SLI and the FAMILY STONE

[Ace]

Only one I need is the type that lights up over your head... mine burned out.

Hey.. you said it's an odd incandescent/fluorescent kinda hybrid, long and thin and clear, pins on the side...?

Yeah.  I've a box of them.  Whole bunch.  Perfect condition. Even various sizes.  Perfect, clear, glass, incan/fluoro bulbs.  Got some.  Just sitting here.  So many, I don't know what to do with them all.  Wish I knew someone who could use them.  Yep.

Ace; I'll show him whose an odd sort of bulb.

[pat]

How fortunate is that? I mean really, here I've been looking and looking for them and you just happen to have SEVERAL.

I just can't believe my luck.

Oh, darn, too late, I just ordered some. Guess I'll just have to wait till they come in.

Hopefully they don't have to come all the way from California.   

[Ace]

Well; paybacks are heck.  And I'm sure Buff told me so.

I get this email, tonight.  From the Asus Estore.  "our inventories are updated" and now they've got the stupid flex connector of which I just bought.  For $5. 

Stink. Stank. Stunk. 

Ace; why do good things happen to good people.... too late. 

[Buffalo2102]

Heh!  I didn't see that one coming.  If I had, I'd have told you so.  Oh, well, I guess it's a good fallback for when your Ebay purchase arrives and it turns out to be the wrong item.  Asus are apparently notorious for putting different numbers of slots in between the PCI-E slots on different boards and so have SLI bridges of varying lengths.  I've seen lots of complaints from people that have their sound cards between the SLI boards and have trouble getting the bridge to go over the top.  Hope yours fits!

I can tell you now that my kid is a girl.  So "Sli" and "Poaster", and any kind of name prefixed with the word Buffalo are right out.  We have already seriously considered April though and it remains a strong contender.

I've got plenty of bulbs here but I'm probably too far away to be of any help there.  We should really ask Travis to get involved, since he always seemed to have a blub.

Buff;  Whatever happened to Travis?

[Ace]

I don't know what became of him.  He bought that stereo, and then reappeared for a time, and then I don't know. I miss him too.  Every group should have a Canadian in it, eh? I did see a Travis was due for a 40th birthday, so maybe this place just aged him rapidly.  I know it's added years onto my life, since I first poasted back in 97 or whenever. 

You could go with "May" but that would probably just confuse her.  My step-dad's name is June.  and he was born in March, so go figure.

I know what you mean by board variance; I checked the one the one supposedly came with and it looks to span the same spread.  On Asus site, they don't make any distinction as far as the 3 types being further defined; just the hard T shape, the flex, the long flex bridge.  Here in the US we make some flex bridges that weren't supposed to.

Ace; I have a big round glowing bulb, but it's not so bad if I wear my hat.

[pat]

Could be he just went off and did whatever it is that teenagers do. Don't ask me what that may be as it's been quite some time since I've been one or had any about the house.

He was fun to have around though, good kid.

[Ace]

I am now a SLIder...

For UnAmericans, that is slang for a greasy hamburger sold by White Castle here in the states...

I now have an SLI enabled computer.  The GPU install wasn't bad, except for trying to get the stupid screw back in to hold the top.  Booted up fine, but also did NOT have any "enable SLI" pop up that was expected... Went through the NVidia control panel, and no SLI check box anywhere (?). Finally came across one, in a standard view and checked it.  Booted itself back, and went back into the control panel and then there was an SLI enable choice. Clicked it, rebooted itself... and came back in some goshawful 640 mode no depth rendition, huge and safemodish.  Thought maybe it was because no drivers installed on the 2nd card (even though it was not to need that...).  But went into the normal properties and reset to 1280x1024 full color, and came back fine.  Everything shows 2 cards, went in and played COD 4 with 2 card enabled and worked ok.  Not noticeably better than before, but fine.  I'll try Oblivion and other games later today.

I was afraid that maybe the SLI balloon registry entry (to pop it, at start up) might have cancelled out the SLI recognition, but apparently not.  Just took awhile to kick in the dual card setting.  Temps are fine, and did not put in the heat duct.  Might later, but doesn't seem to matter.  The Bridge from EBay was just fine.  Just the right length, as the short flex one.

