A ? about adding a PhysX card to my system

[sttubs]

What would be the best PhysX card for my system? (system specs to the left) Is there a low/medium/higher quality card that I'd want to use for PhysX?

[brandonwh64]

9600GT is ideal, u can use something lower that than but something with 96 shaders would preform physx top notch, 32 shaders work but i have seen some cases were it made it worse.

[[Ion]]

Anything above a 9800GT or GTS250 is overkill. I have a 9600GT for PhysX and it seems to be plenty, don't notice any difference between it and a GTS250

[wolf]

GT240 is the perfect fit IMO, a touch of overclocking on the shaders alone makes for some extra goodness too.

[newtekie1]

GT240 is definitely ideal.

[Dent1]

Sttubs,

You've got the fastest commerical video card on the market, the 5970, why would you waste your time with a physx card, what benefit will it add?

[newtekie1]

Originally Posted by Dent1

Sttubs,

You've got the fastest commerical video card on the market, the 5970, why would you waste your time with a physx card, what benefit will it add?

It will add the abiliy to use PhysX and enjoy the extra eye candy it provides.

[Mr McC]

Originally Posted by brandonwh64

9600GT is ideal, u can use something lower that than but something with 96 shaders would preform physx top notch, 32 shaders work but i have seen some cases were it made it worse.

Originally Posted by [Ion]

Anything above a 9800GT or GTS250 is overkill. I have a 9600GT for PhysX and it seems to be plenty, don't notice any difference between it and a GTS250

Originally Posted by wolf

GT240 is the perfect fit IMO, a touch of overclocking on the shaders alone makes for some extra goodness too.

Originally Posted by newtekie1

GT240 is definitely ideal.

Seriously? So you are saying that I could pick up one of these and follow Fits' guide for hybrid installation and check this out?

As far as I'm aware, that requires me to use a leaked beta driver that has now been updated several times via official releases, have you experienced any issues running the latest games in a hybrid set up?

I'm still not convinced I want to do this, but if I did, which card would you pick up from the following list, bearing in mind that a XFX 7900 was the last Nvidia card I owned and I haven't kept up. I'm not aware of the advantages of the 2xx series over the 9xxx series, they are similarly priced in some instances, is it just a case of rebranding? Nor am I aware of the differences between the various GT / GTS / GTX models. The site's in Spanish because I want an idea of real-world price, but you can see where you need to go, and the task is to pick out the best and cheapest option to go ahead with a hybrid set up whilst ensuring that PhysX is as good as it possibly can be, thanks in advance:

http://www.alternate.es/html/categor...&l3=GeForce+9&

[Dent1]

Originally Posted by newtekie1

It will add the abiliy to use PhysX and enjoy the extra eye candy it provides.

I'm not convinced, eye candy in like a library of <5 games in 2010.

Cant the 5970 render the phyx in software mode? it seems rediculous that Nvidia would pay off games developers to disable a ATI video card's ability to render the eye candy. In theory a workhorse like the 5970 should be able to render these physics without a problem right?

[Mr McC]

Originally Posted by Dent1

I'm not convinced, eye candy in like a library of <5 games in 2010.

Cant the 5970 render the phyx in software mode? it seems rediculous that Nvidia would pay off games developers to disable a ATI card's ability to render the eye candy. In theory a workhorse like the 5970 should be able to render these physics without a problem right?

I thought all the spare cores/threads on my i7 would be enough to handle it, but certain features are only enabled via a dedicated card. I'm not convinced either, but if we go down the road of questioning the rights and wrongs of proprietary manouvres within marketing, we'll get the thread locked and I won't get my question answered.

[erocker]

Originally Posted by wolf

GT240 is the perfect fit IMO, a touch of overclocking on the shaders alone makes for some extra goodness too.

Originally Posted by newtekie1

GT240 is definitely ideal.

Agreed.

Originally Posted by Mr McC

Seriously? So you are saying that I could pick up one of these and follow Fits' guide for hybrid installation and check this out?

As far as I'm aware, that requires me to use a leaked beta driver that has now been updated several times via official releases, have you experienced any issues running the latest games in a hybrid set up?

I'm still not convinced I want to do this, but if I did, which card would you pick up from the following list, bearing in mind that a XFX 7900 was the last Nvidia card I owned and I haven't kept up. I'm not aware of the advantages of the 2xx series over the 9xxx series, they are similarly priced in some instances, is it just a case of rebranding? Nor am I aware of the differences between the various GT / GTS / GTX models. The site's in Spanish because I want an idea of real-world price, but you can see where you need to go, and the task is to pick out the best and cheapest option to go ahead with a hybrid set up whilst ensuring that PhysX is as good as it possibly can be, thanks in advance:

http://www.alternate.es/html/categor...&l3=GeForce+9&

Originally Posted by Mr McC

I thought all the spare cores/threads on my i7 would be enough to handle it, but certain features are only enabled via a dedicated card. I'm not convinced either, but if we go down the road of questioning the rights and wrongs of proprietary manouvres within marketing, we'll get the thread locked and I won't get my question answered.

