast PCI Express 2.0 buses, no such chip has been “required” for a while.

Up to this point, AMD hasn’t confirmed the naming scheme of the above-mentioned chipsets, but it can be assumed that those are set to accompany AMD’s launch of its Bulldozer processors, rumored to happen sometime around the middle of this year. While it would have been nice to see SLI support like this long ago, it’s at least nice to see things “native”, like it should be. Going forward, virtually any decent motherboard you purchase, either AMD or Intel-based, will support both CrossFireX and SLI. For consumers, this is a great thing.

So today, we are pleased to announce that SLI has been licensed to the world’s leading motherboard companies for integration onto their upcoming motherboards featuring AMD’s 990FX, 990X and 970 chipsets. ASUS, Gigabyte, ASRock, and MSI are among the first motherboard manufacturers to offer this new capability, with more coming on board shortly.