Sli

[little P]

I have a question regarding SLI.

All the tests I've read and watched are reporting that the scaling of the Gigabyte GTX 650ti Boost is excellent and in most (all but F1 2012) cases in SLI configuration they are performing at the same level as a GTX 680. Considering a 680 is £340 and two 650ti boosts are £275 I'm happy with that and once the prices come down a bit more still I'll probably add another 650 card.

My question is if my PSU can handle it. It was new with the rest of the system - a Corsair CX600.

I've tried using a couple of those power supply calculators but they don't seem to list a 650ti Boost as a gpu, only a 650ti.

So I'm wondering what your opinion is?

I've also had some more ram bought for me by a relative after doing some D.I.Y. for them as a surprise which is nice of them. Although I don't think I need it I'm not going to insult them by saying no thanks, so I guess I'll put tit in there anyway. So in total it'll be 4x4gb sticks of Corsair Vengeance and two 650ti Boosts in SLI. I know these cards draw very little power compared to others but is 600W enough. Hoping it will be?

 

[little P]

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/15769-650-ti-boost-sli/

This is the only thing I've found so far on it, do you guys agree?

 

[Kenadian]

I don't know little P, when it comes to this stuff I always like to err on the side of caution. I know what the Video Cards say they draw but when the system is being taxed fully, doesn't everything draw more power? I know the CPU overclocks itself something like 400 MHz which I believe would draw a bit more, does that mean fans spin up and consume more as well as RAM; I don't know?

I've never thought to monitor it as I've never been that close to max power.

Personally, I like at least a few hundred watts headroom.

As for SLI, I'll probably never do it again if I can avoid it. Sure it's boosted performance but the performance gains I've seen are inconsistent to say the least. The only thing SLI has really done for my system is smooth out framerates and dropping frames never seems to happen, ever.

So far the only game that really seems to suffer from SLI on my system is Euro Truck Simulator 2. SLI has introduced micro stuttering and the only way around it right now is to disable SLI.

I'm also not a big fan of the increased heat blowing from my case. Two cards next to one another produce a tremendous amount of heat which just makes me uncomfortable.

I'm no SLI expert however so maybe someone here has better advice for you.

 

[mondo]

Why do you want SLI? Unless you're running 2560x1440 its unlikely you're running out of Vram with one card right now. I guess if you've got low frames on most games are a nice enough setting it could be worth it but like D00k says, performance can be inconsistent and the gains varied.

For the calculator, just use the next highest card up to work it out - I think those 600 series cards draw less power than the last 4 of 5 generations of Nvidia card so you might be ok.

 

[little P]

Hmm. I found this article backing up what I've already read.



They were impressed at the power of two Boosts, but I can't seem to find mention of how much power they will draw... Well, if I am going to SLI and it does require a higher watt psu I guess I can get a modular one this time...

The reason I'm thinking of SLI'ing is... I don't know really... I think I've caught the pc bug and just want it to be a beast :icon_redface:

Kitty know's what I mean, I mean why else would you SLI two 780's?

With my system as it stands the only thing I can't run on Ultra with consistently high fps is Crysis 3, I drop it down one to Very High and it's smooth as silk.

I'm just thinking ahead I guess. It's good to know that option is there, as it's much cheaper than buying a whole new card! In some of these tests the SLI'd Boosts are near a Titan :icon_eek:

 

[Kenadian]

I think Kitty SLI'd two 780's to get more oomph out of his system as his upgrade path is pretty limited now. He's on a Socket 1366 which has been discontinued for a while now.

I know you've caught the PC bug little P but if you don't really need the extra then I'd wait for a bit until you can afford a better single solution card and a better PSU.

To be perfectly honest, I believe you're throwing money away with SLI and I can assure you that the gains are not going to be what you're expecting.

 

[Engnr]

I agree with Duke. If it is working well now, leave it. If a second gfx card is so cheep that you can skip a lunch to buy one, sure, what the hell. But I'd be way happy with what you put together thus far. My system is so many years old now, but it still plays Guild Wars 2 well enough I can't see spending the cash. So instead we bought a toy car, 2013 Dodge Challenger R/T V8. Jez needed a car and didn't want a "teacher" car. She is like a kid in the candy store, lol, hell so am I. It's expensive, but after the year we had last year, life is just too damn short not to have a bit of spice. Damn it's fun to drive and looks so cool.

 

[Kitlope]

I think Kitty SLI'd two 780's to get more oomph out of his system as his upgrade path is pretty limited now. He's on a Socket 1366 which has been discontinued for a while now.

To be perfectly honest, I believe you're throwing money away with SLI and I can assure you that the gains are not going to be what you're expecting.

Duke nailed it. The only reason why I added a second GTX 780 was because of my monitor upgrade last month as I'm looking for frames as close to the refresh rate of 120 Hz as possible. If I would have stayed with a 60 Hz monitor I wouldn't have bothered. If you can run a relative consistent 60 frames with good settings with your 60 Hz monitor in most games, then I wouldn't bother spending the extra cake. I've even changed the default frequency from 120 Hz to 100 Hz to keep the frames more consistent as it struggled often to get to 120 frames, using lightboost it's imperative to keep the frames as close to refresh rate of choice (within 20 frames from what I read). I'm quite sure you're running a 60Hz monitor so I wouldn't bother, at least not at this time.

Like Duke, I'm actually a little disappointed too as I figured I would get more consistent frames than what I currently get, but I think it's more of a BF3 Frostbite engine thing or nVidia driver so it's out of my control (frames can nosedive to the 60 - 75 FPS about 20% of the time, but I'm sure it's out of my control). But the second card has helped, just not nearly as much as I expected.

