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Nvida Hybrid SLI

Security Corporate	Posted: March 21, 2009 02:34 am
Gore God of Massacre Group: Old BB:S Betatesters Posts: 3115 Joined: April 28, 2005	Well, I've been doing a bunch of research on Nvidia's Hybrid SLI and GeForce Boost features. Turns out my motherboard has those features automatically enabled, and I just need to be the corrosponding graphics card. My motherboard has GeForce 8200 integrated graphics, but that's currently being overshadowed by the 9400 GT already in there. Because of my case's slim profile, I cannot get the GeForce 9800 GT's and above cards. However, I found out that the GeForce 8400 GS and the 8500 GT are also compatible for Hybrid SLI / GeForce Boost. I'm currently led to believe I use one of those two cards in Hybrid SLI with my mobo's integrated 8200 graphics, the performance increase will be more than my current 9400 GT. I'm not sure whether I should experiment with this or not. What is everyone's opinion on the matter? And Luciel, have you ever had customer buy this kind of build?

Luciel	Posted: March 23, 2009 07:23 pm
Doom Trooper Group: Moderators Posts: 1070 Joined: August 18, 2005	Hi mate, While no one has bought that kind of build for me, i have configured it a couple of times in my time, enough to say that in my experience it´s not stable, but then again you don´t loose anything trying. The main problem is in games using features like for example shader model, that one of the 2 chips support and the other one doesn´t, which cause the "bridge" if you will to crash and/or cause graphic disruption/issues. You can get smaller versions of the 9600GT now, look for galaxy or manly, both do reduced sized versions.

Security Corporate

Posted: March 24, 2009 03:14 pm

Gore God of Massacre

Group: Old BB:S Betatesters
Posts: 3115

Joined: April 28, 2005

QUOTE (Luciel @ March 23, 2009 11:23 am)

You can get smaller versions of the 9600GT now, look for galaxy or manly, both do reduced sized versions.

I would have definitely went for that, however, my 220 watt slim form factor PSU won't be able to take the strain, and I can't find PSU's that small. Frankly, the only games play are Source games, so I just need something to max all those out (something the 9400 GT almost does, but it doesn't have the umph to do it online).

From a bit of research though, I've found that the low profile ATI Radeon 4650 and the GeForce 9500 GT won't tax my PSU as much and will be able to use:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16814102829

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16814150322

I just need a definite answer. Would it be a good idea to try these cards on my crappy PSU? You're the most experienced with these things, so I have to ask you. Thanks a lot for your help.

This post has been edited by Security Corporate on March 24, 2009 03:15 pm

mrmicky	Posted: March 24, 2009 04:10 pm
The Pwnerer Group: BB:S Team Posts: 1397 Joined: September 15, 2006	My personal experience with the 9600 GT is this. Max settings (16x AF + AA) on any source game even in high smoke containing areas, I would get well over 40 fps. It would sit on 90-120 fps when just walking. However on WoW I only get 40 FPS everywhere becuase of it's shitty design 9600 GT is a good card, but 220 wat PSU won't cut it. -------------------- Lightsaver the energy efficient Lightsabre

Security Corporate

Posted: March 24, 2009 05:11 pm

Gore God of Massacre

Group: Old BB:S Betatesters
Posts: 3115

Joined: April 28, 2005

QUOTE (mrmicky @ March 24, 2009 08:10 am)

My personal experience with the 9600 GT is this.

Max settings (16x AF + AA) on any source game even in high smoke containing areas, I would get well over 40 fps. It would sit on 90-120 fps when just walking.

However on WoW I only get 40 FPS everywhere becuase of it's shitty design

9600 GT is a good card, but 220 wat PSU won't cut it.

Good to know on it's abilities. Hehe and yeah, the 9600 GT is about as energy efficient as a Hummer. It's going to eat my PSU alive.

Does anyone know of any power supplies for slim form factor comptuers?

