my friend has asked me to build him a pc he is looking to spend alot £1500 he wants to play games on a dual monitor setup but im not sure about the power of the gpu needed the gtx 770 and 780 would come in budget or should i use a sli configuration
What's he using the second monitor for? From my experience it's 1 or 3 monitors 2 is just weird, for example FPS games you don't get crosshair you're looking at the Bezel.
Anyway single card is most reliable and either card will do. Sli would be required for 3 monitors for the smoother experience.
770 with 4GB or 780.
or you could just use 1 AMD Radeon HD card which can connect upto 3 monitors.
OP try these cards out:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121716
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127732
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121671
Nvidia cards can also connect 3 displays. But as for dual monitor gaming? I hardly see the point in this at all as I have already done it.
If your friend games on a single monitor, but has a second monitor for browsing the web, the second monitor will not take up any resources. Maybe a little bit of RAM, but nothing from the GPU.
Just grab the GTX 770.
The 780 is wayyyy too much card for a couple of 1080p displays.