Efficient folding card comparison

[thebluebumblebee]

Soon it will be Fall here in North America and we should prepare for the folding onslaught that accompanies cooler weather. I noticed this @ bit-tech forums and thought it would come in handy. I know there are alot of GTX460's out there that could be put to good use. Considering the power efficiency and cost of this card, it's a no-brainer.

I know that I'm repeating myself, but I want someone who is only reading this thread to know the problems with the bit-tech article. I applaud them for their effort, but they made a big mistake. The problem is that they took the PPD that the card generated and divided it by the total system wattage. That overhead has a greater impact on the lower PPD cards. Does anyone here believe that the GTX280 is more efficient than the 9600GSO? If they had just divided PPD by ((system Folding total wattage)-(system idle wattage)). The following is a chart I put together using bit-tech's PPD numbers and W1zzard's maximum power numbers. This will completely take the system overhead out of the equation. Don't tell me the math method is wrong, I'm just using their methodology. The PPD for the 240GT is from a 353 point WU, which may give it an unfair advantage. Using a 787 point WU gives 75.76 PPD/watt. The wattage for the 240GT is from W1zzard's review of the MSI version, not Palit's overclocked and overvolted version which uses 85 watts (which seems wrong).

Card PPD Watts PPD/Watt
240GT 4236 51 83.06
GTX460 768MB 8654 146 59.27
GTX460 1GB 8654 155 55.8
GTX465 10152 199 51.02
GTX470 11731 232 50.56
GTX295 15248 320 47.65
9600GSO 4181 91 45.95
GTX285 9680 216 44.81
GTX480 13892 320 43.41
GTX275 8640 220 39.27
GTX260 216? 6174 168 36.75
GTX260 6075 186 32.66
GTX280 8100 249 32.53

I feel better now that I got that out of my system.

In the < 7" / extra-low power category, does anyone have a better suggestion than this passive Zotac GT240:

No. The 240GT was a glaring omission in that bit-tech article, but due to their testing methods, that may have been a good thing. A good (F@H) review of the 240GT at FAH-Addict.net

About how much power does the 460 take? I was kind of shocked to see that the physical size of the card is smaller than my 8800GTS, yet it takes 2 6-pin power connectors. Not that having two 6-pins is a problem for me, I'm just kind of shocked that a midrange card would need that kind of power.

Interesting how a card with two 6 pin power connectors takes less (albeit ever so slightly less) power than a card with just one.

I wonder if it would work if I just filled the ground pins on the second connector with paper clips or something...

AFAIK, if you can run a G80 8800GTS, you can run a GTX460. I think the extra power connector is there for OC headroom. (thanks Nvidia) Also, notice that the power requirements for the card are real close to the 150 watt limit (actually over for the 1GB version) of a PCI-E slot + 1 6pin PCI-E power connector. A single 8 pin connector would have worked, but they are not common with the lower power PSU's. You could get a molex to PCI-E adapter if needed.

Edit: I realize that my PPD/watt numbers above have their own problem, that being that they do not include the load on the system by the client. I wish we had the "system Folding-system at idle" numbers.

 

[mstenholm]

Thank you tbbb. Each way of representing is useful, bit-tech shows what it cost to turn on their rig and fold with one card. Yours on the other hand show what an additional card in any rig would cost, extra. One thing is for sure - GTX460, 768 is an good folder and so are the rest of the 400 serie, even if they (GPU3-client) steal some more CPU-cycles in the process.

Extra info: I idle at 166 watt (turbo off) and fold at 270 watt (260, 216 in system specs)