Luciel	Posted: March 25, 2009 10:52 pm
Doom Trooper Group: Moderators Posts: 1070 Joined: August 18, 2005	Unfortunately it´s the same deal with the asus pundit, 240w is as far as i know the most you can get on a psu that size (do not trust psus of that size that say more). you might be able to hook a 9500gt on there, depending on the hdd and ram you have (160-250gb sata hdd and 2gb ram would be compatible), again it also depends on brand, i know kingston value ram is very energy efficient, and hdd wise maxtor while far from the best, is the less energy consuming but it has to be sata, ide consumes a lot more, if you have a seagate, forget about it, great hard drives, but power hungry. Oh and no worries mate, glad i can help you : ) This post has been edited by Luciel on March 25, 2009 10:52 pm

Security Corporate

Posted: March 26, 2009 12:42 am

Gore God of Massacre

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Joined: April 28, 2005

QUOTE (Luciel @ March 25, 2009 02:52 pm)

Unfortunately it´s the same deal with the asus pundit, 240w is as far as i know the most you can get on a psu that size (do not trust psus of that size that say more).

you might be able to hook a 9500gt on there, depending on the hdd and ram you have (160-250gb sata hdd and 2gb ram would be compatible), again it also depends on brand, i know kingston value ram is very energy efficient, and hdd wise maxtor while far from the best, is the less energy consuming but it has to be sata, ide consumes a lot more, if you have a seagate, forget about it, great hard drives, but power hungry.

Oh and no worries mate, glad i can help you : )

Yikes, so I'm pretty much stuck with the 220 watt. Well, almost every component in my computer was made for energy efficiency. I'm using Crucial Rendition RAM, which has very low wattage, and my dual core processor is a 45 watt energy efficient one. I'm unsure of the brand of my hard drive, but I'm sure it sucks little energy as they wouldn't bundle an energy hog HD with a "green" system.

With all things considered, I still have a lot of power left for a good graphics card. The 9400 GT for sure runs just perfectly, and after some research (and what you've said), the 9500 GT will work out as well.

The ATI 4000 series of cards seems to be extremely energy efficient. Their mid-range Radeon 4650 card has recently gone low profile, and it does not require a 6 pin power connector at all (it gets everything from the PCI-E slot). Now, the requirements say that a 400 PSU is recommended, but the 4650 doesn't use a lot of power to begin with. Do you think I can get away using that card with a 220 watt PSU?

mallic

Posted: March 26, 2009 04:26 am

Penguin Overlord

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god knows me and you trekked the damn internet to find you a better psu only to realize that emachines orders theirs custom

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

QUOTE

I am too connected to you to
Slip away, to fade away
Days away I still feel you
Touching me, changing me

Security Corporate

Posted: March 26, 2009 04:50 am

Gore God of Massacre

Group: Old BB:S Betatesters
Posts: 3115

Joined: April 28, 2005

QUOTE (mallic @ March 25, 2009 08:26 pm)

god knows me and you trekked the damn internet to find you a better psu only to realize that emachines orders theirs custom

I feel like just buying a normal PSU, leave it outside the case, and then fitting the cables into the inside of the computer. It'll be ghetto sure, but at least I'll be able to get the graphics card I want.

But before I make any rash decisions, my question in my post before this one still stands.

Luciel	Posted: March 27, 2009 12:47 am
Doom Trooper Group: Moderators Posts: 1070 Joined: August 18, 2005	No the ati wont do it i´m afraid, i think a low end 9500gt would be the best option, search for the manli 9500GT 512mb ddr2 version

hunter	Posted: March 28, 2009 11:12 pm
Fantasma Cazador Group: Old BB:S Betatesters Posts: 3702 Joined: December 08, 2004	Forget all this confusion and buy another pc! --------------------

Security Corporate

Posted: April 02, 2009 06:53 am

Gore God of Massacre

Group: Old BB:S Betatesters
Posts: 3115

Joined: April 28, 2005

QUOTE (hunter @ March 28, 2009 03:12 pm)

Forget all this confusion and buy another pc!

I refuse!

Well Luciel, I believe I've found a solution. Upon further research, I found a low profile GeForce 8600 GT. Yes, it's an older series, however, thanks to Nvidia giving CUDA and PhyX support to GeForce 8 series cards (just downloading the proper drivers) the 8600 GT I found will be better because of higher memory and core clock speed and because it uses GDDR3 memory instead of GDDR2. The price on Amazon.com is a cheap $40, and from the reviews and benchmarks it should easily maximize the graphics on all Source games. I'm going for it.

Think it's worth a shot?