GTX 780 in sli on i7 920

[Thevenom]

Hello everyone,

I was wondering if I am bottlenecking my videos cards by having an:

Evga GTX 780 SC ACX in SLI
I7 920 O.C. To 3.6ghz
6gb ram
Evga x58 3x sli
1200w psu

I am going to upgrade once haswell comes out, will I see a big difference?

Thanks,
TheVenom

 

[Yuriman]

Yes and yes. Depends on what games you play, but yes.

 

[Thevenom]

Thanks for the reply,

I play pretty much everything new that comes out. At the moment

BF3
Diablo 3
Metro Last Light
Bioshock infinite
Skyrim

At 2560x1440

 

[EXCellR8]

yea that's way overkill, not to mention pricey.

i had my 920 OC'd to 4.0ghz and my single 7970 would bottleneck in some games.

 

[Yuriman]

Diablo, Skyrim and (I think) Bioshock are all games that a single 780 should be able to max and then some with ease. I haven't played BF3 or Metro yet so I can't speak for them, but have you considered getting the second 780 some months from now when they drop in price a little, seeing as you may not need the extra power now?

 

[Thevenom]

Two late I already have them and they are amazing, I was really just wondering how much I'm actually leaving on the table with my cpu.

Everything plays perfect atm maxed out. Waiting for BF4!

 

[Deleted member 4644]

I have an i7 860 OC to about 3.8 and there is no doubt that it bottlenecks my single 780 GTX in several games. Waiting for haswell here.

 

[bystander36]

Your resolution matters more in determining what will bottleneck those cards. If you are running at 5760x1080p, you'll need a lot more GPU power before you bottleneck a CPU, but at 1080p, that would bottleneck in a flash.

That said, all CPU's experience bottlenecks in some games.

 

[tarmc]

yea that's way overkill, not to mention pricey.

i had my 920 OC'd to 4.0ghz and my single 7970 would bottleneck in some games.

just curious how to tell if cpu is bottlenecking gpu?

 

[toyota]

just curious how to tell if cpu is bottlenecking gpu?

its the easiest thing in the world to check so please dont listen to some of the convoluted ways people will tell you to check. all you have to do is simply lower your resolution. if your frame rate stays about the same then its your cpu that is limiting you.

here you can see there was spot in Hitman where i dropped below 60. I was curious to see if it was a cpu limited spot so I lowered my resolution from 1920 to 1280 and the framerate stayed basically the same. thats right even a 2500k at 4.4 can keep you from staying above 60 fps in some cases.

 

[alcoholbob]

An 3770k or 4770k at 4GHz+ with a single 780 will probably be smoother in the majority of games than a 920 at 3.6GHz with SLI 780s.

 

[tarmc]

i'll have to play around a bit and see

 

[bunnyfubbles]

Diablo, Skyrim and (I think) Bioshock are all games that a single 780 should be able to max and then some with ease. I haven't played BF3 or Metro yet so I can't speak for them, but have you considered getting the second 780 some months from now when they drop in price a little, seeing as you may not need the extra power now?

and what makes you think they are going to drop in price any time soon?

the GTX680 came out March 2012 @ $499 MSRP and to this day is still $499 MSRP from the bigger brands like EVGA/ASUS/Gigabyte, etc

with any luck we'll have new options from AMD by the end of the year, but a price drop on the 780 doesn't appear to be imminent

 

[EXCellR8]

they sure are going fast... must be nice to have disposable income.

780 will be beyond $600 for quite some time, and I highly doubt it will fall near $500 by the end of the year; even when it's bested by something else.

i spent $300 on my last graphics card and I'm still not happy about it

 

[JAG87]

its the easiest thing in the world to check so please dont listen to some of the convoluted ways people will tell you to check. all you have to do is simply lower your resolution. if your frame rate stays about the same then its your cpu that is limiting you.

here you can see there was spot in Hitman where i dropped below 60. I was curious to see if it was a cpu limited spot so I lowered my resolution from 1920 to 1280 and the framerate stayed basically the same. thats right even a 2500k at 4.4 can keep you from staying above 60 fps in some cases.

