GTX 650 dedicated PhysX card with GTX 970

[Juston Li]

Hello

I just bought a GTX 970 and its currently shipping.
I was gonna sell my current GTX 650 but found out I could use it as a dedicated PhysX card.

Does it makes sense to do so in my case? Or will the GTX 650 be too slow and bottleneck my 970?

 

[Alpha3031]

You won't need a dedicated PhysX card. NVidia cards have dedicated PhysX processing bits, so it should work better with less power.

 

[Sakkura]

The GTX 650 might bottleneck performance. But since you have the card already, you can test it yourself - compare FPS with and without the 650.

 

[Ryan Daugherty]

Hello, I have a 610 to use as dedicated phys x and it works quite well. I dont think it would bottleneck.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

Great idea....the 650's presence will take load off the GPU allowing it to do better. Not that the 970 needs a lot of help ... iff you play 3D / 144 Hz, you will notice it more

 

[Alpha3031]

Try it. If there's little/no improvement don't use it. If you had a AMD card, there would be a lot of benefit, but also a lot more work using a dedicated PhysX card, but since it's going to be as easy as setting the PhysX processor in NCP, why not.

 

[17seconds]

These charts are comparable to your situation. The GTX 650 pairs excellently with a high-end GPU.

http://1pcent.com/?p=169

 

[Juston Li]

Thanks for the replies!
My 970 comes Thursday, I'll give it a try and post my results. (Though I'm not entirely sure my motherboard would support this configuration but we'll see)

 

[DrFiStCaKe]

Thanks for the replies!
My 970 comes Thursday, I'll give it a try and post my results. (Though I'm not entirely sure my motherboard would support this configuration but we'll see)

I am curious if this works. I have a Gigabyte 770 4gb. I want to upgrade to the 970 and use the 770 for a Physx card until I get a second 970 to run SLI. Do you connect the SLI bridge or do you just plug them into the 16x PCIe slots and set up the physx dedicated card in windows and you are done?

 

[Juston Li]

Sorry I forgot to follow up.
I couldn't actually test it because my box doesn't have room for 2 cards=/ I just sold my 650

Honestly the 970 is such a beast I'm not sure if it would have made a huge difference. Plays Arkham Origins and Borderlands Pre-Sequel at full Physx, 1080p 60hz

 

[zoltar151]

i have a zotac 970 and a gigabyte 650 and i ran an msi kombuster physx test and the results were unparallel. 45 FPS with the 970 alone max load. dedicated 650 70 FPS MAX LOAD. i would say for sure that i should not bottleneck you. every game that uses physx that i've had a dedicated 650 for performs better and i challenge any one to show me proof of otherwise. aside from that its jsut a power waster becuase not all games will use it. my 650 has passive power so most of the time the case is so cold and the gpu is so unused the fan doesn't even spin on my 650. it only kicks up when needed. I've also tested batman Arkham Origins and with a dedicated physx card my fps were far more constant at 72 FPS rather than jumping all about. so that's my 2 cents worth. i invite any one else to join the discussion.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

I'd add that the extra load from 3D at 120/144hz will make the PhysX card even more significant.

 

[17seconds]

Does Kombustor use PhysX or physics?

 

[zoltar151]

Does Kombustor use PhysX or physics?

there is only Physx

 

[17seconds]

I'm about to install my old GTX 580 for PhysX just so I can play Borderlands 2 with my GTX 780 Ti. I don't get why people would say these high-end cards can handle PhysX just fine on their own. Most of the time its okay, but there are definitely times when the graphics get choppy with a lot of effects on screen. I'm weighing whether the extra noise is worth it.

 

[zoltar151]

I'm about to install my old GTX 580 for PhysX just so I can play Borderlands 2 with my GTX 780 Ti. I don't get why people would say these high-end cards can handle PhysX just fine on their own. Most of the time its okay, but there are definitely times when the graphics get choppy with a lot of effects on screen. I'm weighing whether the extra noise is worth it.

so far i've found it worth it in games tha use physx but the card but be 75% as good as the main card. my 650 hasn't hindered my 970 so i think you ok

 

[El Tigre]

If your PC can handle both cards (your PSU), then why not? The GTX 650 is the go to card for dedicated PhysX duty, I on the other hand am using my old EVGA GTX 680 Superclocked+ 4GB as a Dedicated PhysX card to help my SLI GTX 970 at 4K resolution and it does a big difference as I need every once of performance for 4K gaming and with my 680 doing the PhysX work, I get about 10-15% better performance. My PC and CPU handles all 3 cards just fine and I don't have any bottlenecks either. I also plan to use my GTX 970 as my new PhysX card once the 980 Ti/Titan II come out as I want 384/512 bit memory cards to use 6-8GB of VRAM as 256 bit only chokes them above 3GB. I know, it's overkill, but why not?, lol.

 

[17seconds]

Well there is GPU accelerated PhysX using the proprietary API owned by Nvidia,. And then there is "physics" run on the CPU that could be from Havok, Frostbite, etc., or even Nvidia. Only the Nvidia GPU accelerated type is going to benefit from a PhysX card.

Kombustor has the KMark (PhysX) test. After some research, it looks like it has both CPU and GPU acceleration.

 

[Alpha3031]

 

[Iordan_1]

what about using the gtx950 for dedicated physx on the 970, its only 60$ more than the 650

 

[Alpha3031]

@Iordan

I'll say that my last post still stands, and that it isn't nice to hijack another person's thread to ask your own question eve if they are relates, especially if the last post on the thread is almost 1 year ago.