Hopefully BF4 is optimized better than BF3 regarding a couple of these issues (better SLI performance, less frame nosedives).

Larkstarr is doing an *almost* apple to apples comparison between Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge (with PCIe-3) so it will be interesting to see his results. There's a lot of conflicting data on the internets of whether PCIe-3 produces more frames.

I also read a couple days ago about a dude with an i7 (didn't say which chip) overclocked to 4.9 Ghz, 32 GB of ram and 2 nVidia Titans and experiences the same frame drops that I get, so like that skinny blonde hotty with the huge rack, it's simply unattainable.

I've also, even just an hour ago and for the last week, been slowly overclocking my cpu as I think I have a bit of a bottleneck there because of the 2 780's. Factory is 3.33 Ghz and I've upped it to 3.72 Ghz with good stability, but I am having a random BSoD issue and I'm not sure if it's related to the overclocking as it seems to have started when I added the second card. But it's rare and I'll know more as time goes on...

I've been tempted to drive the 10 minutes to Memory Express (awesome brick & mortar computer store) and pick up a Haswell 4770K with a Asus Rampage or Sabertooth motherboard and other than the $600.00 pricetag my current chip still holds it's own, albeit it's about 15% slower. I'm really wanting to hold off until Broadwell comes out which should be around next summer and hopefully Intel doesn't forget about the desktop power user like they did with the rather disappointing Hasfail.

 

[Die Alone]

Really there is only 2 valid reasons to SLI/crossfire super high resolutions or have top tier card and want slightly more umph.

As you listed P the price difference for the second 650 vs the 680 can be evened out if you sell the current 650 somewhere, should make the price almost even. Saving on much heat, noise and power draw. And thus gain more consistent framerates. Also you current PSU will handle the 680 aslong as its atleast 450+watts.

 

[little P]

Cheers lads, makes total sense what you're saying. D.A. makes a great point about saving money by not getting a higher wattage psu and selling the Boost on to get a 680 or above later.

PC building is addictive, once you've had a taste you want more :icon_redface:

 

[Kenadian]

PC building is addictive, once you've had a taste you want more :icon_redface:

Kind of reminds you of cack huh?

 

[Kenadian]

I've also, even just an hour ago and for the last week, been slowly overclocking my cpu as I think I have a bit of a bottleneck there because of the 2 780's. Factory is 3.33 Ghz and I've upped it to 3.72 Ghz with good stability, but I am having a random BSoD issue and I'm not sure if it's related to the overclocking as it seems to have started when I added the second card. But it's rare and I'll know more as time goes on...

This may be a stretch but is it possible your read speed on your HDD is the issue?

...assuming of course you're using a mechanical 7200RPM over an SSD.

The only reason I ask is because your CPU shouldn't be too taxed as much of what's happening is being handled by the GPU's in B2K.

Am I completely off base here?

 

[Kitlope]

This may be a stretch but is it possible your read speed on your HDD is the issue?

...assuming of course you're using a mechanical 7200RPM over an SSD.

The only reason I ask is because your CPU shouldn't be too taxed as much of what's happening is being handled by the GPU's in B2K.

Am I completely off base here?

I've got an 120 GB SSD but it's an older model (came out 3 years ago) although I have BF3 installed on a mechanical drive due to size restraints. I plan on upgrading to a new 256 GB version before BF4 comes out and have it installed on that. But you bring up a valid point - the drive I have BF3 installed on I can't remember if it's a 5400 rpm or a 7200 rpm...

 

[Die Alone]

I really doubt drive speed is to account for the BSoD. That could influence frame rates but doubtful thats its the full culprit. My best guess is driver issue without seeing the actual bluescreen message. Try cleaning video drivers and reinstalling and make sure you have the best mobo drivers and bios aswell.

 

[Kitlope]

Just checked, the particular drive I have BF3 on is 7200. Funny thing is since I have a couple at 5900 I wouldn't have even realized it...

 

[Kitlope]

I really doubt drive speed is to account for the BSoD. That could influence frame rates but doubtful thats its the full culprit. My best guess is driver issue without seeing the actual bluescreen message. Try cleaning video drivers and reinstalling and make sure you have the best mobo drivers and bios aswell.

I think you misunderstood the post DA, I don't think Duke nor myself was implying that it was a drive speed issue for the BSoD. I think Duke was asking about performance and whether I was using a SSD or HDD. I've updated m/b drivers and bios is to the latest version, I always use driver cleaner when swapping out GPU drivers. Got all that stuff going, but thanks!

I'm actually thinking the BSoD issue I was having was DRAM voltage related as I think I had it set too low. I'll know more in the next few days if it doesn't crash on me.

 

[Kenadian]

No the drive has nothing to do with BSOD, I was commenting on Read Speed only. I think your BSOD is voltage related as it only became unstable with the overclocking.

 

[Shilka]

I think you misunderstood the post DA, I don't think Duke nor myself was implying that it was a drive speed issue for the BSoD. I think Duke was asking about performance and whether I was using a SSD or HDD. I've updated m/b drivers and bios is to the latest version, I always use driver cleaner when swapping out GPU drivers. Got all that stuff going, but thanks!

I'm actually thinking the BSoD issue I was having was DRAM voltage related as I think I had it set too low. I'll know more in the next few days if it doesn't crash on me.

Having seen your rig pictures, your issue is probably Blue Screen of Dust :icon_lol: