Card advice - real world power draw and points per card

[Chickenman]

So I am currently rocking a 280 that I will replace with a 560ti in my main rig, the main rig wont be crunching full time and the 560 is just to have dx11 support for mostly 1680x1050 gaming.

My question is about what the best choice id for my other rig (q6600 that currently lies dormant), it can run 3 PCIe cards and I kinda wanted to fill it up.

So, my options are:

1 - Keep 280, leave it undervolted (1v) at stock clocks and be done with it.
2 - Grab 2x 550ti for less power draw but more cores and the view to adding another 550ti for looks later.
3 - Run the 280 and a 550ti for the same (theoretical) power draw as 3x 550ti but possibly lower points per day.

I guess what I am asking is how relevant is the 280 compared to the current midrange cards when it comes to power draw/points/cost the theoretical stuff is... well theoretical as otis pointed out.


The 460 also gets a look in here so any experience/numbers from that would be cool as well.

[Otis11]

There are two more relevant pieces of information - How much does power cost where you are and what is the price of a 550ti (and I guess how much can you sell the 280 for).

Also, anyone know what the 550ti will do in PPD or Power draw?

If we can get those numbers I can throw it in my excel chart and give you a layout of your 3 options pretty accurately and show what is the best option depending on how long you are going to be keeping them.

I still run my GTX 260s... so I wouldn't say its outdated, but if we get that info we can decided if it's cost effective.

[Snow Crash]

Put the 280 in your Q6600 and be done with it

This will give you a bit of time to be all happy shiney with the additional points the 560 in your main's going to get you before you start looking around for something new Once you get over the initial rush from crunching you'll need something to keep you interested ... maybe next gen will be out by then and you will also have time to save up for the card that is better suited for the GPUGrid application, heck, they may have even changed the 32 core alignment by then
The problem with the 560 is that GPUGrid will only be using 2/3 of the cores so you won't get to actually use all those new fancy cores and OCing on a rig with 3 cards is also more difficult.

[Snow Crash]

Best thing to increase your points for now would be to put WinXP (32 or 64 is just fine) on your cruncher rig and set your preferences to LONG wus only. You should see a substantial increase just from doing that alone. Next I would say the heck with undervolting ... overvolt that bad boy and turn the shaders up

Seriously ... if you do those two things you will see a big difference in your overall points, your PPD, and also in your PPW

[Chickenman]

Next I would say the heck with undervolting ... overvolt that bad boy and turn the shaders up

The crazy thing is that at 1volt it does stock clocks no probs. at 1.15 which is still an "undervolt" it does 729/1458, I will have to look around and see what shader clocks people have been able to hit because I was quite impressed with it out of the box, I can remember benching at 1550 ish before but that was a couple years ago now.

I think I have missed something, does GPUgrid only use 32 shader cores per WU? EDIT: Read the other thread and answered my question as well as sending me away to start again... lol

The GTX580 and GTX570 are the best. Tomorrow you will be able to add the GTX590 to the top of the list. The GTX465, GTX470 and GTX480 cards are all better for crunching here than the GTX560 Ti, GTX550 Ti, GTX450 and GTS450.

The difference is in the architectures:

GTX465, GTX470 and GTX480 are Compute Capable (CC) 2.0 cards (GF100)
GTX460 is CC 2.1 (GF104)
GTS450 is CC 2.1 (GF106)
GT440, GT430 and GT420 are CC 2.1 (GF108)

GTX580 and GTX570 are CC2.0 (GF110)
GTX560 is CC 2.1 (GF114)
GTX550 is CC 2.1 (GF116)

GTX 590 is presumably CC2.0 (GF110)

All the CC2.0 cards have 32 cuda cores (shaders) per SM (core) and all the CC2.1 cards have 48shaders per SM. Unfortunately the CC2.1 cards under perform relative to the shader per SM as if they only have 32shaders per SM, making them about 33% slower per SM.

Bottom line - Get a CC2.0 card and not a CC2.1 card.

Another question is - my new SB motherboard is a UD3R B3 with no SLI support but it has a X4 PCIe slot for another card - will this run GPUgrid without issue if I was to put two nvidia cards in there?

[Otis11]

GPUGrid does not require SLI so you can run as many GPUs as you can fit in the Mobo.

[Snow Crash]

Keep in mind that on the X58 platform you should increase your IOH core volts for each card you add ..
1x = 1.1
2x = 1.15
3x = 1.2

I don't know about other platforms but I bet a similar adjustment should be made.
Any multi-card 775 plaform crunchers care to chime in?

[Snow Crash]

chickenman - let us know how serious you are about GPUGrid
You'll be top 10 in your country very soon !!!

1. Have you set GPUGrid preferences to LONG WUs only?

2. Have you reduced your BOINC cache so you don't get the next GPUGrid WU until just before you finish the last one?
(this will make sure you get the full *quick turn-around point bonus*)

3. Have you set your BOINC preferences to use 1 less core/thread less than you are using for CPU crunching. I see you are fellow WCG'er so if you set your processors to 99% that will leave one completely free for GPUGrid and you'll score much better!

