Nividia SLI compatibility?

[amagad]

Hi, can anyone tell me if its possible to put a gtx 580 and another (cheaper) card like the 460 in sli together? I know ATI has this technology like a 5970 and a 5870 in crossfire so i was wondering if nvidia has it too. Also will the 580 downgrade itself to perform like the 460? What other combinations are there to use with the gtx580?

 

 

Thanks.

[TwoLate]

Well for this sim, Sli will not work. Only performance increase you will get is raising the AA or Af. I had two 260gtx. I now have a 480gtx. One 260gtx performed as good as the 480tx. A friend of mine bought the new 580. He went from 480tx to 580 with no increase. So unless they put sli in I do not worry about sli in this sim. To awnser your question, I think you can do that in cuda not sli. Meaning second card is used for physics.

[KillaALF]

No you cannot put two (or more) different Nvidia GPUs together in a SLI configuration - see here

 

Pretty sure it's the same for Ati's Crossfire.

[amagad]

Yea im aware that the sim doesnt support this but for other games for example. The gtx 580 and gtx 460 is the same chip? will this 2 work in sli?

[KillaALF]

No, not the same chip, so won't work.

[Slammin]

I have a GTX580 and so far I have not run into a game where I think I need Sli. Really, I doubt I'll ever go Sli again, and I've had 7800GTX's in Sli, 8800GT's in Sli, then got a 280GTX and now 580GTX. I saw no improvement in A10 going from the 280 to the 580 but do see huge performance increases with the 580GTX in everything else I play.

 

A10 responds very well to CPU overclocking. And don't be fooled; even though you may be running a multicore CPU and not see the CPU/cores reach 100%, that does not mean you are not CPU-bound. A10 responds well to higher CPU cycles (clocks), regardless of CPU utilization. This seems true for other CPU bound sims as well (FSX?).

 

Enjoy the eye candy with that 580. I sure do!

[Thorvald]

Does A10 have support for SLI yet? I have triple SLI 8800's and it's a dog at present (I assume optimization issues due to beta for now).

Edited November 28, 2010 by Thorvald

[ilikepie]

have a read of post 2 and 4 bud. not supported yet. and its's still being optimized, next patch has been slated for that. :thumbup:

[TwoLate]

I have not heard anything definte on Ditectx11 or sli in DCS A-10. It is a shame because with a wall hit with silicon either we have to go organic or tillieum I think it is called and both are two expensive for desktop. Only improvement will have to be the sim engine utilizing multi thread, multi cpu or multi gpu. We are at the wall right now on core speed for the next 5 years at least. That is why AMD is pushing out a 12 core hoping the gaming industry will get off thier seats and start programing multi CPU and GPU.

[Slammin]

Multi CPU/core/threading support is exactly what is needed in sims. I think GPU capacity is way ahead of CPU capacity right now, in a sense. The missing link is for programs/programming to support the process threading that multi-core CPU's allow.

 

Then we rinse, wash, and start all over again, and then need stronger GPU's :-)

 

It really is cool if you observe over the years how the weak link has gone back and forth between CPU and GPU. I think now, it is clearly evident that both CPU and GPU capacity is there and that it is the developers, that need to take advantage of, and adopt to the technology better, and allow us to quit trying to chase the rabbit. We got the rabbit. Now feed it!

[Callsign.Vega]

This thread has a lot of bad information. I run both BS and A-10C titles with 2x 480's in SLI and it works great. Both 480's go to 100% GPU utilization at my 12.3 mega-pixel resolution.

[TwoLate]

This thread has a lot of bad information. I run both BS and A-10C titles with 2x 480's in SLI and it works great. Both 480's go to 100% GPU utilization at my 12.3 mega-pixel resolution.

 

Pick a mission that starts on ramp. Trackir off, hit 5 on numpad to get view straight out of cockpit. Check your frame rate. Now do that with sli and one card and see your difference. Blackshark you had an increase in Sli. A10 nobody I know get an increase with sli.

[Callsign.Vega]

Pick a mission that starts on ramp. Trackir off, hit 5 on numpad to get view straight out of cockpit. Check your frame rate. Now do that with sli and one card and see your difference. Blackshark you had an increase in Sli. A10 nobody I know get an increase with sli.

 

I run A-10C with 3x 30" at 4800x2560, SLI is needed for surround. With this high of a resolution both 480's go to max utilization and I am GPU limited, not CPU.

[Slammin]

Surround Vision is what they call that? Myself and everyone else was talking about the normal Performance Sli mode.

