help/ideas for my sli

[lagooch]

i have a dfi nf4 sli dr board. with my ati x800 pro vid card i was getting 5000+ 3dmark scores. i just sold that vid card and got 2x 6600gt cards so i could sli them. i can't even play half life 2 now. i have tried 3 different versions of nvidia drivers, i switched the cards to different slots, i tried overclocking the forceware and it won't let me. rivatuner tells me that my gpu cores are running at 300 and the gpu ram is running at 600 on one card, and when i enter a game it does not go up. when i switch to the other card, the voltage, and ram speed go up. the core stays the same, but the ram runs at 1000 where it is supposed to. when i enter a game with this vid card in the first pcie slot, the voltage, and core jump up. my 3dmark score is now, with sli'd cards, amd 64 venice core 3000+ oc'd to 2.6, ocz pc4200 el dual channel ram, 2x 250gb 16mb cache 7200 rpm raid configured, 480 watt power supply...is 569!!! WTF??? can anyone help me? what am i doing wrong?

 

[GodLovesPunk]

Have 2 identical 6600GTs? Have the extra molex connector plugged in near the dual PCI-e slots on the motherboard? Dare I ask.. the motherboard is set to SLI mode and not single card mode? Using the latest nvidia driver? Let me know how things turn out.

 

[lagooch]

Originally posted by: GodLovesPunk
Have 2 identical 6600GTs? Have the extra molex connector plugged in near the dual PCI-e slots on the motherboard? Dare I ask.. the motherboard is set to SLI mode and not single card mode? Using the latest nvidia driver? Let me know how things turn out.

yes i have the extra power cords plugged into the two spots that dfi asks for one. i have tried several different drivers and a few would rid me of the power/sentinel msg, but, when i try to run 3dmark or half life lost coast, it freezes my computer. i did notice, after posting that msg, that both video cards are registering the same numbers, they are no longer different. i tried to run just one, with sli jumpers set back to single vga mode and it still gave me the sentinel power msg. the only thing i can think of is; my 480w true power antec ps has the older standard plug for the non-sli boards, the 20 pin i believe. my board will work with it, but now i'm wondering if i need to get a ps that has the 24 pin main plug. never encountered a problem until now. i have tested both cards and i know they are both working as they should be, i am almost positive the that sentinel error msg is the thing lowering the performance to rediculously low lvls. anyway, thank you for the info, i will post if/when i get it fixed.