Build not making the cut

OmegaRed

I've been having some issues with my my rig that i built a few months back. It just seems like I am not getting enough out of it and there is a bottleneck somewhere but I am not sure where.

Here are the main specs:
MSI P6N SLI-FI, Sockel 775 nForce650i
SLI Club3D 8800GTS, 512MB, NVIDIA Geforce 8800GTS X 2 (SLI)

4096MB-Kit OCZ PC2-6400 ReaperX HPC Enhanced Bandwidth X 3 (6 gigs)

Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 boxed, 8192Kb, LGA775, 64bit

MS Windows Vista Ultimate 64bit

I was have trouble running crysis and crysis wars on medium settings and chalked it down to crysis being the monster that it is but I I am now playing FarCry 2 and struggels ever now and again. I have a 24" monitor. I have reduced the settings on FarCry 2 to 1280X1024, AAX2, DX10, and everything on very high and it still laggs pretty bad in parts.
Another problem that I have come accross is in the System Score that you can run with Vista. It never works when I run it it alos stopps half way through. My scores are 5.9 for everything except my RAM which is at 4.5 so my over all system score is 4.5.
Any suggestions on why you think it might not be performing a bit better?
Thanks

Sqaull20

Sli makes Crysis a nightmare, its up and down constantly.I havent got around to getting Far Cry 2 yet, but from looking at the reviews its not as hard as Crysis, but Dx10 still needs serious power.

You have a nice system, but sli for me anyway was nothing but a head ache.

I would sell those two video cards and get the just as fast, without the issues HD4870.

You should get the price of the HD4870 ( €220 ) from the sale of your 2 8800gts's.

http://www.pixmania.ie/ie/uk/1344930/art/sapphire-technology/radeon-hd-4870-512-mb-gdd.html

After that I would re install windows and get the latest drivers and patches for your video card/games.

OmegaRed

Well, I just got completely annoyed with the whole thing for the last two days. So I decided to strip everything and start from scratch. Bear minimum.

I tried it with just 1 single graphics card in and get this, I got more FPS on a bench mark test.

My theory: On the mother board there is an SLI bridge chip that you can actually take out and switch around for SLI mode or non SLI mode. My guess is that this chip just can’t handle the load balancing between the two cards (maybe the two cards have so many pipe lines that the bridge can’t handle it all of them).

I have another MoBo that is SLI and dose not have this chip which I got a few months ago:
http://www.elara.ie/products/detailsfull.asp?productcode=ECE1326199

Gonna try that tonight and see how I fair! Will keep you posted!

Anti

The 650i was known for being a nightmare in sli. But a bios and chipset update sorted that. Make sur eyou have the latest.

OmegaRed

No go! It still works better with just one card even with the other (better) board. When I turn on SLI, the FPS drops by about 20 FPS.

Is it the games or is it that this board and the other (680i and 650i) are just poor SLI boards for 8800GTX’s?

Is it worth buying a better SLI board like a 750i/780i/780a/790i?

Cuddlesworth

OmegaRed wrote: »

No go! It still works better with just one card even with the other (better) board. When I turn on SLI, the FPS drops by about 20 FPS.

Is it the games or is it that this board and the other (680i and 650i) are just poor SLI boards for 8800GTX’s?

Is it worth buying a better SLI board like a 750i/780i/780a/790i?

Maybe you should give up on the idea of SLI, its inherently a waste of time and resources.

OmegaRed

you're right an I am starting to feel that way about it myself.

I just watnted a machine that could handle anything a I threw at it and with the results trhat one card has produced I should have been ablt to do that with two.

I guess I just go the GTX 280 route or ATI.

Anti

sli on a 780 is much improved over the 6XX boards. But remember the game has to support SLI or you will see no benifit at all, or even reduced performance. But from my experience with 780i boards, their a pile of steaming shit. Badly fitted heatpipes caused overheatign and death to 3 boards !!

the_syco

OmegaRed wrote: »

I just watnted a machine that could handle anything a I threw at it and with the results trhat one card has produced I should have been ablt to do that with two.

I guess I just go the GTX 280 route or ATI.

Was thinking the same way myself not too long ago, but found that SLI only got a 20% increase, if even that. Good for heavy digital production, bad for gaming, it would seem. Looking at the 280 myself. Looks excellent, and from reviews (of people here), can handle games at ultra high.

Anti

ati 4870, cheaper then the 280 and a fair bit faster.

OmegaRed

If I go the ATI route i'll ahve to switch MB also. Probably not a bad idea though seieng as i've now had it up to here with SLi!

AlmightyCushion

OmegaRed wrote: »

If I go the ATI route i'll ahve to switch MB also. Probably not a bad idea though seieng as i've now had it up to here with SLi!

No you won't. If you want to crossfire two cards together then you would but you can use a single ati card fine on that motherboard.