It's actually much easier, just turn off vsync/frame caps and check your GPU usage. If it's not maxed out, there's a CPU bottleneck.

And in your case, GPU at 99% load is not a CPU bottleneck.... no idea what your usage was at 1280, but in the screenshot you posted that's not a CPU bottleneck.

 

[toyota]

It's actually much easier, just turn off vsync/frame caps and check your GPU usage. If it's not maxed out, there's a CPU bottleneck.

And in your case, GPU at 99% load is not a CPU bottleneck.... no idea what your usage was at 1280, but in the screenshot you posted that's not a CPU bottleneck.

the way I said is the simplest and most accurate way. and yes that was nearly a complete cpu bottleneck because my framerate did not improve by lowering the resolution and if I lower my cpu speed then my performance goes down.

 

[bystander36]

Well, at the higher resolution, when you hit 99%, you probably were at the perfect point between GPU and CPU bound, and when you dropped the resolution, you were then CPU bottlenecked. At least that would account for both conditions.

 

[Termie]

I subscribe to the GPU usage approach. I think it's the clearest indicator of what is really going on, and it also allows you to test the bottlenecking at the settings you actually play at.

Toyota - most likely at 1080p you were just at the cusp of a CPU bottleneck.

To the OP - my i7-860@3.5 bottlenecked a single GTX670, so I'd bet you'd get about 40% of the potential performance of GTX780SLI. That would only matter if you weren't planning on upgrading, but you are, so I assume your question was really just a theoretical one.

 

[bystander36]

To the OP - my i7-860@3.5 bottlenecked a single GTX670, so I'd bet you'd get about 40% of the potential performance of GTX780SLI. That would only matter if you weren't planning on upgrading, but you are, so I assume your question was really just a theoretical one.

Wouldn't that vary radically from game to game?

edit: I see he mentioned he has 1440p which definitely means most games will use the GPU more than 40%.

 

[yours truly]

It's actually much easier, just turn off vsync/frame caps and check your GPU usage. If it's not maxed out, there's a CPU bottleneck.

And in your case, GPU at 99% load is not a CPU bottleneck.... no idea what your usage was at 1280, but in the screenshot you posted that's not a CPU bottleneck.

Wouldn't that depend on the game and its SLI optimisation? I can have some games pegged at 99% GPU usage and others where the performance is all over the place.

 

[blastingcap]

Hello everyone,

I was wondering if I am bottlenecking my videos cards by having an:

Evga GTX 780 SC ACX in SLI
I7 920 O.C. To 3.6ghz
6gb ram
Evga x58 3x sli
1200w psu

I am going to upgrade once haswell comes out, will I see a big difference?

Thanks,
TheVenom

What resolution? If you're gaming on triple 30" monitors for instance, the answer is "rarely if ever." At your resolution though, it's possible. I know that my old 1055T@stock actually bottlenecked me in at least one game at 5760x1080.

 

[willomz]

Why are there so many who ask for retrospective advice?

Ask for advice BEFORE you make major purchases..

 

[2is]

It's actually much easier, just turn off vsync/frame caps and check your GPU usage. If it's not maxed out, there's a CPU bottleneck.

And in your case, GPU at 99% load is not a CPU bottleneck.... no idea what your usage was at 1280, but in the screenshot you posted that's not a CPU bottleneck.

Agreed, this is the method I use as well.

 

[toyota]

lol I just proved to you that looking at gpu usage is not always accurate. I am at 99% in that screen but if I raise my cpu speed frames go up and if I lower it then it goes does down. that is why I showed you the lower res screen where I removed a great deal of gpu load and the framerate stayed basically the same.

so you guys can do whatever you like but lowering the resolution is way more accurate.

 

[2is]

lol I just proved to you that looking at gpu usage is not always accurate. I am at 99% in that screen but if I raise my cpu speed frames go up and if I lower it then it goes does down. that is why I showed you the lower res screen where I removed a great deal of gpu load and the framerate stayed basically the same.

so you guys can do whatever you like but lowering the resolution is way more accurate.

Lowering resolution is not strictly a GPU load setting. I'll stick with my method.