Additional gfx card for physx

[DarkParadox]

Evening all, i have built a pretty good gaming pc as it is and plays 99% flawlessly at max everything, but, i am wondering if i can use my spare 8800gtx in the other 16x slot in my mobo to use for just the physx. ive debated this idea myself for sometime but i want to know opinions/advice for if its viable or not and how to do it (like using the sli clip to join the cards). the mobo is crossfire, only option i had at the time.

spec of pc:

Gigabyte GA-MA790FXT-UD5P AMD 790X + SB750 Socket AM3 Motherboard
AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 965 Black Edition 140W 3.40GHz
G.Skill Ripjaw 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C7 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (F3-12800CL7D-4GBRH)
Samsung F3 500GB 16MB Sata II HD502HJ x2 raid0
Thermaltake Spedo Advance Case
52 in 1 Card Reader Black with USB
Logitech Z-2300 2.1 Channel Speaker System
Thermaltake W0132RB 1000W ATX2.2 Modular Power Supply
Asus Xonar D2 7.1 Channel Audio (PCI-E)
LG 22x DVDRW/RAM SATA Internal Drive - black
Asus GeForce GTX 295 1792MB GDDR3 PCI-Express Graphics Card (Single PCB)

Cheers
Jason

[Aaron]

No real tech knowledge needed.. Just stick the card in the extra PCI-E slot, start up and in the nVidia control panel, select that you want to use the 8800 as the card for physx instead of the 295.. No sli bridge etc needed, and doesnt matter that your board is crossfire only - it'll still work :)

[DarkParadox]

ahh excellent, cheers Aaron. Still always get confused with sli and crossfire :thumb:

[wonderlust]

As Aaron said.

I did just this at the weekend, stuck in my old 8800GT in the second slot of my P45 board the drivers were picked up automatically and Physx was autoenabled in the control panel.

[Bradmax57]

you can use a nvidia card for physx whilst using a ati card for the main display?

[{SAS}TB]

you can use a nvidia card for physx whilst using a ati card for the main display?

Yep


Source (http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1456964)


Warnings: Proceed at your own risk. The patch used here is not an official patch from Nvidia but it works. It was written by GenL. It works great for me so far, but your results may vary. If you're willing to take the plunge, read on!

Assumptions: You have an ATI card plugged in that you wish to use as main render. You have an Nvidia card plugged in that you wish to use for dedicated Physx. Both their drivers have been installed.

Step 1: Download latest nvidia driver. Pick the driver that fits your card and OS. I picked the latest beta drivers for 9 series cards and win 7 64 bit.
http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us

Step 2: Download the physx patch. Found here.
http://www.ngohq.com/graphic-cards/1...html#post82837 (http://www.ngohq.com/graphic-cards/16223-nvidia-disables-physx-when-ati-card-is-present-30.html#post82837)
There's mod 1.01 lite for x86 or 1.01 lite for x64. I personally picked 1.01 lite for x64.

TB EDIT I used THIS (http://www.ngohq.com/attachments/graphic-cards/2379d1259440244-nvidia-disables-physx-when-ati-card-is-present-physx-mod-1.02.rar)Physix Patch

Step 3: Goto the control panel and Uninstall any previous Nvidia drivers/Nvida Physx/Nvidia stereo vision.

Step 4. Install the latest Nvidia drivers that you previously downloaded. I chose the beta drivers.

Step 5 Restart your system in safe mode by hitting F8. Choose the top most safe mode. Now run the physx patch you downloaded in step 2. It should report several files have been patched.

Step 6: Reboot your system again. Right click your desktop and click on screen resolution. Click Detect. This should give you an greyed out imaginary monitor. Click on that monitor icon, then with that monitor, select available display output on nvida video card. Then click try connect anyway on vga and then apply.
Next click on extend desktop to this display. So now you have two monitors extended plus an imaginary nvidia monitor extended as well. Now you are ready to start enabling physX!

Step 7: Rightclick your desktop and then click on nvidia control panel that now appears. Click set physx configuration. Then Click on enabled for set Physx GPU acceleration choices.

And now you're done! You may run Fluidmark to confirm that hardware physx has been enabled. Higher Vantage 3dmark scores will also result. And yes now you can finally play batman with your ATI doing massively pretty rendering and still get all the cool physx effects eye candy turned on at the same time.

ATI+Nvidia -- The way it was meant to be played! http://www.hardforum.com/images/smilies/smile.gifI would just like to reiterate "Warnings: Proceed at your own risk"

Good Luck !!

