Destroyer Quad SLI?

[Sukina]

I bought a destroyer and am running a 9950 BE phenom @ 3.0 (Everything over is unstable, guess I'm just unlucky) 8 gigs of ram @ 1066, 950 W (1030 max PSU) all of which seems to be running well, and 2 9800 GX2, which I am attempting to quad SLI (then the trouble starts) I need some help.

Let me start from the bottom. Yes, both cards work, Ive rotated them to check functionality. Yes they are connected correctly, and are in the correct slots. However, I DO NOT know, and need to know how to check for if the secondary pci 2.0 16 slot is working. (this must be the cause).

My problem. When both cards are in the system w/ NO SLI bridge, I detect 2 9800 gx2 (the manufacturer says I should detect 4, since there are technically 4 GPUs) I can engage SLI without the bridge and get the multi core to process one whole card (2 GPUs) with no problem. Here's where it gets 'weird'. With SLI engaged, I add the SLI bridge (complete powerdown, and myself staticly grounded, with system unplugged). When I start up bios boots, then the windows load bar comes up, and blinks off to a black screen, and thats it, nothing else.

When SLI is off, there is no problem even with bridge in place. I have reinstalled the drivers a few times also. Ive gone through this cycle maybe twice. Including having left the system with SLI OFF, With SLI bridge in place (boots fine) then initiating SLI, whereupon it restarts and goes back to the same black screen after windows tries to load. IT WILL ONLY load in safe mode, and then obviously, the drivers are severely reduced or off altogether.

Is the destroyer even quad capable? Is it the BIOS? Or more likely, is it the PCI slot? Solutions? Tests?

[FatAlbert]

hmm, I haven't got access to that powerful cards but I think the gx2 will run in quad sli. try blue ones slots. when I was benchinh with two 73gt ddr2 first was in blue and the second card was in second (red) pci-e slot, try run quad sli in different slots. try higher pci-e frequency (I'm not sure about it)

[Aura89]

You could try putting both cards into the 8x lanes, which are the Blue PCI-Express slots, like the guy said above, i don't think though that you'd be able to put in in a combination.... only reason i say that is unless you have a smaller SLI-Bridge then you can't lol

[Sukina]

actually I think it came with 3 bridges... 1 for card long, 1 for 2 card shirt, and 1 for 3 cards. Ill see if I cant get it to fit. who knows, it might not even register as haveing a primary if theyre both in the 8's. How about performance? Think that will suffer if theyre both in 8x? Im gonna do some functionality tests to figure out what is and isnt working this weekend, and if I find it is the slot, I guess Ill RMA. No point in having 500 bucks of video power, if I cant use but half of it...

[Aura89]

actually I think it came with 3 bridges... 1 for card long, 1 for 2 card shirt, and 1 for 3 cards. Ill see if I cant get it to fit. who knows, it might not even register as haveing a primary if theyre both in the 8's. How about performance? Think that will suffer if theyre both in 8x? Im gonna do some functionality tests to figure out what is and isnt working this weekend, and if I find it is the slot, I guess Ill RMA. No point in having 500 bucks of video power, if I cant use but half of it...

No i don't think that 8x will hinder performance because it's PCI-Express 2.0, 8x is enough bandwidth in 2.0

As to the 3 bridges you got, you only have 1 with 2-way SLI capabilities, and that one is long, preventing you from doing any cards close together, the other two SLI bridges are for different 3-way SLI configurations, one is all right next to eachother and the other is 2 next to eachother and the 3rd all the way at the bottom of the motherboard

I'm not saying that 2-way SLI would be impossible with a combination of a 16x and 8x slots, you would just need a different SLI bridge :P

[Sukina]

crap. I ran out of time to do much yesterday, but I thinj one of the cards might've been fried when I swapped them around... I need to tweak some more to make sure its not the mobo. If I get fed up with playing with it, Ill just RMA both the cards and the mobo. Then I just have to play aroudn and hope I dont get more DOA stuff... I wonder if the slot can be dead without the rest of the mobo being fried?

[saaya]

welcome to XtremeSystems Sukina :toast:

It sounds more like a vga/vga driver problem to me, but im not sure i understand everything correctly.
individually each card works fine?
you can enable sli with a single card (its dual gpu) and it works fine?
but as soon as you add the second card you cant enter windows?
are you using the latest driver?
are all power cables connected to the cards?
what psu are you using?

you can boot in safe mode, so i assume the problem is somehow caused by the driver, which doesnt fully load in safe mode...
Id recommend you to use a driver cleaning tool and then install the latest drivers and see if that works...

hope this helps :toast:

EDIT: is this all with the cpu oced to 3ghz?
does the same problem happen at stock speeds?