4. As for OC'ing your card, shaders is pretty much the only thing that matters, GPU core does nothing so don't bump it up if you don't have to. Memory at stock should be just fine, just don't underclock it as you can starve the shaders if you do that too aggressively. I had a 285 that would do 1674 shaders at stock volts, I bet you could get there with some volt manilpulation, make sure to turn the fans to 11

5. For a 280 (or any 2XX series card) DO NOT set the SWAN_SYNC environ variable

6. Believe it ... your CPU OC makes a difference, fairly small but it does, so crank that up also. You probably already have done that to get the best for WCG but I'm just making sure

7. You're not likely to change OS on your main rig but in order of performance for an OS: Linux, follwed very closely by WinXP, with Vista and Win7 come in a distant 3rd.

Otis ... what did I forget? you know I hate the when the "old timers" kicks in
If anypne missed the reference to one of the GPUGrid experiments working on proteins related to alzheimer's http://www.gpugrid.net/forum_thread.php?id=2503) time to go read up, these guys are doing serious science

[Otis11]

Keep in mind that on the X58 platform you should increase your IOH core volts for each card you add ..
1x = 1.1
2x = 1.15
3x = 1.2

I don't know about other platforms but I bet a similar adjustment should be made.
Any multi-card 775 plaform crunchers care to chime in?

Huh... I need to look into that. I can run a single 260 at 1512 shaders, but when I add the second I have to drop to 1486 (whatever one click is, i'm trying to do that from memory)

If I up that... it might let me keep them up?
(i'm on p57)

[Snow Crash]

should ... give it a go and let us know

[Chickenman]

chickenman - let us know how serious you are about GPUGrid
You'll be top 10 in your country very soon !!!

1. Have you set GPUGrid preferences to LONG WUs only?

2. Have you reduced your BOINC cache so you don't get the next GPUGrid WU until just before you finish the last one?
(this will make sure you get the full *quick turn-around point bonus*)

3. Have you set your BOINC preferences to use 1 less core/thread less than you are using for CPU crunching. I see you are fellow WCG'er so if you set your processors to 99% that will leave one completely free for GPUGrid and you'll score much better!

4. As for OC'ing your card, shaders is pretty much the only thing that matters, GPU core does nothing so don't bump it up if you don't have to. Memory at stock should be just fine, just don't underclock it as you can starve the shaders if you do that too aggressively. I had a 285 that would do 1674 shaders at stock volts, I bet you could get there with some volt manilpulation, make sure to turn the fans to 11

5. For a 280 (or any 2XX series card) DO NOT set the SWAN_SYNC environ variable

6. Believe it ... your CPU OC makes a difference, fairly small but it does, so crank that up also. You probably already have done that to get the best for WCG but I'm just making sure

7. You're not likely to change OS on your main rig but in order of performance for an OS: Linux, follwed very closely by WinXP, with Vista and Win7 come in a distant 3rd.

Otis ... what did I forget? you know I hate the when the "old timers" kicks in
If anypne missed the reference to one of the GPUGrid experiments working on proteins related to alzheimer's http://www.gpugrid.net/forum_thread.php?id=2503) time to go read up, these guys are doing serious science

Thanks Snow Crash, I wont be changing from Win7 on this rig but my q6600 will be XP. The WCG stuff is going to taper off, will only be running on this rig in offpeak power times to try and keep things sustainable without the mrs going mental whereas gpugrid will chug along but possibly only overclocked in offpeak but I am waiting for the first bill so we shall see >.>

I have done the other things you mentioned except the cache thing? How can I alter that for GPU grid?

I had to have it off the last two nights as I have family staying and they couldn't sleep with all the fan noise

I will be buying the first new card next week for my quad, still looking through prices and performance/watt stuff in older threads so haven't made a decision about what I will grab yet.

[Snow Crash]

I have done the other things you mentioned except the cache thing? How can I alter that for GPU grid?

http://www.gpugrid.net/prefs.php?subset=global

then click edit preferences for whichever profile you have your PC configured to use and in the netwrok configuration section, second line down enter .01

Maintain enough work for an additional 0.01 days

as for a new card ... wait until you have the cash for a 570, you will get many more points with it than a 560 and the 570 will give you a much better points per watt overall.

[INFRNL]

@ OTIS: what brand 260's are you running? I will have to double check but my evga runs@ 1584 I believe with no issues. Also what is you avg for 1 260? I think I am around 45k now; will have to double check this as well

In the past when I was running 3 cards per system; it never affected my oc; only drawback was I lost a little bit for running multiple cards on 1 system.

[Otis11]

@ OTIS: what brand 260's are you running? I will have to double check but my evga runs@ 1584 I believe with no issues. Also what is you avg for 1 260? I think I am around 45k now; will have to double check this as well

In the past when I was running 3 cards per system; it never affected my oc; only drawback was I lost a little bit for running multiple cards on 1 system.

One is EVGA and one is MSI both one tick below 1512 shaders (I'd check but that cruncher is currently down)

I was averaging 70-90K PPD each depending on what WUs I was getting. I've never been able to run it past 1512 but I also haven't figured out how to mess with their voltages...