BTW I used the 195.62 nV Drivers (Win 7 64 Bit) and the Cat 9.12s with the ATI Hotfix

[Umar]

Yep

Good Luck !!

BTW I used the 195.62 nV Drivers (Win 7 64 Bit) and the Cat 9.12s with the ATI Hotfix
Thanks for posting that I'll deffinately take a look into this ... now to find me an Nvidia card :rolleyes:

Umar

[skunksmash]

im about to follow this guide tomorrow afternoon.....im gonna attempt to install a GTX260 with the 5970, using the above method..

i just downloaded the latest NV drivers & the physX patch..... hopefully ATI is kind to me & i dont have to endure too much heartache.. :p

[node]

Didn't know you could do this! Physx is still pretty overated and underused in games, but I've always got a spare GFX card somewhere. Easier than SLI too since it can be a different card.

[DarkParadox]

A little update, i realised that i actually only have my 7900gtx as i sold my 8800gtx sometime ago, so i cant do this anyway :(

[skunksmash]

SWEET!!! :D:D:D

http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/272/phys2.png

was a bit of a nightmare to get into the case (poor P5K), i had to loose the USB headers on the mobo...

also getting physX running with the latest NV drivers & an ATI primary was a complete headache.. :(

but i love this mobo....it chews up & swallows anything i throw at it...:)

check out my new vantage run...



previous / OCed (875/1200).... without physX

http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/1246/vantage4.png


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


new / stock clocks (735/1010), physX on :thumb:

http://img25.imageshack.us/img25/9161/phys3.png

[Gazanimal]

Nice work SkunkSmash.

:thumb:

[wonderlust]

strange how my q6600/GTX260 with an 8800gt doing physX beats your cpu score?!?

http://forums.aria.co.uk/showpost.php?p=157723&postcount=102

[skunksmash]

whats the Q6600 clocked at..??, what your system RAM clocks & timings..?? :)

[wonderlust]

in that post it was @ 3ghz and 3.6Ghz, ram is 800 @ spd settings of 5.5.5.12 too lazy to set it to the EPP settings ;)

on a very old and bloated Windows 7 x64 install, the GTX260 is a GFG maxcore ocx on it's standard clocks 655/1125/1404 qnd the 8800gt was at bog standard timings.

Edit:-

my board is a P45 so both cards were running Pci-e x8 v2

[skunksmash]

well there you have it.... your PCIE 2.0 x8 slots are the equivalent to my PCIE 1.1 X16 slots...

my 2nd slot (PCIE 1.1 x4), is giving off pretty low bandwidth..... it would be the equivalent to a PCIE 2.0 x2 slot on your board.

i'd probably get the same results with a 9600 :p

[wonderlust]

Thought there was something strange that a chip with more cache and 2 better gpus appeared to be slower but now it all makes sense! ;)

[marsey99]

you can also sli on a p35/38/45/48 you know :thumb:

[skunksmash]

you can also sli on a p35/38/45/48 you know :thumb:

really....???

pray, continue. :p

[marsey99]

o yes, you need hacked drivers which trick the forceware into thinking the chipset is x58 and it works, physically they work the same and have for a few years but it was software that stopped it.

thers a thread on tpu on how to do it, hang on il find some linkage :D

edit

ignore the op they got it working and the links are to the end of the thread, i cant do it but i know many others with sli on the p45 ud3p.

http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=60844

[skunksmash]

o yes, you need hacked drivers which trick the forceware into thinking the chipset is x58 and it works, physically they work the same and have for a few years but it was software that stopped it.

thers a thread on tpu on how to do it, hang on il find some linkage :D

edit

ignore the op they got it working and the links are to the end of the thread, i cant do it but i know many others with sli on the p45 ud3p.

http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=60844

cheers Marsey your a font of knowledge..... :kungfu:

this opens up a few more ''experimentation'' doors while using my existing H/W...:thumb:

[marsey99]

i just read stuff i find interesting m8, i think its about page 100 in that thread you want for the later drivers.

hey you live and learn, learn and teach m8.

i except pay pal, hardware or sexual favours, dont mind which :lol:

[skunksmash]

i just read stuff i find interesting m8, i think its about page 100 in that thread you want for the later drivers.

hey you live and learn, learn and teach m8.

i except pay pal, hardware or sexual favours, dont mind which :lol:

i'll take this option if its all the same to you mate.... :DSnigger

[wonderlust]

hmm can I SLI an 8800gt and a GTx260? ;)