The best rig - theoretically

[pcm81]

1. I am posting this out of sheer curiosity; i do not intend to upgrade, just yet.
2. I've seen benchmarks for 680s, 7970s, but i did not see a full blown bench for uber-rig.

Lets assume we have unlimited budget and are only limited by windows driver support. I am currently limited to 4-gpus with 2x6990s; not sure what nvidia gpu limit is. What would be ultimate rig:
1. 2x 6990s
2. As many 7970 as one can jam in the case (3? 4?)
3. As many 680s as one can jam in the case (3? 4?)

Lets assume what all hardware is water cooled and we are after the best raw performance. Ignoring driver maturity, since some cards are very new... What is the best "raw metal" rig these days?

dx11, sci computing etc.

 

[Jaydip]

Wait for the dual gpu monsters to be revealed by NV and AMD and then make your pick

 

[Grooveriding]

With what is on the market right now ?

4 cherry picked 7970s on water cooling. Over-volted and clocked. to 1300+ Probably four of these http://oclab.ru/topic/vozdushnyiy-chempion-ili-obzor-sapphire-hd-7970-toxic.

Put them on an R4E with a 3960x.

That or 4 cherry picked 680s on air, water does nothing for them OC wise as you can't add voltage. :biggrin:

 

[RavenSEAL]

4 GTX 690s and a 3960X would be something...


RS

 

[pcm81]

With what is on the market right now ?

4 cherry picked 7970s on water cooling. Over-volted and clocked. to 1300+ Probably four of these http://oclab.ru/topic/vozdushnyiy-chempion-ili-obzor-sapphire-hd-7970-toxic.

Put them on an R4E with a 3960x.

That or 4 cherry picked 680s on air, water does nothing for them OC wise as you can't add voltage. :biggrin:

OCin in pure clock cycles still increases power draw. Increasing voltage allows for higher clock cycle ceiling. Power draw is proportional to voltage squared and linearly to clock cycles. That is you double clock, without voltage adjustment you double power draw; you double volts without clock adjustment you quadruple power draw.

 

[Grooveriding]

OCin in pure clock cycles still increases power draw. Increasing voltage allows for higher clock cycle ceiling. Power draw is proportional to voltage squared and linearly to clock cycles. That is you double clock, without voltage adjustment you double power draw; you double volts without clock adjustment you quadruple power draw.

The best 680s I have seen are hitting 1300 on stock voltage and it ends there. It's still manageable temp wise with the stock cooler. Against a 7970 getting more voltage pumped into it as well as higher clocks which gets too hot for the stock cooler to handle.

My 680s are on water for acoustics and fun. I was just saying that with what you can currently do with a 680 overclocking wise, water is no benefit. That is not true for the 7970 though.

 

[pcm81]

The best 680s I have seen are hitting 1300 on stock voltage and it ends there. It's still manageable temp wise with the stock cooler. Against a 7970 getting more voltage pumped into it as well as higher clocks which gets too hot for the stock cooler to handle.

My 680s are on water for acoustics and fun. I was just saying that with what you can currently do with a 680 overclocking wise, water is no benefit. That is not true for the 7970 though.

That makes sense. I am running 6990s on water. It seems though that i am cpu limited anyways... at 4.4GHz on 980X.

Would be fun to see a well controlled bench with the same mobo/cpu loaded with 4x 680s and 4x 7970s. on water as applicable.

 

[Grooveriding]

That makes sense. I am running 6990s on water. It seems though that i am cpu limited anyways... at 4.4GHz on 980X.

Would be fun to see a well controlled bench with the same mobo/cpu loaded with 4x 680s and 4x 7970s. on water as applicable.

This guy tends to be the bleeding edge nutter I see around the forums. He's running 680 quad on a R4E/3960x and shares some benches.

Not sure if he was running 7970 quad before, I believe he was only using two though looking at his youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ovm7...DvjVQa1PpcFOpwHlB70YlOPXjcq6s9SavVX_7Mg_76u4=

edit: http://www.overclock.net/t/1143724/3x-120hz-eyefinity-portrait-setup

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ovm7...DvjVQa1PpcFOpwHlB70YlOPXjcq6s9SavVX_7Mg_76u4=

That is nice, he removed and modded the bezels on some 120hz monitors for eyefinity. I've never liked eyefinity/surround because of the bezels, but that mod basically fixes all my complaints about them.

