I ripped out SLI - sold one card already.

[rrohde]

Well, after a lot of consideration and testing DCS builts after builts, I came to the conclusion that SLI is not beneficial for DCS. Also, the additional heat and the restricted airflow of having two of these rather large cards was a consideration, and it did outweigh the non-existing benefit.

 

So, yesterday I ripped out one of my GTX 980s, put it on Craigslist, and sold it the same day.

 

My goal is to go with a single GTX 1080 later this year instead. Until then, I am very happy with my (now single again) GTX 980. I literally cannot tell any loss of performance whatsoever.

 

In hindsight, I should have never gone the SLI route to begin with... :doh:

 

Anybody else in the same boat right about now?

 

EDIT: Mods, if this is in the wrong forum section, please move this. Thanks.

Edited July 2, 2016 by rrohde

[agentdarnell]

I am not sure you will notice a difference going with a single 1080 over a single 980 just for dcs.

[rrohde]

I am not sure you will notice a difference going with a single 1080 over a single 980 just for dcs.

 

4GB of VRAM vs. 8GB of VRAM (1080) should be rather noticeable... no?

[Winston 60]

rrohde, I did the same last week. Removed my two 4gb GTX 680's in favor of a single GTX 980ti.

 

SLI development for DCS has been painfully slow with no news yet of a solution in the foreseeable future.

[agentdarnell]

4GB of VRAM vs. 8GB of VRAM (1080) should be rather noticeable... no?

Not if it does not use it. What resolution are you playing at? If not 4k or more you won't notice a difference and even then might not notice one.

[rrohde]

Not if it does not use it. What resolution are you playing at? If not 4k or more you won't notice a difference and even then might not notice one.

 

 

It's in my sig: 27" Acer Monitor (2560x1440). That's my current situation. :)

[Wrecking Crew]

I did the same last w/e. Removed the second GTX 980 Ti and get better clock freq and it runs comfortably cooler, and a solid 60 FPS. The second card went into my guest machine, replacing a GTX 680.

 

WC

[Art-J]

Not if it does not use it. What resolution are you playing at? If not 4k or more you won't notice a difference and even then might not notice one.

 

I'd say It certainly uses all of it in 2.0. In 1.5.4 might not.... until You install Starway's 8k version of his scenery :D. This sim is the most VRAM-hungry game I've ever played so far.

[NineLine]

SLI is still planned of course.

[TwilightZone]

4GB of VRAM vs. 8GB of VRAM (1080) should be rather noticeable... no?

yes, more vram is noticeable to be sure. agree, moving from 4 to 8 gb would be a big change for dcs......i had two 980 4gb cards and also went to a single card since sli does'nt work proper.....have a single titan-x 12gb (was able to make a good trade:D)........big difference in fps at 1440p.........probably move to the 1080 or some variant of it in the future

[Winston 60]

SLI is still planned of course.

Thanks SiThSpAwN, and so I'll get another card as soon as this breakthrough comes along! :yes:

[Sn8ke]

I've done numerous test. The only difference you will notice NOT using SLi is you will loose about 7-12 FPS.

[BravoFoxTrt]

I have 2 Radeon MSI R9 280's (cross fire), and like the OP, if I go XFire I get Light flickering and loss of fps. 2 or more Vid. Cards doesnt work with DCS, its a shame but I have high fps with only one vid card working.

 

Sith, is Cross Fire going to work eventually??

[boedha68]

I did it last year.allready happy for a year.

[AtaliaA1]

yes, more vram is noticeable to be sure. agree, moving from 4 to 8 gb would be a big change for dcs......i had two 980 4gb cards and also went to a single card since sli does'nt work proper.....have a single titan-x 12gb (was able to make a good trade:D)........big difference in fps at 1440p.........probably move to the 1080 or some variant of it in the future

 

 

Interesting discussion. How much does the CUDA cores play in the difference would be good to know.

 

It is possible to test isn't it? 2048 and 3072 should make some difference I would think.

 

Has the effectiveness of CUDA been looked at in an DX9 moved to DX12 been tested? Only a

hand full of software out that would even want to know the answer to this I suspect.

 

Would be good to know. for us anywho.

 

When I hit the lottery I would hire a group of top notch programmers to revamp this Sim.

to a brand new computer language after taking care of other things of course.

[Aluminum Donkey]

I think we can all agree, after many people's many years of fiddling around, is that you're always, always, always better off buying one good video card than screwing around with two (or four!!) crappier ones and trying to get them to go in SLI. It isn't worth the aggravation, the time--or the money.

 

Just get a decent one to begin with instead of farting around with SLI. My single, archaic GTX 760 2GB is actually pretty decent--and you can buy one used dirt cheap!

 

A 980 is probably very good, a 980 Ti should be all you ever need. Single cards are so lightning fast these days, why bother messing around. If the smell of burning money reminds you of kerosene and huge turbofans at an airshow, get a single Titan X or one of those funky new 1080s, take it out of the box, take a huge sniff, install it and go.

 

Screw SLI :)

[Enduro14]

Ya I hate to say it but I've recently done the same thing. Removed 1 980 and am pleasantly surprised how things are running at 4K. Will add though today I will be picking up a Gainward Phoenix GLH 1080.

Sli is great when it works but currently it's just become to much of a hassle for me and the busy work schedule.

[Outlaw24]

rrohde, I did the same last week. Removed my two 4gb GTX 680's in favor of a single GTX 980ti.

 

SLI development for DCS has been painfully slow with no news yet of a solution in the foreseeable future.

 

I agree, I also pulled out my GTX 680 sli in favor of the GTX 980ti, I will probably wait for the next card release after the 1080 series.

[Hans-Joachim Marseille]

SLI is still planned of course.

Was that a tongue-in-cheek comment or is it actually planned?

I'm on the fence for another card, sacrificing my Xfire setup as I'm quite tired of the wait.

Getting awesome performance out of Asetto Corsa in Xfire though.

I'm undecided what to get ... RX 480?

Edited July 5, 2016 by Hans-Joachim Marseille

[BravoFoxTrt]

Hans, what ever you get, please post about it. Thanks in advance!

[Socket7]

You can set DCS 2.0.2 to render in AFR2 mode through the nvidia drivers and it seems to work just fine. Gpu core load drops and is split evenly between them, where the same settings would max out a single card's workload. It's maybe 25% less gpu load? SLI never doubled performance like people hope IME, but AFR does give each card double the time to render the scene, as each card draws every other frame.

 

Considering that DCS 2.0.2 will happily use 8GB of video ram though, Vram is more likely to be the bottleneck that will kill your framerates.

 

I just noticed last night while playing with the gazelle. DCS's FPS monitor was saying it was using 7000mb of vram on "high" detail settings.

Edited July 10, 2016 by Socket7