Judas

I'm gonna jump the gun here and try something...

as the reports floating around on the internet about win7's capability of allowing 2 very different video drivers to work in tendem have been very good. Plus the fact that i feel like trying something crazy...

the problem is if i had 2x HD4870x2's in crossfire.... this leaves VERY little room for a 3rd card... it would have to be a single slot solution.

I was looking at getting a 9800GT nvidia card for the job... but it doesn't look like i can get myself a single slot version of it...

would a 9600gt be good enough for the job?

Anyone else around here attempted this yet?

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Lowfat

I used a 9500GT for PhysX. Worked good for Mirror's Edge.

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i7 920 @ 4.2GHz * EX58-UD5 * 6GB @ 1600MHz * (2) XFX HD4890 * (4) X25-M RAID0 * Enermax Revo 85+ 1050W * Silverstone FT01BW

Q8200 @ 3GHz * P5Q Pro* 4GB @ 878MHz * 9500GT * Auzen Prelude * 30GB Vertex * 11.5TB * Seasonic 420 M12-II * Silverstone LC17B * LG GGC-H20L

kris23

9400 to 9500 are good, reviews show that FPS dont increase much after that....

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procupine14

from what I'm seeing you should be fine with that card. Since all its doing is processing physx it doesn't have to be anything extravagant

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Laptop: HP dv6000 - Vista Ultimate (32-bit) - AMD Turion 64 X2 TL-60(2.0GHz) - NVIDIA GeForce Go 7200 256MB - 4GB Kingston DDR2 667 - 160GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive

HTPC: Vista Ultimate 64-bit - AMD Athlon 5200+ x2 - 4GB OCZ DDR2 800 - 250GB Seagate Barracuda - Samsung EcoGreen 1TB - Hauppauge single tuner HD - ASUS Radeon HD4550 512MB - ECS RS485M-M mobo - Creative X-fi soundcard

Other PC: Vista Ultimate 64-bit - AMD Athlon 4200+ X2 - 4GB Crucial Ballistix DDR2 800 - 250GB Seagate Barracuda - XFX 8600GT XXX - DFI Infinity NF570 SLI-M2/G

Judas

yeah.. reason i didn't bother getting into the gtx 2xx series for just a physx card..

looks like i found only a 9600gt single slot cooler card.

Now the only problem i might have is the fact that the HD4870x2 asus card i got with the triple fan won't fit on the bottom pci-ex slot, and when it's in the top.. it covers up the 2nd pci-ex slot (the card is a 2 slot design with a 3 slot overlap due to the cooler which imo, was a bit of a stupid design when it comes to crossfire....but maybe i can make it fit somehow)..

the 2nd hd4870x2 i am still not decided on... i figure i'd just stick the nvidia card in and see if i can get it work first.

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Chaos

test it with 1 of the 4870X2's and if it works there is no reason it wouldnt work with all 3

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Judas

indeed ... that's the thought

i'm curious how many people would be interested in purchasing a $100 CAD (75 USD) video card for physx with an ATI video card for graphics if this works with little to no issues at all..

Probably quite a number that have win7 already imo

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Chaos

that would be short lived if AMD+Havock gets implemented

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Judas

That's true..

but what even if AMD+Havock get implemented.. who's to say physx won't continue to play a roll.... obviously it's got it's footing now.... but just requireing an nvidia card.

SO lets say..... AMD+Havock are at work now..... Someone has a SLI rig, they stick a HD4770 in there and have physx/havok plus their SLI cards doing the job...problem solved..

Crossfire + Physx nvidia card.... have physx and havok on ATI setup... problem solved....

This could even present the possibility of Cross- Havok/Physx solution in a game. Best of both worlds..... ?

Pretty crazy ideas imo

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Mac Daddy

Let me know how you make out I have a 4870 here with a 9600GT for dedicated Physx I ran into driver conflicts with XP.

On the 9600GT it should be plenty. Running mine O/Ced with the Accelero mod on the AMD system I can outbench my 4870(stock) on the Intel machine on 3DMark6

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"My mom said the only reason men are alive is for lawn care and vehicle maintenance." - Tim Allen

Judas

i know some hacking is required for xp to get it to work.... vista is a plain no go... and win7 from various reports state that it works pretty much out of the box

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Bolletje

Look for a 9600GSO. It has more SP's which often is better than higher core speed (9600GT has 64 SP's and 9600GSO 96 (although for example EVGA has a 9600GSO with 48 SP's))

The 9600GSO clocks very well. XFX also has all-copper stock coolers, so it would run fine

Maybe I also will give it a try. A 9500GT is collecting dust here, so :P Also clocks very well

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CDsDontBurn

it'd be awesome if you get this to work.

i say you make another install of vista just for giggles and to test this out and see if it works

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Judas

It won't work in vista..

period...

you can't hack it....

Win7 and win XP are the only OSes capable of running 2 or more completely different sets of video drivers.... XP however with a fair bit of difficulty and win7 apparently with relative ease.

I'm SAPOSED to receive my 9600GT tonight... So i'll be able to plug it in.. download the nvidia drivers for Win7 RC1 7100... install.. then run some tests.... Probably the first and major noticeable change will be 3DMark Vantage as my initial post it up test.

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Mac Daddy

Well keep us posted Bro I would try it but the machine Win7 is installed on is in the Panzerbox prototype and my 9600GT would never fit

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"My mom said the only reason men are alive is for lawn care and vehicle maintenance." - Tim Allen

procupine14

Well if this works I will be jumping online and snagging a 9xxx series Nvidia card and a new mobo. Pending that everything goes well with Judas. Keep on going!!!