 

[RavenSEAL]

That makes sense. I am running 6990s on water. It seems though that i am cpu limited anyways... at 4.4GHz on 980X.

Would be fun to see a well controlled bench with the same mobo/cpu loaded with 4x 680s and 4x 7970s. on water as applicable.

Your electric company must love you!

 

[pcm81]

Your electric company must love you!

Yep, they do. I am still ahead though from the old bitcoin days...

 

[Joseph F]

FYI, GTX680 SLI doesn't scale after two cards. Adding a third usually does nothing, from what I've seen.

EDIT: Nevermind. It was only one review that I read that showed such results.
I looked at another one, and it wasn't quite that bad, though 4-way scaling still sucks. (7970 Quadfire is still better than 680 Quad-SLI)

 

[aaksheytalwar]

You can easily blow 10-15 grands on an uber rig

Just ssds can set you back a few grands and another 1-2 grands for big super fast hdds. Cooling another grand or so. 27" 120hz eyefinity another 3 grands or so. 10 grands will definitely not cut it, probably around the 15k mark

 

[pcm81]

You can easily blow 10-15 grands on an uber rig

Just ssds can set you back a few grands and another 1-2 grands for big super fast hdds. Cooling another grand or so. 27" 120hz eyefinity another 3 grands or so. 10 grands will definitely not cut it, probably around the 15k mark

My current rig was $5K

 

[Grooveriding]

FYI, GTX680 SLI doesn't scale after two cards. Adding a third usually does nothing, from what I've seen.

Yeah this is also true. Tri and Quad SLI are scaling poorly on the 680. If someone were to go balls to the walls, 7970 quad would be better with the current multi-gpu tri/quad scaling situation compared between amd/nvidia.

http://nl.hardware.info/reviews/264...quad-sli-review-english-version-battlefield-3

3 7970s are faster than 4 680s. :ninja:

 

[aaksheytalwar]

FYI, GTX680 SLI doesn't scale after two cards. Adding a third usually does nothing, from what I've seen.

True. IMO at the best playable settings 7970 stock tri cf will probably be >= 680 stock tri sli and 7979 quad fire will probably beat 680 quad sli again at stock. 7970 scales nearly linearly with tri setup and okay with quad setup. However 680 sli stock is a bit faster than 7970 cf stock when both are getting über fps

 

[aaksheytalwar]

My current rig is about 5.5k too, this is with a single 7970 prices in India are like 1.2-1.5+ times as much. Besides, I use everything balanced and high end, from my speakers to mouse pad to monitor to psu etc, not just gpus. Just my hdds and ssd cost me about 1.5k

 

[pcm81]

My current rig is about 5.5k too, this is with a single 7970 prices in India are like 1.2-1.5+ times as much. Besides, I use everything balanced and high end, from my speakers to mouse pad to monitor to psu etc, not just gpus. Just my hdds and ssd cost me about 1.5k

I only counted the cost of computer, not the screens and audio system...

 

[Smoblikat]

Id say a 2700K for gaming, or for overall use a 3960, with 4XHD7970's.

 

[Ferzerp]

Are the tests that have been published with the 680 4-way using PCIE 3.0 or 2.0? From that one report we saw, 2.0 with more than two 680's became a severe bottleneck. It would be interesting to have this possibility explored to see if it is truly the case.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

^ Vega showed that, 2.0 bottles badly.


Also FPS is a poor measurement of performance when AMD is stuttering through gameplay with CF.

 

[Joseph F]

^ Vega showed that, 2.0 bottles badly.


Also FPS is a poor measurement of performance when AMD is stuttering through gameplay with CF.

Microstutter disappears in CF and SLI when you have three cards, or more.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Double Disappear, or as I like to call it Double D's.

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Without the screen and audio setup it is still around 4k for me as well that too with a single 7970. Each 7970 plus arctic extreme means $1000+ for me

And I spend like 2-3k a year on upgrades even after this. So I will upgrade to ivy as well. So on avg 3k a year worth parts

 

[Joseph F]

Without the screen and audio setup it is still around 4k for me as well that too with a single 7970. Each 7970 plus arctic extreme means $1000+ for me

And I spend like 2-3k a year on upgrades even after this. So I will upgrade to ivy as well. So on avg 3k a year worth parts

I think you should go for watercooling of you're going to sink that much dough into it.

 

[pcm81]

I think you should go for watercooling of you're going to sink that much dough into it.

My watercooling for 2x video cards + cpu was about $900, so its not too painful...