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More Physx questions - 5870 + ??

coolsouthern

coolsouthern

coolsouthern

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Joined
12 Aug 2009
Posts
337
Hi my rig is the one in my sig below.

I was thinking of getting an Nvidia card to sit alongside it to use purely for Physx. I wanted advice on a couple of points:

i. Is this hard to do? Do I literally put the new card into the second slot, go to my devices in Windows and select that card as Physx only? Or do I have to download some speciic software and start messing around deeper?

ii. Can I get a good enough card to do this for, say, under £100? I thought a cheap 260 would suit me fine but even the cheapest of these is around £120.

Only been into PC gaming for a short while but if memory serves me right I'm thinking I could try and find an old 8800gt or 9800 to purely do Physx and I'd be just as better off than with a 260?

Thanks in advance for any advice :)
 
Also is my Mboard up to using both cards without hampering performance?

I keep reading comments about how a dual GPU option lowers from 16x to 8x . I'm not entirely sure what this means ( sorry to be a "noob") but I have a feeling that mine would run 2 GPU's at 16x but 3 would run at 16, 8x , 8x ?

Am I right?? Or just spouting complete rubbish?

Cheers again!

Also... Are the 240's and 250's for sale here at OCuk just new names for the previously mentioned 8800's and 9800's?
 
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hope this help hehe

2 x PCI Express x16 slots, running at x16 (PCIEX16_1/PCIEX16_2) (Note 2)
1 x PCI Express x8 slot, running at x8 (PCIEX8_1) (Note 3)
(The PCIEX16_1, PCIE16_2 and PCIEX8_1 slots support 2-Way/3-Way NVIDIA SLI/ATI CrossFireXTM technology and conform to PCI Express 2.0 standard.)
1 x PCI Express x4 slot
1 x PCI Express x1 slot
2 x PCI slots

(Note 2) For optimum performance, if only one PCI Express graphics card is to be installed, be sure to install it in the PCIEX16_1 slot; if you are installing two PCI Express graphics cards, it is recommended that you install them in the PCIEX16_1 and PCIEX16_2 slots.
(Note 3) The PCIEX8_1 slot shares bandwidth with the PCIEX16_2 slot. When PCIEX8_1 is populated with a PCI Express graphics card, the PCIEX16_2 slot will operate at up to x8 mode.
 
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antran said:
hope this help hehe

2 x PCI Express x16 slots, running at x16 (PCIEX16_1/PCIEX16_2) (Note 2)
1 x PCI Express x8 slot, running at x8 (PCIEX8_1) (Note 3)
(The PCIEX16_1, PCIE16_2 and PCIEX8_1 slots support 2-Way/3-Way NVIDIA SLI/ATI CrossFireXTM technology and conform to PCI Express 2.0 standard.)
1 x PCI Express x4 slot
1 x PCI Express x1 slot
2 x PCI slots

(Note 2) For optimum performance, if only one PCI Express graphics card is to be installed, be sure to install it in the PCIEX16_1 slot; if you are installing two PCI Express graphics cards, it is recommended that you install them in the PCIEX16_1 and PCIEX16_2 slots.
(Note 3) The PCIEX8_1 slot shares bandwidth with the PCIEX16_2 slot. When PCIEX8_1 is populated with a PCI Express graphics card, the PCIEX16_2 slot will operate at up to x8 mode.
Click to expand...

Wow... will take me a while to decipher this. :)

Am I to assume that my mobo has 3 PCIE slots then? 2 at x16 and 1 or 2 at 8x?

I will look into the hack thanks for the advice.

Any advice on the cheapest , quietest GPU for what I want? Was thinking one of the 240's would do for me!
 
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coolsouthern said:
Are the GT 240's a rebranded name for the 8800's??
Click to expand...

The 240's are DX10.1, and they only have 128bit mem interface.

8800GTX had 384bit mem interface, and G92 8800's had 256bit, and they were only DX10, their core clocks were also higher than these GT240's, so I wouldn't class these cards as re-branded 8 series Geforce's.
 
Ok thats cleared it up for me a bit...

So would I be better of going for the 250? Do they have a higher mem interface?

Hmm also just realised I don't know if my PSU could hack it. I have the Corsair 650w that Ocuk put into their pre built systems
 
Bradmax57 said:
240's are more like a 9600gt? but with dx10.1 and 40nm
Click to expand...

9600 had 64sp's. The 240 has 96. I don't think memory speed has much baring on PhysX performance.

I bought a Palit 240 and run it as a dedicated PhysX card without issue, Batman AA runs perfectly with high PhysX settings and I even removed the fan to run it with passive cooling without issue. All powered from a BeQuiet DPP 650 PSU that is running a 4870x2 and a 4Ghz i7-920. Power draw from the 240 is minimal.
 
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layte said:
9600 had 64sp's. The 240 has 96. I don't think memory speed has much baring on PhysX performance.

I bought a Palit 240 and run it as a dedicated PhysX card without issue, Batman AA runs perfectly with high PhysX settings and I even removed the fan to run it with passive cooling without issue. All powered from a BeQuiet DPP 650 PSU that is running a 4870x2 and a 4Ghz i7-920. Power draw from the 240 is minimal.
Click to expand...

Ah ok that sounds good as Ocuk have the Palit GT 240 at about £55 I think. Although I was tempted to get a 275 from the MM which was going for £120... great price!!

£55 for a Physx card is the more sensible option I suppose. How difficult was it to get it working as just a Physx card? What is the process? Did you have to fit both cards, delete all drivers, install the 240 drivers 1st and then install the ATI ones over them? And do you connect both cards to the monitor? Could I do this throughthe HDMI (main GPU) and then sub connections for the 240?

Haha just read that sorry for the pile of questions. I really wanna do this but feel it may be complicated for me what being a noob and all!

Thanks :)
 
coolsouthern said:
Ah ok that sounds good as Ocuk have the Palit GT 240 at about £55 I think. Although I was tempted to get a 275 from the MM which was going for £120... great price!!

£55 for a Physx card is the more sensible option I suppose. How difficult was it to get it working as just a Physx card? What is the process? Did you have to fit both cards, delete all drivers, install the 240 drivers 1st and then install the ATI ones over them? And do you connect both cards to the monitor? Could I do this throughthe HDMI (main GPU) and then sub connections for the 240?

Haha just read that sorry for the pile of questions. I really wanna do this but feel it may be complicated for me what being a noob and all!

Thanks :)
Click to expand...
Grab the patch from here: http://www.ngohq.com/graphic-cards/...sx-when-ati-card-is-present-78.html#post86252

Install the NV card, install the drivers and then run the patch.

The NV card will need a connection to a display to be active (or a dummy monitor if you can find a guide) I use a VGA cable plugged into my LCD.
 
layte said:
9600 had 64sp's. The 240 has 96. I don't think memory speed has much baring on PhysX performance.

I bought a Palit 240 and run it as a dedicated PhysX card without issue, Batman AA runs perfectly with high PhysX settings and I even removed the fan to run it with passive cooling without issue. All powered from a BeQuiet DPP 650 PSU that is running a 4870x2 and a 4Ghz i7-920. Power draw from the 240 is minimal.
Click to expand...

Memory bandwidth doesn't normally have that much affect (tho in some cases it can but thats a more complex story) however you still ideally want atleast 20GB/s.
 
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