The 7950GX2 - Is it SLI or Not ??

[bagman]

Hi there
I've been wondering about this for a while now, but what prompted me to ask the question here was the GPU load balancing bar.
I have recently discovered I can enable this feature even though it is not offered in the Control Panel.
I simply go to “run” and in the “start “ panel paste the following: 'rundll32.exe nvcpl.dll,LaunchMultiGpuApplet' . Without the quotes. You can then make sure "Enable SLI Multi-GPU" is selected and also have the option to tick "Show GPU load balancing".
Now, I was always under the impression that the 7950GX2 was in essence a 7900GT SLI setup but reduced to being a "single card" board as it only requires one PCI Express slot.
So if the 7950GX2 multi-GPU card is not your traditional SLI setup, how is it that I can enable the load balancing bar ?

In addition, why does the loading bar ( whether vertical or horizontal) only appear when running certain games ?
For example, when running Doom 3, Far Cry, GRAW, Splinter Cell Chaos Theory the vertical bar appears.
When running Medal of Honor Allied Assault the horizontal bar appears.
However, Splinter Cell Double Agent and Call of Duty 2 do not show either bars.

Does the loading bar only appear if the game is "optimized"for SLI ??

MOHAA is very old so I can't see how the bar shows with it and not with COD2

Many thanks in advance for your assistance
Bagman

 

[mrthingyx]

As far as I'm aware, the GX2 is effectively 'SLI on a stick."

 

[Darkwave]

It's basically two GO 7900s, roughly of 7900GS/GT performance each, sandwiched together in SLI.

P.S. Split it and you'll find the second PCI-E slot, one board simply serves as an expansion board.

 

[bagman]

Thanks guys.
Another question please. When I enable the load balancing, I either have a vertical bar on the left with a solid green bar that expands and contracts or a horizontal bar that pretty well stays in the middle of the screen.
I do not have both at the same time.
To ensure load balancing is working correctly, which is correct i.e. both vertical and horizontal bars at the same time or only one depending on whether I have selected AFR or split frame rendering in multi-GPU performance mode ?

cheers

 

[Rroff]

If you have a 7950GX2 you will find nVtray very useful (allows you to get to the multiGPU applet and stuff) http://nvtweak.laptopvideo2go.com/

I also reccomend nHancer http://www.nhancer.com/ as it allows you to tweak the SLI profiles for games.

The load balancing bar should show for every game - even ones that don't support SLI - in those cases the bar would simply be empty. (EDIT not sure if that is default behavior as I have things tweaked - it might be that those games do not support SLI and its not showing up)

Contrary to common belief the 7950GX2 is NOT based on 2x 7900GT boards but is infact a slightly modified version of the G71M core - its 2x Geforce GO 7900GTX... one way to look at this card is to look at it as 3 parts... a part that slots into your PCI-e x16 slot and then provides 2x PCI-e x8 lanes that then are each populated by a 7900 series GPU... so yes its a full SLI solution.

 

[Rroff]

Afaik you can't get both unless you have a quad SLI setup

 

[gt_junkie]

Works a treat too. Had to go all the way to an 8800GTX to beat it sufficiently.

Mine got 9331 in 3DMark06 in an AMD X2 system.

gt

 

[gizmoy2k]

Yep its sli and works very well....in XP

The main reason I got rid of mine was because of lack of vista support, haven't looked for a while but im still not sure this card is fully supported yet in vista

 

[Rroff]

Supposedly some of the driver sets on guru3D work with this card under vista but I've not tried it...

 

[matt100]

i HATED my 7950gx2.. never could seem to get it working right.

Asus P5B delux, c2d at 3.2ghz and couldn't get above 9k 3dm 06. I managed 8500 with 2 7800gtx in sli and an amd setup.

Well rid of that card now tbh, I'm sure if you hit the sweet spot its an awesome setup (I did managed to get over 10k in 3dm06 once or twice but never found that spot again) not for me though.. out of the box awesomeness courtesy of an 8800gtx will do fine.

 

[Rroff]

Its a lot of work to get above 10K with it... but it is possible... with some decent cooling and a volt mod the core does clock up nicely... a good CPU helps.

 

[Tute]

So around GTS speeds then?

 

[gt_junkie]

So around GTS speeds then?

Yup. But the extra memory and larger memory bandwidth over the 320 GTS means it more than matches and sometimes beats it. 640's obviously a little bit faster tho.

My GX2 would have broken 10k had i had a C2D to go with it.

gt