[EtherealN]

Vega, it's not bad information just because you have a one-of-a-kind rig that I am fairly certain you are the only one on this forum to use... People need information that is relevant to their machines, not your machine. ;)

[Callsign.Vega]

Surround Vision is what they call that? Myself and everyone else was talking about the normal Performance Sli mode.

 

Vega, it's not bad information just because you have a one-of-a-kind rig that I am fairly certain you are the only one on this forum to use... People need information that is relevant to their machines, not your machine. ;)

 

If people aren't seeing frame rate increases at resolutions like 1920x1200 in SLI, that's just because they are CPU limited and not GPU limited. That does not mean SLI isn't working is my point.

[Slammin]

Why would one expect to see a performance improvement when using Sli with a game that does not support Sli? From my experience, enabling Sli for a game that does not support Sli usually resulted in worst performance.

[TwoLate]

If people aren't seeing frame rate increases at resolutions like 1920x1200 in SLI, that's just because they are CPU limited and not GPU limited. That does not mean SLI isn't working is my point.

 

 

I do not call this rig CPU limited.

 

Asus Rampage III Extreme | Intel Core i7 980x Extreme Edition 3.33GHz | Samsung T260 25.5-inch | EVGA GeForce GTX580 1536 MB DDR5 | Thrustmaster Warthog | Track IR 5 Pro | Cooler Master Silent Pro M1000| Corsair 6 GB Dominator GT PC3-16000 2000Mhz Triple Channel Memory | Logitech G19 Gaming Keyboard | Win 7 64bit |

[Callsign.Vega]

Ok to put this to rest, I did some tests. I took my setup out of surround mode and used 1 30" at 2560x1600, with all in game setting at max with 4x AA. 1x 480 (no sli) produced 52 FPS in the cockpit of the A-10C on the first replay before taken off pause (Beta 3). The 480 was at 100% max GPU useage. I then turned on SLI with 2x 480's. The same exact view went from 52 fps to 87 FPS with both GPU's around 90-95%. That's a pretty nice 68% FPS boost.

 

I could instantly tell the SLI was working properly because the 2x 480's spooled up to 100% fan and if you know anything about 480's it sounds like a 747 is landing. ;) I could do benchmarking just by sound lol.

 

Theres a caveat though. While playing around with the SLI settings in nVidiaInspector there was a particular combo of settings that virtually broke SLI in both DCS titles. The SLI FPS dropped down to 7! I will hunt down this bug through some testing and report back. In the meantime, it's good to know that with the proper settings SLI in DCS titles works great.

[Slayer]

I agree. I have SLI 480 GTX, One had failed and had to be sent out to get repaired. At 1920x1200 I notice a difference, can only get steady 60 FPS if I look up from the cockpit or go to external views. Some stuff in the sim still causes graphical slowdown no matter how much GPU power you throw at it. Hopefully when they come to the optomization phase it gets better.

 

Bottom line for me is trying to get 60 FPS with highest details possible. Anything over that is a waste and below 40 FPS is a slideshow.

[TwoLate]

Ok to put this to rest, I did some tests. I took my setup out of surround mode and used 1 30" at 2560x1600, with all in game setting at max with 4x AA. 1x 480 (no sli) produced 52 FPS in the cockpit of the A-10C on the first replay before taken off pause (Beta 3). The 480 was at 100% max GPU useage. I then turned on SLI with 2x 480's. The same exact view went from 52 fps to 87 FPS with both GPU's around 90-95%. That's a pretty nice 68% FPS boost.

 

I could instantly tell the SLI was working properly because the 2x 480's spooled up to 100% fan and if you know anything about 480's it sounds like a 747 is landing. ;) I could do benchmarking just by sound lol.

 

Theres a caveat though. While playing around with the SLI settings in nVidiaInspector there was a particular combo of settings that virtually broke SLI in both DCS titles. The SLI FPS dropped down to 7! I will hunt down this bug through some testing and report back. In the meantime, it's good to know that with the proper settings SLI in DCS titles works great.

 

 

Yes please tell us how you got sli to work.

[Thorvald]

Interesting... even with my Tri SLI it is a dog in the cockpit on the ramp.

 

I'll watch this thread with interest (still have to try latest beta).

[Quirkitized]

You guys aren't running windowed mode are you? SLI does not work in window mode, make sure you are using full screen for any game in regards to SLI.

[ronht]

I've found that Force Alternate Frame Rendering 2 gives the best results with SLI

[Callsign.Vega]

You guys aren't running windowed mode are you? SLI does not work in window mode, make sure you are using full screen for any game in regards to SLI.

 

That is old information. SLI has bee working in windowed mode for quite some time now.