add PhysX card or not?

Rukk · **add PhysX card or not? -** 03-13-2010, 16:02 | posts: 61 | Location: SC, USA

I have a question that may have been asked and answered already but after doing some searching I have been unable to find a specific answer.

I currently have a 295gtx installed. I also have a 8800gtx laying around. Can I use the 8800gtx for PhysX (LANPARTY LT X38-T2R mobo, I know its a crossfire board) and if I can, is it a worthwhile thing to do?

I have thought about this before, but at the time I was under the impression that I couldn't use the 8800gtx for PhysX, now I'm thinking that I may have been mistaken.

Enlighten me Gurus. Thank you.

Li4m79 · 03-13-2010, 16:09 | posts: 4,691 | Location: Scotland

you should be able to run your 8800 as a physx card, as long as its going into a pci-e slot, you should be good to go!

You probably won`t see a huge amount of gain as the 295 is a pretty meaty card in the first place and can handle the physx pretty easily on top of its other tasks, but if you have the card sitting idle, you may as well, you`ll gain a few fps at higher PhysX moments at higher settings

MaxBlade · 03-13-2010, 18:59 | posts: 664

I agree.. I dont think your going to see any diff. But hey if its just laying around.. try it. Turn it off on one and on on the other.

---TK--- · 03-13-2010, 19:13 | posts: 14,700 | Location: New Jersey, USA

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rukk

I have a question that may have been asked and answered already but after doing some searching I have been unable to find a specific answer.

I currently have a 295gtx installed. I also have a 8800gtx laying around. Can I use the 8800gtx for PhysX (LANPARTY LT X38-T2R mobo, I know its a crossfire board) and if I can, is it a worthwhile thing to do?

I have thought about this before, but at the time I was under the impression that I couldn't use the 8800gtx for PhysX, now I'm thinking that I may have been mistaken.

Enlighten me Gurus. Thank you.

I tried a 9600gt as a physics card in this rig crossfire m/b BTW and found the 295 to render physics better alone

Veteran · 03-13-2010, 20:08 | posts: 7,388 | Location: United kingdom

i would not bother tbh,your not going to notice a great deal,if anything.

Rukk · 03-13-2010, 22:16 | posts: 61 | Location: SC, USA

Well, I installed the 8800gtx easy enough and powered back up.

After a bit of Vista installing driver software on its own immediately after boot up, I ran control panel and there the 8800 was ready to be used and I set it to the PhysX card.

I've only played a bit of Battlefield Bad Company 2 at this point and running Fraps and it "looks" like my frames are a good bit higher and not dropping as low or as often. In other words, it "looks" like it is being somewhat beneficial at worst. Gameplay seems smoother as well.

I have yet to do any comparisons but I'm thinking I'm liking it. And it was just lying around.

Thanks Gurus.

---TK--- · 03-13-2010, 22:25 | posts: 14,700 | Location: New Jersey, USA

run 3dmark vantage 2 cpu test with physics enabled with the 295 alone and the 88gtx as physics and also try the nurien demo too

Li4m79 · 03-13-2010, 22:38 | posts: 4,691 | Location: Scotland

Battlefield Bad Company 2 doesn`t use physx does it??

itsb1again · 03-13-2010, 22:54 | posts: 545 | Location: Florida

what about me guys? I have a GTX 285 my FPS drops around 45 - 50 with hbao on in BFBC2... would i gain any performance or should i just buy 2 x 5870's ?? and yes money is an option, so if i'm going to get 20 to xx FPs should i do it?

Rukk · 03-13-2010, 23:23 | posts: 61 | Location: SC, USA

To be honest, I am not sure that BFBC2 uses PhysX. I just assumed that it did.

I do have Sacred 2 and I'm pretty sure it uses PhysX. I'll check that out.

Rukk · 03-14-2010, 00:09 | posts: 61 | Location: SC, USA

Alright, I checked out Sacred 2. Looks like I am getting a minimum of 5 to a maximum of 10 more frames using the 88 as the PhysX card.

I don't know how accurate my testing was, I stood in the same place outside and let the weather do its thing for a long time while I watched the frame rate.

At the very least, using the 88 does seem to work a little better for me as my frames were consistently higher when using it albeit not by a tremendous amount.

So, it appears the Gurus were correct of course that I would see little gain. It does appear to be positive though so I'm gonna continue to check this setup out.

Prefetian · 03-14-2010, 11:06 | posts: 24 | Location: Sweden

AFAIK BF:BC2 uses the Havok engine so there won't be any use there.

Darren Hodgson · 03-17-2010, 13:04 | posts: 9,682 | Location: England

I've always wondered if having PhysX enabled means that your graphics card is not being used fully in games that don't have PhysX, you know, is the card putting a little performance aside *all the time* regardless of whether a game uses PhysX or not, or does it utilise 100% of the card's performance *unless* the game has PhysX.

Anyone know?

I was just wondering if that's why Rukk was getting higher framerates with BFBC2, i.e. by shifting the potential PhysX workload onto another graphics card, the game can use 100% of the GTX 295's power for itself instead of 90% (or whatever).

Copey · 03-17-2010, 15:54 | posts: 10,646 | Location: U.K

Quote:

Originally Posted by Darren Hodgson

I've always wondered if having PhysX enabled means that your graphics card is not being used fully in games that don't have PhysX, you know, is the card putting a little performance aside *all the time* regardless of whether a game uses PhysX or not, or does it utilise 100% of the card's performance *unless* the game has PhysX.

Anyone know?

I was just wondering if that's why Rukk was getting higher framerates with BFBC2, i.e. by shifting the potential PhysX workload onto another graphics card, the game can use 100% of the GTX 295's power for itself instead of 90% (or whatever).

Ive allways wondered this, i dont know how you would test it tho,, maybe gpu load or something?

s88urd · 03-18-2010, 15:42 | posts: 352 | Location: uk

I added an 8800gts 640mb as a physx card, tbh noticed no difference, ran dark void with high physx effects both with and without the card. Noticed no increase in FPS tbh

Copey · 03-18-2010, 17:36 | posts: 10,646 | Location: U.K

Quote:

Originally Posted by s88urd

I added an 8800gts 640mb as a physx card, tbh noticed no difference, ran dark void with high physx effects both with and without the card. Noticed no increase in FPS tbh

You see, i noticed a massive difference when i added another card for physX on dark void, maybe because your 285 is more than powerful enough on its own?