780 x 2 possible with this PC?

Angst · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:32

Gregster said:
I wouldn't advise the OP to buy another 780 if he feels that 60fps is all he needs. He should stay with what he has however, sometimes we like to upgrade and I wouldn't want to spend money that will not be beneficial. You make some good points but a bottleneck isn't good and I would hate to choke a couple of 780's.

He obviously feels that a second card is necessary for 60fps otherwise he would not post asking about upgrades therefore a second card would not go to waste and as i said with that monitor he is not bottle necked by his cpu so the 780's will not be choked.
But if that is your stance on it why did you not post this to begin with rather than going off about cpu limitations for very limited selection of games at frame rates higher than the op needs?

Kaapstad · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:35

Gregster said:
I wouldn't advise the OP to buy another 780 if he feels that 60fps is all he needs. He should stay with what he has however, sometimes we like to upgrade and I wouldn't want to spend money that will not be beneficial. You make some good points but a bottleneck isn't good and I would hate to choke a couple of 780's.

+1

I remember running my Titans on the Heaven 4 bench, I was getting over 200 fps but where they were bottlenecked the image quality was terrible. It was a bit like driving a card down a dirt track. It was not until I got the CPU up to 5.0ghz that things smoothed out.

Angst · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:36

Kaapstad said:
It was you who mentioned BF4 but the above is still relevant to other games.

Have you ever tried running two or more modern GPUs on an X58 system ?

Mentioning "multiplayer games" means only one game with you guys.
I did before running an i7 920 on a 120hz monitor, it was fine for upto 100fps and so perfect for a 60hz monitor.

Kaapstad · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:38

Angst said:
Mentioning "multiplayer games" means only one game with you guys.
I did before running an i7 920 on a 120hz monitor, it was fine for upto 100fps and so perfect for a 60hz monitor.

That is not what I asked

I asked whether you had tried it with a couple of modern GPUs ?

Angst · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:40

Kaapstad said:
That is not what I asked

I asked whether you had tried it with a couple of modern GPUs ?

Pray tell what difference it makes? the cpu easily makes 60fps in every game available today so what difference do the gpu's make?

Kaapstad · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:42

Gregster said:
You will deffo be CPU bottlenecked. For one card, it should be fine but for 2, you would need a beefier CPU, which means a new mobo

Angst said:
He obviously feels that a second card is necessary for 60fps otherwise he would not post asking about upgrades therefore a second card would not go to waste and as i said with that monitor he is not bottle necked by his cpu so the 780's will not be choked.
But if that is your stance on it why did you not post this to begin with rather than going off about cpu limitations for very limited selection of games at frame rates higher than the op needs?

I think what Gregster posted is crystal clear.

Gregster · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:43

Angst said:
He obviously feels that a second card is necessary for 60fps otherwise he would not post asking about upgrades therefore a second card would not go to waste and as i said with that monitor he is not bottle necked by his cpu so the 780's will not be choked.
But if that is your stance on it why did you not post this to begin with rather than going off about cpu limitations for very limited selection of games at frame rates higher than the op needs?

Don't turn this into a big issue fella. The OP has seen mine , yours and others thoughts and some good info all round. I will step out and let others jump in, so not to confuse the OP or turn this thread into a mess.

Angst · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:44

Kaapstad said:
I think what Gregster posted is crystal clear.

He says you will be bottle necked with 2 but not one which makes no sense as at 60 fps he will not be bottle necked whether he has one or 2 cards. At 1440p 60hz he may be gpu bottle necked but he wont be cpu bottle necked so a second gpu will be fine.

Angst · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:46

Gregster said:
Don't turn this into a big issue fella. The OP has seen mine , yours and others thoughts and some good info all round. I will step out and let others jump in, so not to confuse the OP or turn this thread into a mess.

Ok

Kaapstad · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:47

Angst said:
Pray tell what difference it makes? the cpu easily makes 60fps in every game available today so what difference do the gpu's make?

How many threads do we see on these forums about rotten GPU utilization, that's the reason.

If the CPU is not up to the job you get very erratic fps with low minimums and high maximums along with poor GPU utilization.

Angst · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:49

Kaapstad said:
How many threads do we see on these forums about rotten GPU utilization, that's the reason.

If the CPU is not up to the job you get very erratic fps with low minimums and high maximums along with poor GPU utilization.

But if the cpu is not maxed out it is not the cpu is it. If there is low gpu usage it is something else either the game or drivers etc.

Kaapstad · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:53

Angst said:
But if the cpu is not maxed out it is not the cpu is it. If there is low gpu usage it is something else either the game or drivers etc.

What I have just described is a CPU bottleneck and yes you will get one with two GTX 780s and a 920 @3.8

You may also want to read some of the Mantle threads as it will give you an idea how bottlenecked some CPUs are and what a difference Mantle can make with less powerful GPU setups than a pair of GTX 780s.

Geeman1979 · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:56

Kaapstad said:
How many threads do we see on these forums about rotten GPU utilization, that's the reason.

If the CPU is not up to the job you get very erratic fps with low minimums and high maximums along with poor GPU utilization.

Not always the reason

Angst · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:57

Kaapstad said:
What I have just described is a CPU bottleneck and yes you will get one with two GTX 780s and a 920 @3.8

Not at 60hz you wont on 99.9% of games out. The gpu's used are irrelevant.

Kaapstad · 21 Mar 2014 at 17:59

Geeman1979 said:
Not always the reason

Not always but it is often enough.

As I have just edited into my post above, the one thing Mantle really shows is how bottlenecked even a single GPU and CPU can be.

Kaapstad · 21 Mar 2014 at 18:01

Angst said:
Not at 60hz you wont on 99.9% of games out. The gpu's used are irrelevant.

So why is Mantle making DX11 look silly when it comes to smoothness and improvements in minimum fps.

Geeman1979 · 21 Mar 2014 at 18:04

Kaapstad said:
Not always but it is often enough.

As I have just edited into my post above, the one thing Mantle really shows is how bottlenecked even a single GPU and CPU can be.

I get bad Gpu usage in BF4 in SLI with a pair of 780's and a 3960X at 4.8

Cards dropping to 60% at times.

Angst · 21 Mar 2014 at 18:05

Kaapstad said:
So why is Mantle making DX11 look silly when it comes to smoothness and improvements in minimum fps.

Because that's only the craply optmised and borked game bf4 with worse cpu's or above 60hz...
iv'e tried mantle with 2 280x's and a 3570k, it increases my fps yes but when im limited to 72fps it makes no difference.

Angst · 21 Mar 2014 at 18:06

Geeman1979 said:
I get bad Gpu usage in BF4 in SLI with a pair of 780's and a 3960X at 4.8

Cards dropping to 60% at times.

What fps and what cpu usage like?

Geeman1979 · 21 Mar 2014 at 18:10

Angst said:
What fps and what cpu usage like?

To be honest, it runs better on one card for me than two. Gpu usage with one card at a constant 99% usage. Frames i'll have a check next time I run it. For 1080p full ultra one card will breeze it.