For your first post, to enable PhysX is easy. Have the ATi drivers already installed, put the Nvidia card in and install drivers. When it asks to reboot, run the 1.04ff PhysX "patch", then reboot. Done.

For the second post, while an i7 should be able to handle the physics, CPU's just aren't optimized for PhysX, hence the PhysX card.

[wolf]

Originally Posted by erocker

For your first post, to enable PhysX is easy. Have the ATi drivers already installed, put the Nvidia card in and install drivers. When it asks to reboot, run the 1.04ff PhysX "patch", then reboot. Done.

It really is that easy, I've run the hack myself and it works a treat, however I used a stupidly overpowered card for physx, GTX260 c216.

the GT240 is ample, maybe even a tad overboard, but it is quite a low power consuming card so it makes it a good fit without halfing the sp's and going for a GT220.

[erocker]

Originally Posted by wolf

It really is that easy, I've run the hack myself and it works a treat, however I used a stupidly overpowered card for physx, GTX260 c216.

Heh, I'm currently using a GTX 470 for PhysX... and folding of course.

[lisburnni]

is there any suitable nvidia GPUs for physx that dont need an external power source. all my PCI E plugs are used on my psu. im guessing 9600gt or 9800 gpus

stoney

[erocker]

Originally Posted by lisburnni

is there any suitable nvidia GPUs for physx that dont need an external power source. all my PCI E plugs are used on my psu. im guessing 9600gt or 9800 gpus

stoney

The GT 240 doesn't need any external power.

[lisburnni]

il look into it

cheers matey

stephen

[sttubs]

Thank you all, I'll be keeping an eye out for the GT240 then. I'm glad I started this thread as there are others interested in adding PhysX to there systems too.

[[Ion]]

That and there are 9800GT 'EE' (Energy Efficient) cards that just run off the PCIe bus

[newtekie1]

Originally Posted by Dent1

I'm not convinced, eye candy in like a library of <5 games in 2010.

Thats why you don't spend a whole lot of money on a PhysX card. If you are going with nVidia as your rendering card, just stick with a single card, as most of the higher end cards are more than capable of PhysX by themselves along with rendering, they don't need a dedicated card. If you are using ATi, spend very little on an extremely cheap card. If he has spend $700 on a rendering card, obviously having the best experience possible is at the top of the list of wants, so spending $50-75 more for the little extra eye candy in a few games is probably worth it.

Originally Posted by Dent1

Cant the 5970 render the phyx in software mode? it seems rediculous that Nvidia would pay off games developers to disable a ATI video card's ability to render the eye candy. In theory a workhorse like the 5970 should be able to render these physics without a problem right?

The HD5970 can't render PhysX in any mode. There is not a system to render PhysX on any ATi card. Do not confuse PhysX with physics in general. There are plenty of software based physics options that games can use. However none of the commerically viable options that run on software can provide a level of physics close to the hardware accelerated physics that PhysX provides. Of course there is a software mode to PhysX, it gives generally about the same level of physics that an alternative like havok provides, this is what is seen when you play a PhysX game on ATi hardware(or turn hardware accelerated PhysX off). You can also force the hardware accelerated PhysX to run on the CPU, and as erocker mentioned the CPU isn't optimized for this, and hence the performance is rather poor.

Your assesment that nVidia is paying of game developers to disable something on ATi hardware is way off. It isn't about rendering the PhysX, it is about calculating it. PhysX is a propriatary phsyics engine that nVidia owns and develops. It can't run on ATi hardware, but that doesn't mean games that utilize PhysX will have not physics at all, they will just have physics about equal to what they would have if they used one of the alternate options of physics. So for game devs there really isn't a down side. If they use PhysX in software mode for ATi hardware the level of physics is similar to what they would have gotten if they use something like Havok, but they also have the option to use hardware acceleration with an nVidia card to provide physic beyond what is possible with Havok.

[sttubs]

Another thought, how do you hook the ATI/Nvidia card to the LCD, one from each card, in a "Y" configuration?

[erocker]

Originally Posted by sttubs

Another thought, how do you hook the ATI/Nvidia card to the LCD, one from each card, in a "Y" configuration?

You don't. No need to hook the display up to the Nvidia card at all. The instructions I gave in my post above is all you need to do.

[sttubs]

Is there any difference in playing a game that is not on the PhsyX list?

[[Ion]]

No. If there is no PhysX acceleration, then a dedicated PhysX card will have no effect whatsoever

[phobias23]

before my sli, i had a hd5870 and I used a gt9600 asus for physx, i test mafia 2 1st with my hd5870, then with physx enabled.
Youll see the difference! physx for hardware is great for those games who really use it.(no so many)
Thanks to Panther by the way.

Anyway follow Erockers advise about hybrid physx.

[wolf]

GT430 just came out, thats the same amount of SP's as the GT240, but the GT240 is likely cheaper, and actually the faster card.