Ace "Two Cards" Jackson

[Bill]

Well congratulations on the install and actualization of SLI.  You have now spent a little more money but have realized the full capacity of your motherboard after much worry and consternation.  All for little or no apparent improvement in the graphics performance, but you do now have braggin' rights - "I have it and I did it, so there." 
I hope you're happy.

Ol' single card Bill

[Ace]

Oh, not so fast...

It seems, every time I look in the NVidia control panel, that SLI is NOT enabled/selected.. when I do click on enabling it (both as "Apply" and as "Ok") the computer reboots...  Sometimes coming back in the mega size ugly mode, sometimes holding to the normal resolution.  And, in going back into the NVidia control mode, same thing...  So I'm thinking SLI is NOT enabled but at this point I'm stuck as to what to do to confirm if it is, or just do different.  Each reboot generates a MS "system recovered from serious error" pop up.

Both cards show as operating fine in the device view; I installed the drivers that came with the card, just to see if that would make a difference.  They loaded to the original card, while the new one held onto the ones I already had installed.  There is no BIOS SLI setting (that isn't "on").  I deleted the SLI Balloon registry edit, but couldn't really locate its hiding in the Registry itself.  I figure my "didn't notice any difference" then could well be based on it's not functioning.

So, right now, until I can go back into the NVidia setting and see it STAY with SLI, I figure there's still work to do.  One of those "do everything right, but that's not enough" conundrums.  I don't know if two cards can "work" but NOT in cooperation, so would almost rather see a warning sign at this point.

Ace;  :(

[Bill]

I seem to recall that when you first started with this machine, you had a warning or error message about not having 2 cards.  Someone, maybe Buff or Chandler, poasted directions to turn something off and the error disappeared.  Maybe be you should retrace those steps and change the original "fix."  I also recall that you commented that the "fix" wasn't intuitive, ie not simply checking or unchecking a box.

Bill; on again, off again.

[Ace]

Yes... and that's the thing, I can't find any reference on how to UNdo the SLI Balloon kill "fix."  Program is sliballoon.reg, and I've got that on the desktop.  But no means to identify or find it in the registry, if that was added.  Or, any way as yet to re-establish the start up SLI balloon (to make it reappear).  I too am thinking that could affect the boot up trigger to enable SLI.

Other thing is I'm not getting the options through the NVidia control panel that the mobo manual shows I should... There should be a desktop manager choice that also has "Properties" which leads to the SLI enable.  I don't have that appearing at as the 3rd choice, and am instead getting to the SLI enable through a display button.  So it's throwing me that I can't follow the instruction chain I see in the references, as those aren't showing.

There's no means I can find to connect power directly to either card, so no choice as to adding a connect that way if it's a power issue.  I've confirmed cards are seated, and showing as working properly, so either I'm getting blocked on the NVidia software recognition or ... who knows. 

Ace; another day that ends in "y"

[Buffalo2102]

Oh dear, what troubles and tribulations you are having.

To undo the SLI balloon fix, open notepad and paste the text below into it.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\NVIDIA Corporation\Global\NVTweak]
"NvCplEnableMultiGPUConfigurationPage"=dword:00000001

Save it on your desktop as a .reg file, such as SLIundo.reg  Then just double-click it and it should just add the entry to your registry that the "fix" removed in the first place.

Having said all that, I believe that the SLI balloon thing was removed from the nVidia drivers because of the annoyance it caused.  You should really be running with the latest nVidia drivers which doesn't have the balloon thing in it.  I don't think.

Also, take a look here - it seems to be just what you need.
http://www.notebookforums.com/thread94018.html

Buff; Good luck.

[Ace]

Thanks Buff, dear, appreciate that.  I'm trying the undo as recommended.  Also will download drivers from NVidia (had that originally, then installed the EVGA version that came with the card, so will try door number 3).  Since I already flipped around drivers with no effect hard to tell which should come first, registry change or drivers.

Ran the command... didn't do anything as far as bringing back an SLI balloon or options...

Where it seems I'm getting stuck is that I'm not getting that immediate "You have an SLI capable configuration; wanna enable?" pop up, and am NOT seeing the option I supposedly should to set up out of the NVidia settings screens that the motherboard manual shows.  So just manually going in and hitting "enable" without prompting seems to not do the trick (and isn't lasting...). 

Drivers I guess are next, again (they're gonna take a couple hours to download, with my speed burning dial up Onspeed connection).

Ace; workin' on the weekend.

[Bill]

Drivers still downloading, eh?

