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New to SLI, second card periodically being recognised, help!

3t3P

3t3P

3t3P

Soldato
Joined
20 Dec 2006
Posts
3,760
Hi all

Added a second GTX 470 and when it works its great, bringing lots more horsepower for 3D etc. I can select the SLI option in NV control panel and can also see the second card in MSI afterburner.

However on some boots the second card doesn't show up in either of the programs:( or device manager..

I tried changing the BIOS PCI/PCIE startup sequence and thought that had solved it, but it hasn't.

On 285.38 drivers

First card is MSI second PNY but I know this shouldn't make a difference.

Any ideas? It's really annoying I just want my PC to boot with both cards enabling all the time

Is it worth updating the motherboard BIOS?

Cheers

well I disabled the LAN controllers and booted up, for the first time a windows message bubble popped up saying something about a PCI bridge, hopefully now its working reliably.

Update: So I managed to update the mobo bios to the latest and greatest, (vers 2001) and on first boot both cards were in NV control panel and device manager.

However it is STILL failing to initiate on some boots.
I've reseated the card and re-jiggled the power connectors to no avail.

Does anyone know what is happening here!?
It's re-heally annoying to have to boot again and again to play games using sli:(
 
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Brands of cards don't matter as long as they are same VRAM model.

As for the problem.... um. So you checked all the power connections at both PSU and GFX end. Also check the SLI bridge make sure that is seated correctly.
 
yeh ive reseated all power connections and even cleaned the sli connector area too.

i cant swap the cards around as top card is under water, second on air atm.

it seems the slots are working, seems a software/windows problem, its just bizarre
 
but I know the second card works...

googling around this is a well documented problem with this board:(

a possible fix is since the bios update to format again. would like to avoid that situation but if I have to...

its got me beat

PS: sli bridge cable can fit on either orientation, right?
 
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argh again with the non-sli boot

sg.jpg


I have my old HX620 spare, which didn't make coil noise like this AX850! that's just great, £140 for a premium PSU that's worse than my 5yr old one...

BIOS is fully up to date now...

I don't think its a power or mobo slot problem from reading around, it's this damn board, which is disappointing as its med-high end

GPU-Z says 'SLI Disabled'

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1606465

http://www.overclock.net/intel-motherboards/1051943-p8p67-deluxe-problem.html

http://www.eggxpert.com/forums/thread/704290.aspx

http://forums.us.ncix.com/forums/index.php?mode=showthread&msg_id=2360392&threadid=2360392&forum=101&product_id=59314&msgcount=12&overclockid=0

Just uninstalled all NV drivers, cleaning them out one by one in safe mode with driver sweeper.
Reinstalled driver again and STILL not seeing second card
 
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I cant find the link now as im (supposed to be...) working but with AMD the drivers are set to swich the 2nd card off when not in use (by default). There is a value in the reg' that you can change to keep them both on all the time. Im playing out tonight but i will paste it in here for you tomorrow..?
 
any links would be great m8

Just installed WHQL drivers and thought that had fixed it, but no

in good news though, got both cards at 800mhz core on a boot that DID work and got 9826 3D mark 11 points on the performance preset, I wanna break 10k though:D

scr.jpg


broke 10k with 825mhz core clocks:)
 
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http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums...Recent-5970-experiences&p=4178603#post4178603

"Have you guys tried turning off ULPS?

ULPS feature is enabled by default installing this driver, however you can edit this setting from windows registry,

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\Cl ass\{4D36E968-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}\0000\EnableUlps

set 1 to enable ULPS
set 0 to disable ULPS

many users have another folders than 0000. I had 0000 and 0001. Some have had 0002, 0003 0004 etc. Where ever you find EnableUlps change it to 0 it fixed my lockups with everest and both gpus downclock to 157 with the 9.12 hotfix drivers

original source here.

edit: everest still hard locks the system everything goes blabnk on gpu1 and then it locks. "
 
resolved now, for what ever reason i've yet to have a boot where SLI did not initiate:)

seems eventually perhaps that BIOS update seeped through and started doing some good, either that or the NV drivers sorted themselves out:)

SLI 4tw
 
3t3P said:
resolved now, for what ever reason i've yet to have a boot where SLI did not initiate:)

seems eventually perhaps that BIOS update seeped through and started doing some good, either that or the NV drivers sorted themselves out:)

SLI 4tw
Click to expand...

How did you manage to fix this mate, as om having this issue where the 2nd card dosent gert picked up from time to time.

Both cards work great in either slot, ive switched the top card to the bottom card and vice versa.

Ive updated the bios on the mobo and put the latest drivers on and its still doing it .
 
Seems to be a specific problem to that board :| from a quick google seems a few people have it and its totally random, sometimes goes away by itself, sometimes just pops up out the blue.

EDIT: Are you turning all power off to the board when shutting down either mains switch or PSU switch? someone has it booting up fine every time if they shutdown but don't power off entirely, but it randomly happens again after the motherboard loses all power.
 
Yeah i just press shutdown and leave it as it is, the light remains on the mobo.

Strange thing is its worked fine with no issues at all for over a month.
 
Also seems if you installed the OS on the board with a BIOS version <1305 and then update to 1305 or higher BIOS you HAVE to reinstall the OS to get reliable SLI operation (but even then some people still have issues but that fixes it for most) if you initially had 1305 or higher BIOS reinstall won't make any odds.
 
Not sure what was in it, SLI deffo works tho as it picked both cards up after the bios flash, well once anyway.

Im tempted to offer both on MM and then get a single better card. I dont really want to swap out mobos again.
 
Clean the card's edge connector with some alcohol or something.

Recently Nvidia control panel kept coming up and telling me I had no SLI bridge. Turned out the edge connectors were dirty.

And I had a Radeon that did it once too. Didn't work at all.. It's kinda like the old "Blow in the socket" on an NES dude.. Just try cleaning the edge connectors on the GPUS.

Ed. When a GPU that needs power doesn't get it they usually have a speaker aboard that makes a right old noise if you are not getting power to the card.

My 8800 Ultra used to scream its lungs out if I forgot to connect the power cables.
 
I did use my arctic TIM cleaner on the cards sli cojnector area, maybe that did ig in the end lol. its not exactly as high-pressure connection wise compared to the PCIE slt so maybe if its a bit dirty there is poor contact...

very annoying problem though and yeh one possible fix i came across was to update BIOS and format
 
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