SLI Problem

  • Thread starter Thread starter Shawn Malligan
  • Start date Start date
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Shawn Malligan

Hello
I am using two Albatron 8880GTS 320mb cards in SLI mode. When I try to play
Railroads or Civilisation 4 (any of them) I get two white stripes and and an
SLI sign on the left side of the screen during bootup and the game. It
disappears when I return to the desktop. I have used the official latest
Vista Nvidia Drivers and the three beta ones released since 162.22. If I
switch from SLI to single card display everything is fine. I have tried the
MS patches which are supposed to fix performance issues but they say they
are'nt for my system. I haven't tried any other game since the problem has
started.
My CPU is a Core 2 Quad Core 6600, 4gb (recognised as 3gb in 32bit Vista
Premium 32bit) and monitor an Acer AL1916W. I'd like to be able to use SLI
since that's why I bought two cards. Does anyone else have this problem or
know what I can do?
Thanks Shawn
 
Shawn Malligan said:
Hello
I am using two Albatron 8880GTS 320mb cards in SLI mode. When I try to
play Railroads or Civilisation 4 (any of them) I get two white stripes and
and an SLI sign on the left side of the screen during bootup and the game.
It disappears when I return to the desktop. I have used the official
latest Vista Nvidia Drivers and the three beta ones released since 162.22.
If I switch from SLI to single card display everything is fine. I have
tried the MS patches which are supposed to fix performance issues but they
say they are'nt for my system. I haven't tried any other game since the
problem has started.
My CPU is a Core 2 Quad Core 6600, 4gb (recognised as 3gb in 32bit Vista
Premium 32bit) and monitor an Acer AL1916W. I'd like to be able to use SLI
since that's why I bought two cards. Does anyone else have this problem or
know what I can do?
Thanks Shawn
Click to expand...

This is part of the NVidia set-up where it is reporting what it is doing in
SLi. Gawd knows why anyone would want to have it turned on ever!

Go to the NVidia Control panel and delve in the SLi menu and take the tick
out of the box where it says to show SLi performance (or some such words - I
don't have SLi configured so don't have the exact listing)

Frenchy
 
Hi Frenchy

I tried to change the settings for SLI performance mode but now I get is a
single line going across the screen with SLI on left hand side. Is there
another setting I need to adjust? Thanks everyone.

Shawn
 
Shawn Malligan said:
Hi Frenchy

I tried to change the settings for SLI performance mode but now I get is a
single line going across the screen with SLI on left hand side. Is there
another setting I need to adjust? Thanks everyone.

Shawn
Click to expand...

That view you now get sounds like you have the tick IN THE BOX, take the
tick out, that puts you back to your original visual problem.

You have a great looking High spec system, but something else is wrong here.

What is the native resolution of your monitor? Don't try and run any
frequency other than 60 Hz. When you get into the game, can you go straight
to the settings and set it up at the same native resolution as your monitor.

In the NView control panel set the 3D settings to QUALITY.

Failing all that, grab a free copy of NHancer (www.nhancer.com) and this
allows you to load specific profiles for many games and that may help.

Frenchy
 
Shawn said:
Hello
I am using two Albatron 8880GTS 320mb cards in SLI mode. When I try to
play Railroads or Civilisation 4 (any of them) I get two white stripes
and and an SLI sign on the left side of the screen during bootup and the
game. It disappears when I return to the desktop. I have used the
official latest Vista Nvidia Drivers and the three beta ones released
since 162.22. If I switch from SLI to single card display everything is
fine. I have tried the MS patches which are supposed to fix performance
issues but they say they are'nt for my system. I haven't tried any other
game since the problem has started.
My CPU is a Core 2 Quad Core 6600, 4gb (recognised as 3gb in 32bit Vista
Premium 32bit) and monitor an Acer AL1916W. I'd like to be able to use
SLI since that's why I bought two cards. Does anyone else have this
problem or know what I can do?
Thanks Shawn
Click to expand...

My two cents:
A 32-bit system can only adress 4 GB. This includes the graphic cards.
Does your problem arise when you remove 1 GB of RAM?
 
Wim Hekken ;-) said:
My two cents:
A 32-bit system can only adress 4 GB. This includes the graphic cards.
Does your problem arise when you remove 1 GB of RAM?
Click to expand...

Well that's the first I have EVER heard of the Graphic Cards Memory being
included in the 4 Gb!!

I ain't saying it is wrong but surely that would have been raised long
before this!

Can any MSVP cast light on this bold statement!

Frenchy
with 785 Mb on his Video Card
 
Of course it is, and it has been raised countless times by people wondering
why they can only see 3Gb (if they are lucky).
The same amount of memory as on the card gets allocated memory addresses
within the 4Gb address space limit of 32 bit vista.
(which means that physical memory is unavailable even though its not
actually being used)
Thats why you need 64 bit if you have 4Gb memory, so that this allocation is
then beyond the physical memory and makes no difference.
Its a limitation of 32 bit that is only now rearing its ugly head as more of
us are installing more memory.
Not sure of its relevance to the original posters question though.

Phypps
 
Hello again

I downloaded the official Vista 32 Bit Nvidia drivers 163.69 (not the beta
one) and now Railroads and Civilization run without the SLI Stripes. But
today I purchased World In Conflict and while booting and playing that the
Stripes are back. Would the next update of Nvidia drivers fix this new
problem as well?

Thanks Shawn
 
Wim Hekken ;-) said:
My two cents:
A 32-bit system can only adress 4 GB. This includes the graphic cards.
Does your problem arise when you remove 1 GB of RAM?
Click to expand...

the 32-bit archtechture of the 80386 intel chipset has a maximum memory
address of 4,194,304 Kbytes. In "Theory" Vista should be able to address all
that ram, but for some reason it can't. Don't know if it has something to do
with Video, but if I recall my system archtecture classes back in the late
90s, it shouldn't

So the system CAN access all 4 gigs of ram, and it doesn't matter how much
ram you have on your video card, but with the way Vista handles RAM I don't
think it will access all 4 gigs, no idea why, I'm guessing the way Vista
handles RAM now that it's unable to completely address all the ram the
architecture is capible of handling.

If you want to see all 4 gigs, find a copy of 64-bit Vista or run Windows XP
32-bit.

As for Railroads (AWESOME game) and Civ (well a bit played out, but still
awesome), no idea. Got a screen shot of the problem?
 
What you need to do is turn off the SLI visual indicators, they're a
diagnostic tool to show you whether SLI is working, what mode it's in and
how much work is being done by which card.

The horizontal band is shown when you're running in split frame SLI mode,
the 2 stripes on the left are shown when you're in alternate frame mode, if
there's no stripes and the indicators are enabled then you're not running in
SLI mode at all.

To turn the indicators off:-

Open the Nvidia control panel, on the top menu select "3D Settings", on the
drop down you'll see "Show SLI visual indicators", if that's ticked the bars
are enabled, if it isn't they're hidden.

Peter Lawton
 
Hello

I find in Nvidia Control Panel for Vista a menu for SLI Performance mode and
I switch between Single GPU, Force Split Frame Rendering and Force Alternate
Frame Rendering 1 and 2. I try each selection no luck. No drop down for Show
SLI Visiual Inditcators so no problem solved. New Driver?

Thanks everybody Shawn
 
On mine the "3D Settings" is right at the top of the control panel, on the
top menu bar. Not one of the main options on the left to change the
rendering types.

On the top bar I've got "File" "Edit" "View" "3D Settings" "Help"

Peter Lawton
 
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