670-SLI-P9X79 problems

[HamMan]

Yesterday I installed a second “MSI GeForce GTX 670 OC Twin Frozr Power Edition 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card” to improve performance on a 27” 2560x1440 monitor; everything works fine when running Heaven almost doubling the performance figures.

I then noticed the second card was only working PCI-E 2.0 x16 so I applied the P9X79 patch to force it to PCI-E 3.0 x16 and the second card was then working PCI-E 3.0 x16.

I then ran Heaven again and after a few seconds it starts flashing rapidly and freezing and I get the error message “Display driver NVIDIA Windows Kernel Mode Driver Version 320.49 stopped responding and has successfully recovered” but it is still either freezes or does sometimes resume at 11 fps.

I tried removing and reinstalling the 320.49 drivers and then tried the latest Beta drivers but still the same problem.

I then restored from an Image Backup to a point before I applied the P9X79 patch and all is now OK again.

What I am doing wrong or am I flogging a dead horse?

Cheers

 

[ubersonic]

You do have both slots set to PCI-E 3.0 in the BIOS yeah?

 

[Kaapstad]

For normal use like gaming using the patch to get PCI-E 3.0 working is not worth the time it takes to install. The difference between PCI-E 2.0 and 3.0 is less than 1%.

It is only really noticeable @1440p when running a benchmark and then the difference is tiny.

Here are some benches showing the difference between PCI-E 3.0 2.0 and 1.0

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=24729238&postcount=9

As you can see the difference between 2.0 and 3.0 is not worth bothering with.

 

[HamMan]

Just checked BIOS and all slots set to Gen 3.

Point taken about the difference between PCI-E 3.0 2.0. Would it be worthwhile reverting first card back to PCI-E 2.0 to keep them both the same (and how would I do that) or does it not matter if there not the same?

 

[Kaapstad]

Just checked BIOS and all slots set to Gen 3.

Point taken about the difference between PCI-E 3.0 2.0. Would it be worthwhile reverting first card back to PCI-E 2.0 to keep them both the same (and how would I do that) or does it not matter if there not the same?

As soon as you reinstall the drivers again it disables the patch for PCI-E 3.0

Or you can just select PCI-E 2.0 in the bios and it won't matter if you have the patch installed or not.

If you are into overclocking using PCI-E 3.0 gives the CPU more work to do for little gain, some people will use 2.0 to gain more overall performance as they can get a bit more out of the CPU in some situations.

 

[Five.Stars]

As soon as you reinstall the drivers again it disables the patch for PCI-E 3.0

Or you can just select PCI-E 2.0 in the bios and it won't matter if you have the patch installed or not.

If you are into overclocking using PCI-E 3.0 gives the CPU more work to do for little gain, some people will use 2.0 to gain more overall performance as they can get a bit more out of the CPU in some situations.

That is interesting and will take note of that since I am soon moving from a pci-e 2 based ex58 system to a pci-e 3 z87.

Does that apply to all systems or x79 only? Cheers.

 

[HamMan]

I will reinstall the drivers later on tonight and see what happens and run Heaven again just for comparison reasons.

Is ver 320.49 the best driver to use at this point in time or is there a more appropriate version?

Cheers and thanks.

 

[Kaapstad]

That is interesting and will take note of that since I am soon moving from a pci-e 2 based ex58 system to a pci-e 3 z87.

Does that apply to all systems or x79 only? Cheers.

With Z87 you should be fine with PCI-E 3.0

As to switching between 2.0 and 3.0 that's down to whether your mobo has the option in the bios.

For normal use with Z87 I would stick with 3.0

 

[ubersonic]

Is your BIOS up to date? as X79 pre-dated the release of any PCI-E 3.0 cards the have been a number of stability improvements over time.

You shouldn't really be having PCI-E 3.0 issues with an ASUS board, the reason you have to force 3.0 via a patch on Nvidia drivers is because while all manufacturers used the 3.0 spec as a reference some deviated with the signal timing, but ASUS are regarded as one of the better ones (AMD just enable 3.0 by default and let people with issues disable it).

It's very easy to just say its not a problem now as you don't really need 3.0 yet however a P9X79 Deluxe can take 64GB of ram and has support for hex core IB-E so its not like SLi 670's are the last cards you will run in it, down the line the issue may become a limiting factor so if an RMA is needed its better to find that out now.

For ref I was running SLi 670's on my ASUS Rampage IV Gene in PCI-E 3.0 with no issues (one EVGA one ASUS).

 

[HamMan]

I did update the BIOS to ver 3501 a few months ago but I will check for the latest ver in the morning. It would be nice to get to the bottom of the problem for the reasons you mention.

Tried several combinations tonight and get the best performance with card 1 set to 3.0 and card 2 set to 2.0.

If it is a known problem I would have thought either NVIDIA or ASUS would have come up with a fix. I know NVIDIA recognized there was a problem with the P9X79 but that was some time ago now.

Cheers and thanks.

 

[HamMan]

Just a very brief update (don’t want to bore you with all the details) and to say thanks for the replies.

Updated the BIOS this morning from ver. 3305 (not 3501 as I said in a previous post) to ver. 4210 but then it would not allow me to install the P9X79 3.0 patch to card 2.

Suspecting card 2 may be faulty I installed it in card 1 slot to check it out and it was working fine in 3.0. Then put card 1 into card 2 slot and that was working ok in 3.0.

Then ran Heaven and it now appears to be working OK but it did appear to stutter a bit in one mode but can’t remember which mode it was now. I think I get the best quality when running in Adaptive 1920x1080 mode but I have had enough of it for today.

Cheers and thanks again for the replies.