Bill

[pat]

Oh, I bet he just walked away from it for a day just to clear his head. Then he'll sit down and figure it  all out and it will work just fine.

Yep, that's it.

[scuzzy]

If he clears his head there won't be anything left.

I am curious as to how this all works out. I recall a time when Ace had all sorts of input devices hooked up to his Quantex.

Scuzzy; good thing his mobo doesn't hold 6 video cards, or we'd never see the end of this.

[Bill]

Gee, does this board have any PCI slots?  Maybe we could see if that could be accomplished, 'course Ace would have to do all the work.  We could just offer suggestions....

Bill

[Ace]

I walked away trying to decide whether to shoot my head, or this _______ thing.  You will not believe this.

Last night, I lost the monitor.  It will boot up to the Windows screen, but before it goes to the "Welcome" the monitor shuts down like in a standby/power saving mode, and does not come back.  I've tried reconnecting, disconnecting, but since I'm blinded to anything nothing I can get to as I'm stymied.

Here's how it went down.. uninstalled the NVidia display drivers.  Rebooted, recognized hardware, went to the install... Apparently the new drivers were corrupted (after the 4 hour download).  Couldn't pull them from the desktop, burned them to disk, couldn't use them from that.  So reinstalled the EVGA ones (April 07) from the disk I got with the new card.

Went ok, but found LG Monitor was just showing as default analog.  So got out the LG disk, and installed the digital driver for my model.  Still wouldn't move into normal 1280x1024 view and quality so rebooted.  That's when the thing went into its spasm.

May try my work monitor, at home... it's analog but if I can just get back into startup at least I can view and try things.  I don't have an analog video plug for the LG, to try it at work (the one on my work monitor is attached).  It doesn't seem like the LG is disfunctional, since it's showing things; just like a power shutdown, at that point of startup.  And nothing will move it off it.  There's no BIOS settings to apply for it.

Unbelievable; Ace

[Buffalo2102]

Sounds like your monitor doesn't like whatever resolution it is now set at.

Push F8 on startup and chose Safemode.  Then set resolution to 640x480 or 800x600 and reboot.  That should get you back to square 1...or 2 (ish).

Buff; resolute

[Ace]

I don't have a Safe Mode option... have noticed other tech pleas with the same.  Only thing the F8 shows is the sequence for boot, and device.  So I can use it to choose the initial device but no 'Safe' mode shown...  So no idea on this thing on how to trigger that.  Only thing I've seen so far was to hit the power switch on monitor during boot, then reboot and hope it gets "found" but don't think that'll work as I've hit the monitor buttons to no effect.

Ace; unsafe

[Buffalo2102]

No safemode?  F8 should give you the safemode option.  Sequence of boot options are normally another key.  I think you may be pressing the F8 key too soon.

I guess that booting up and then pulling the power doesn't make the PC automatically go to the safemode option? (After you've restored the power and switched it back on, of course).

Try the other function keys too - it must be there somewhere.

Buff; I guess it's F8 (fate).

[Ace]

No, boot options are F8.  Bios is Delete.  But I just found a tech forum chain that said the timing is critical, and that you get the boot chain if you hit it "early" but wait and do it and the safe mode appears.. guess I'll see.  Not like I haven't tried it 50 or so times already. 

I'll probably buy a VGA connect, to try the monitor that way in case the digital keeps getting stuck.  What's particularly stupid is these errors are all with things that HAVE been working... drivers were already tried and worked (just not SLI) and monitor has been functioning at this optimal/base level, with the drivers.  Just isn't making sense that it's choking on things that worked a day ago.

I did burn the new drivers, again, and at least will have them if I can boot it and look to reinstall things (again again).  About the only other things I can think to try are going with the other video card as primary, trying a Windows repair.... 

Ace; you definitely didn't tell me, so, on this stuff.  Tell me it'll be F9.

[pat]

Hey maybe you got the Jester version of Windows.

If you do get to safe mode or before trying a new driver install you may want to go to Add/Remove and remove any previous Nvidia drivers listed there.

[Ace]

I'm in, from home.  Blew my lunch hour (but didn't blow my lunch, per se).

Finally got it to boot in Safe mode; criminy is it touchy.  Took repeated attempts; once got the 2nd screen on "which installation to use" but skipped the Safe mode page.  Finally got it to appear and got in.  Took repeated attempts to get the thing to knock down to 800x600, too...  Once that took, I shut down and took out the new card.  Finally it came through by itself to start up.

