Couple of problems I could use some help on with my rig... The first is, with my crossfire setup, I can only get the secondary gpu to fold. the primary (display) gpu refuses to fold. I've tried disabling crossfire, taking the bridge off so as not to confuse the computer that i'm even remotely trying to run crossfire and nothing works. I'm using FAH GPU Tracker, as it helped me get the secondary radeon folding as well as the gts-450 I added. Will the display card just not fold period or am i doing something wrong? The other problem I have is with my GTS-450 overheating. The only free slot the card will work in is the slot right next (behind?) the secondary crossfire card. It's a single slot MSI GTS-450, and basicly it just sucks hot backplate air from the radeon in front of it and overheats after an hour or 2 folding. I've underclocked/ undervolted it as low as it will go and it still overheats. Is my only option to try and find a waterblock that will fit in the tight space and watercool it? Are there any odd shaped heatsinks that have the radiator at a 90 degree angle from the gpu block so it would A)fit and B)put the radiator in a location I could get a case fan to blow on it? I'd really like to let this card run wild on folding. During the winter months, when I could leave the window near the computer cracked to let cold air in, running the card at stock clocks, it would out perform my unlocked radeon 6950 and SMP client in PPD. Thanks in advance
sound likw the gts450 is not up to the task have you tried the new V7 client it mite give you less problems folding on 2\3 cards http://foldingforum.org/viewtopic.php?f=67&t=18302
haven't tried the v7 client yet. i'll give it a try when I get home this afternoon. the gts450 would do ok if I could find anoter cooling solution for it. It being pressed up against the other radeon card isn't doing it any favors at all. I don't know how popular the single slot nvidia cards are around here, I was hoping someone had a solution so I could be lazy and not have to come up with my own time to butcher up a spare cpu cooler...
there are third patry gpu cooler around i thought you were looking for single slot if you can keep it cool that will be a great folder card
I am looking for a single slot cooling solution. Thats why i can't use a conventional vga cooler and may be forced to use a waterblock on it... if i can find one that fits. my other idea was to use, find, modify an air cooler so the part of the cooler that is attached to the gpu is not right under the radiator portion of the cooler. something with heat pipes that run out of the gpu block and turn 90* before the radiator. so the heatpipes clear the radeon card that is right next to the gts450, and hang the radiator over the top of it. something like this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835220032
Thermalright Spitfire GPU Heatsink http://www.anandtech.com/show/3637/quick-look-thermalright-spitfire-vrmr5 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMUZIWdjRNE
that looks perfect! thanks! i put a little piece of plastic in between the cards so the gts could get a little more air. it's holding steady at 90*c at the stock clocks and undervolted as far as it will let me (.950v or so) thats good for about 7,000 or so ppd. im happy, with that thermalright cooler, i should be able to overclock with no problems. thanks again
lol, so the v7 client control has both of my amd GPU's running, but the gts 450 doesn't work now. for the time being i'll use the v7 for the 2 amd's and the smp and use the FAH GPU tracker to run the gts450. thanks again for the help ian, it's nice to have all the cpu's/gpu's folding at once
Everything was working fine and I just had to mess that up. I added a 3rd 6950 to the system and now the gts450 is refusing to work again. Maybe it feels outnumbered? Using FAH V7 or gpu tracker, the core running on the gts 450 errors out as soon as it tries to process anything. v7 reports some ENUM (-1) error and gpu tracker gives a different error which I can't remember off the top of my head, but i'm sure its the same error for each program as they both happen at the same point in the log. I tried re-installing the nvidia drivers then running the hybrid ati/physx patch and no dice. I forgot what i did last time to get all of this working together.
Fixed my own problem. Here's what I did in case anyone else runs into this: I rolled the nvidia drivers back to 266.58 version. You have to go into window's 'screen resolution' setting page from right clicking the desktop. Once in there hit 'detect displays' and the nvidia card should show up as a possible display device, but not an active display. select it and force vga display in the options. Then you can install the 266.58 drivers without it saying there is no display to install them to. After that I ran the ati/nvidia hybrid patcher, but in win 7 you HAVE TO RUN IT AS THE ADMINISTRATOR. I think that was the critical step i was missing. After that things should work. v7 still gives me the UNKNOWN_ENUM(-1) error on my gts450, but FAH GPU works like it did before with the hybrid setup. If anyone is searching, I hope this helps
Finally got around to ordering and installing the spitfire on the gts450. before i would have to undervolt/underclock the card a LOT to keep it from crashing the system from overheating (100*c + temps) stock volts were a tad over 1v, had to undervolt to .962... the lowest it would allow. stock core clock is 780-something, and I usually had to clock it down to 500mhz. even then temps hovered around 95*c constantly. Installed the spitfire... at stock volts and 950mhz core temps hardly get to 65*c. What a beast. Only problem fitting it was that it interfered with my zalman 9900 cpu cooler. I switched to a antec khuler h20 and all is good. Running a 120mm fan on the spitfire, it blows on my northbridge so it's temps have gone up a little, but overall I am completly happy with this solution. the OC'd gts almost does as much work in a day as my 3 unlocked 6950's as far as I can tell. my power bill is going to be so high this month between folding and running the AC non-stop. :nerd:
Ian, I've got some generic xigmatec fan on it now. I could fit a 140mm fan if needed, but right now its running at 950mhz core at 1.062v at around 60*C The hottest i've seen it get is 66*C. To me that's excellent, but the only temps I was getting before the spitfire heatsink were the overheating kind. Is 60-70*c bad?