[Sukina]

I thought about the OC, I wondered if I was close to the limit voltage, so I reduced the system to standard clock. (knowing that now the watts have to be there)

However something interesting has occured. Both cards (I checked again) work. Both PCI slots technically, work. But now, (and Im going to play with it a bit to make sure I havent just got a seating error, and I will cut off Hybrid SLI in bios just to be sure), I have the mobo beep at me after I see the bios screen and windows starts to load. Weird!!! But at least so far, it is looking alot more like a software error. I'm going to check out EVGA (my vga manufacturer) for software updates. Also you mentioned a cleaner. Suggestions? I'm rather relived at this point that I dont think I'll have to take my mobo out... but the situation is no less dire... If worse comes to worse, Ill reset bios just to make sure this isnt my own doing...

[Sukina]

Everything hardware-wise works. Enabled SLI works for an individual card (lets it use both its cores)

Problem: When SLI bridge is added (when complete powerdown, PSU off, monitor off, and static ground) the system WILL NOT get past loading windows.

Useful Info: With both cards in the system, definitely working, with both pci slots definitely working, the system only registers two cards (should show 4).

Is this a bios error?

What I have done to fix possible software issues (running vista 64 ultimate) includes installing the absolute latest drivers (with fixes for vista at that), (178.15)

What should me bios settings be? Im playing with those now to check for possible screwups on my end.

[Sukina]

*Note*
With SLI bridge on the system will boot, if nVidia is turned to multiple displays instead of multiple GPUs

[demonkevy666]

is he even tried using the on board video maybe it's defaulting it on when he pouts in the other card....?

by the way dose this board have ACC or a bios update with ACC ?

[Sukina]

Not sure, How would I check that? (about the ACC/BIOS)

Its not the onboard, I have it cut out in bios. I have it boots PCIE first and Onboard enables ONLY if no VGA is found.

Could still be Bios. Its rather frustrating to have everything work, and not have it want to work together...

[Aura89]

is he even tried using the on board video maybe it's defaulting it on when he pouts in the other card....?

by the way dose this board have ACC or a bios update with ACC ?

I've wondered that too about ACC, currently it doesn't but foxconn did say that they'd put ACC in their 780a motherboard when it comes out....i just hope that means through a bios update rather a whole new motherboard

[Aura89]

Not sure, How would I check that? (about the ACC/BIOS)

Its not the onboard, I have it cut out in bios. I have it boots PCIE first and Onboard enables ONLY if no VGA is found.

Could still be Bios. Its rather frustrating to have everything work, and not have it want to work together...

try disabling hybrid SLI or whatever, in that same window about the "enable only when no VGA is found" it should be the first option

[Sukina]

In talking again to the EVGA, they brought up the point that it may be the south or north bridge. Im gonna need to more support from Foxconn just to make sure there isnt a newer BIOS first. Kinda hoping I dont have to RMA, put another board in, just to find out it still wont work. Everyone is claiming it shouldnt be compatibility issues... This is really turning out to be stressful:shakes:. And to think I thought after I got it to powerup and load windows the first time, the hard part was over, HA! Never!! :shocked:

[demonkevy666]

In talking again to the EVGA, they brought up the point that it may be the south or north bridge. Im gonna need to more support from Foxconn just to make sure there isnt a newer BIOS first. Kinda hoping I dont have to RMA, put another board in, just to find out it still wont work. Everyone is claiming it shouldnt be compatibility issues... This is really turning out to be stressful:shakes:. And to think I thought after I got it to powerup and load windows the first time, the hard part was over, HA! Never!! :shocked:

what os are you using ?
with two 9800 Gx2's is going to be using 2gbs of memory if it's 32bit and not leaving you left with much for the system.

[Sukina]

Vista 64.

[Aura89]

what os are you using ?
with two 9800 Gx2's is going to be using 2gbs of memory if it's 32bit and not leaving you left with much for the system.

Card only has 1gig of GDDR3 ram on it and it only uses 512 megs of that

[Sukina]

ugh. I suppose I'll RMA, see if I get a board that it will work on. That dosent work, I suppose Ill just be screwed.

[Swanie]

Well hope you got it fixed, if not i had similar problems on a different board and it turned out to be the PSU. dont know what u running but check it.