Driver news; seemed "ok" with the EVGA ones.  Did ANOTHER download from NVidia; got the most recent again plus the WHQL previous rendition, and burned both to disk.  Went in and ran the new from the disk (instead of uninstalling, and instead of updating through device mgr).  Checked through device mgr that the new one was showing...  So far ok.  Once I get it "stabilized" (and probably copy over every stupid thing on it, in case it does implode...) I'll try that SLI thing again. 

Ace; when's dinner...

[Ace]

Week 2:

After achieving some stability (back to square one) I reinstalled the second card, today.  This time, the system DID recognize an SLI potential and went to the NVidia properties to enable.  This time, in checking it, it SAID system would need to reboot (and didn't automatically shut down immediately). 

This time, it will go through the Welcome screen and then there's a "click" and the monitor resets, and the start up stops.  Went safe mode, got in.  Went to last good configuration, and that's fine.  Just that everytime I enable SLI, and reboot, it won't go through.

Only thing I know to do now is a BIOS update.  Drivers are new, cards are showing just right so hardware looks good.  Original card is 16x, second at 8x, all's showing just fine.  So will probably go that route, as I've hit the wall otherwise. 

Sunday Update; today's thrill is that my Kensington PocketHub 7 USB port was "found as new hardware" (!).  Had to unplug the mouse and put it into the PC back, since it was into the hub.  No drivers for this thing, Windows Update could find none, no disks to search...  So no clue what this is about.  All is plugged in, as always.

Ace; will see.  We'll see.

[Buffalo2102]

Ace

There may be a power issue here?  If your PSU is struggling then that would explain USB devices behaving strangely.

Other things to consider - check that both graphics cards are running at the same clock speeds etc.  They should both have the same BIOS too.  Since you bought them so far apart, it is likely that they don't.  Rivatuner may be able to help identify any differences in the cards.

I have also read that the older nforce disk controller drivers did not like to work with SLI.  Make sure that your motherboard chipset drivers are up-to-date.

Buff; getting ready for the superbowl....

[Ace]

Hey Buff,
Thing with the power is I don't know how to know there is a power issue (without buying and replacing it...).  Where do you see the BIOS on a video card?  I don't see where that appears.  I did read that link where it mentioned that, but find that odd since the SLI "rules" state the cards don't even have to be the same brand; just same GPU.  So it seemed to be less a "matching" issue than the original "dupe card" mentions.  Just tried the EVGA site; they don't SHOW the video card BIOS, and apparently any significant change will appear if you go to the driver download and it'll be there... So the card company isn't going to be of help on this one.

I'll check out Rivatuner.  I had the Asus mobo Bios updater get to clearing the old, replacing, then stopping at 86% on the install.  I lost my LAN network connections, which I wasn't using anyway.  That showed in device manager, but the pop up "new hardware" thing seems to relate to the USB hub.  Just hard to go forward to try to fix this with the weird side steps.

How'd you like the Super Bowl?  I thought it was super.  I was personally glad to see the upset; it was almost too dramatic...  Also enjoyed the Bridgestone commercials, budlight wheel, giant pigeons, baby E-Trader.  Even the Shaq jockey vitamin water (bleah).

Ace; I wish they would've run over Richard Simmons.

[pat]

I'm curious as to what motherboard you have? If you have already mentioned it I must have missed that.

[Ace]

Well, I'm not surprised.  It's an Asus M2N-SLI Deluxe.  Really, I don't know what's "deluxe" about it, but that's their claim. 

With this "new hardware" pop up thing, I've tried the Asus disk and the Windows disk and I'm out of disks that might hit a nerve, on it... And it tries Windows Update and chokes there too.  So as far as "installing" "it" (the hub..?) I don't know what it would take since it's a plug and play device, ya know?

Ace; time for duct tape...

[pat]

Well duh, don't I feel dumb. That's the same board as I have and my manual indicates a 600 watt power supply for a fully loaded system, whatever that may mean.

I have a 550watt power supply in mine and it's nowhere near what I would consider fully loaded. Tell you what, I'll trade you my 8600 series card for your two 7900s and I'll see if it works here.

Just kidding, but the Nvidia requirements suggest a minimum 450watt power supply so you should be good there, I think.