Quick nooby question.

[Moonpie2]

Hi there

In a system with 2 GPUs (both AMD but both different).

If the output cable is plugged into the weaker of the cards, can you still tell your PC to use the more powerful of the cards (for gaming and such) and having it output through the weaker card, or you basically need to plug monitors into the more powerful card?

- Cheers

 

[tamzzy]

Lucidlogix virtu was supposed to fix this, but it was flavour of the month for the z77 boards. So I suspect you'd have to run the cable from the more powerful gpu

 

[Moonpie2]

Hmm.... I suspected that might be the answer.
Well, maybe I'll try and do some internal jiggling inside my cramped case

 

[tamzzy]

Can you not just plug the dp cable onto the better card?

 

[Moonpie2]

Well, I would also assume the 'better' card should go in the PCEIx16 3.0 slot? And not the lower 2.0 slots?
That would mean some internal re-wangling of my cramped case due to different card lengths.

At the end of the day, maybe I would just keep the better card in a 2.0 slot and plug the monitors into that. No biggie

 

[tamzzy]

Dropping from pcie 3.0 to 2.0 doesn't make a big difference. Couple of percent at worst. Of course thats assuming that your 2.0 slot is wired as a x16, not x8

PS how old is your board? Z68 or earlier?

 

[Moonpie2]

asrock z77 pro4 m

So, I guess the 2.0 slots are fine

 

[tamzzy]

Oh wow, didn't realise some z77 boards had mixed 3.0/2.0 slots.
Also from the specs "- 2 x PCI Express 2.0 x16 slots (PCIE3: x1 mode; PCIE4: x4 mode)"

Your 2.0 slot is electrically a x4. Which is equivalent to a pcie 3.0 X2. I would move it, performance of any GPU there would be gimped.

Just out of interest, have you tried Virtu, seeing as you do actually have a z77 board?