How is SLI/Crossfire These Days?

[Veyne]

Considering building a new system soon, and I've always shied away from SLI (which is what I'll refer to it as from here on out due to my preference of Nvidia cards). I recall the years of bugginess and instability that followed after their initial releases into market. As a single-monitor user, would I gain any benefit from having a dual card setup over a single card setup? Is SLI stable and reliable these days? Would it be worth it to grab a second card? I'd mostly use it for gaming, though I do occasionally do some 3D work, but nothing terribly demanding. I don't even game that much anymore, but when I do, I want my system to run as close to flawlessly as possible.

[Butler to Baby Sloths]

If you can buy a single, more powerful card instead of two less powerful cards, then get the single card.

[Faithh]

If you're buying 2x 680's, you'll be better off with a titan tbh. It's coming this thursday out for 800eur or 900$..

[hiragana]

If you want the best stability and play on a single monitor id just get 1 card personally.

[Outofmana]

The problem still is is that a 2nd card won't give you anymore near a 100% increase, will drain way more power, will bring more heat into the system etc etc but I guess you know all that. If you want the best of the best, go ahead and go with 2x 690s or whatever "the best" is now. But if you are under that range and say you go for a 300 E card, 2x a 150 Euro card will not be better than a single good 300E card. I would just buy a way better single card, especially as a single screen gamer.

[Cyanotical]

In many games SLI has a near 100% scaling on the second card, with diminishing returns on the third and fourth cards, so with two cards it works pretty well and rarely has any issues anymore

Crossfire on the otherhand is not as refined, and unless you want to benchmark, should be avoided if you want a hassle free system

[Faithh]

90% scaling is in my eyes even 100%