__________________
Laptop: HP dv6000 - Vista Ultimate (32-bit) - AMD Turion 64 X2 TL-60(2.0GHz) - NVIDIA GeForce Go 7200 256MB - 4GB Kingston DDR2 667 - 160GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive

HTPC: Vista Ultimate 64-bit - AMD Athlon 5200+ x2 - 4GB OCZ DDR2 800 - 250GB Seagate Barracuda - Samsung EcoGreen 1TB - Hauppauge single tuner HD - ASUS Radeon HD4550 512MB - ECS RS485M-M mobo - Creative X-fi soundcard

Other PC: Vista Ultimate 64-bit - AMD Athlon 4200+ X2 - 4GB Crucial Ballistix DDR2 800 - 250GB Seagate Barracuda - XFX 8600GT XXX - DFI Infinity NF570 SLI-M2/G

Judas

i never received the card last night.. hopefully it arrives tonight..

i was hoping to post some results at the very least late last night... but it never happened..

stay tuned

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CDsDontBurn

you know, looking at tracking results online should help you know when your card is coming to you exactly.

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Judas

There is no tracking...

the trip is 100 miles.. via a company called Dusty Trails..

there is no way of getting tracking at all on it. It's impossible without putting my own on there somehow...

it's only one trip.. point A to point B

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procupine14

Interesting

__________________
Laptop: HP dv6000 - Vista Ultimate (32-bit) - AMD Turion 64 X2 TL-60(2.0GHz) - NVIDIA GeForce Go 7200 256MB - 4GB Kingston DDR2 667 - 160GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive

HTPC: Vista Ultimate 64-bit - AMD Athlon 5200+ x2 - 4GB OCZ DDR2 800 - 250GB Seagate Barracuda - Samsung EcoGreen 1TB - Hauppauge single tuner HD - ASUS Radeon HD4550 512MB - ECS RS485M-M mobo - Creative X-fi soundcard

Other PC: Vista Ultimate 64-bit - AMD Athlon 4200+ X2 - 4GB Crucial Ballistix DDR2 800 - 250GB Seagate Barracuda - XFX 8600GT XXX - DFI Infinity NF570 SLI-M2/G

Judas

Well got the card..... stuck it in the other blue slot on the board..

so right now i've got a ATI Asus HD4870x2EAH in the top blue slot and the Zotac 9600GT (no pci-ex power connector on it) single slot card in the other..

Fired up.. win7 emediately installed the microsoft wddm 1.1 driver..

i downloaded the latest nvidia... installed it.. and even though it didn't want to restart.. i had to to get Aero working again (it disabled it during the install)

After reboot.. the card was recognized.. but not active (no monitor connected to it)

so i plugged in a VGA monitor without really anything there... just so it'd detect something at least.... Soon as it did, the Nvidia physx and Control panels became active..

here's a screenshot after that.... when i get time i'll fire up some physx stuff here soon..

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Mac Daddy

Cool man keep us posted

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"My mom said the only reason men are alive is for lawn care and vehicle maintenance." - Tim Allen

Chaos

so no test yet come on Judas dont keep us waiting

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Judas

busy guys... sorry.... trying to read up on some of this stuff to see what pains other people have gone through... and while reading it before hand seemed a bit confusing and hard to really grasp.... now that i've got it... i can go over it ....

From what i can gather i've got to do a number of things... but i don't want to rush into it...

do it right the firs time if i can

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Judas

sorry for the rather late update..

been working on it.... but haven't had time to sit down for a good length of time until today...

i've been working at it all morning and halfway through the afternoon trying gaud knows how many ways.

Essentially from my testing....

It appears (and i seem to be getting confirmation from the rest of the community out there on the web) that Nvidia has developed their newer drivers specifically to detect the presence of an ATI card. The moment that a ati driver is active, the entire nvidia physx system emediately forcefully disables itself. EVEN in the event of the nvidia video card being the only operating primary video card (ATI card installed, driver installed but not actually working on anything as it doesn't have a monitor connected)

So for me to get physx to even become an option in the nvidia control panel and to enable it, i have to FORCEFULLY disable all ATI adapter via the device manager (at least i don't have to physically remove the card)

What kind of crap is this? It's one for competeing products not to work in an OS together due to OS limitations.... it's completely another for design a driver specifically to purposely not play nice with alternatives let alone work together when the OS grants the options.

I can say right now, i've had ZERO issues running both adapters at the same time... running AERO across both... moving video and whatnot from one to the other and vice versa..... none.. ziltch.. no BSOD's or anything. I can change 3D settings in both control panels and the effects stick. But like i mentioned, unless the ATI cards are 100% disabled, the nvidia control panel emediately removes physx options from it's own control panel and then disables the phyxs own control panel options at the driver level.

Now there only appears to be ONE Solution.... and that is to use a dated driver from january of this year.... It's apparently the NEWEST driver available that doesn't emediately disable Physx the moment an ATI device driver starts...

I'm Currently testing this and if things go well.. i should have a compare link up..

BTW, i'm running system stock clocks and settings ATM just to make sure nothing weird happens.

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Veridian3

I have to wonder if it wouldnt just have been simpler to pick up a cheap PCI Ageia card on Ebay...

Judas

bah.. what would be the fun in that..

plus from the few tihngs i've seen.. the nvidia GPU physX is a bit more powerful.

http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/...rmance_update/


Finished my run

With my Machine set to AUTO (no overclocking or nothing) I beat my previous highest stable overclock score by a reasonable margin..

Here is my Stock PhysX score

ORB - Compare

Here is my last Highest Overclocked score without nvidia card

ORB - Compare

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Mac Daddy

Since there driver support is outdated why would you even suggest it?

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"My mom said the only reason men are alive is for lawn care and vehicle maintenance." - Tim Allen

Veridian3

Because Nvidia still support the cards and they are on the same version as the Geforce series.

cbeasley0

I'm half mast if this works in the near future.