gtx260 and hybrid sli

[watermelonman]

Hi. I am seriously a neophyte about tech stuff so go easy on me. I was curious if getting a motherboard with hybrid sli would increase the performance of my gtx260.

[Quick420]

Huh? You talking use 2 cards? Assuming thats what you meant yes your performance would increase.

[watermelonman]

Sorry, I meant "hybrid". I was reading about it and it has something to do with using onboard graphics in conjunction with your nvidia graphics card.

Here is a link about it:


http://www.nvidia.com/object/geforce_8100mgpu.html


"Turbo-charge your GeForce GPU
Turbocharge the performance of your GeForce GPU. Plug it into a GeForce 8100 motherboard to enjoy GeForce Boost and enhanced graphics performance."




I was wondering if this stuff actually boosts performance.

[particleman]

Hybrid SLi to boost performance only works with low end cards like the 8400. There is actually a small performance hit when using Hybrid SLi with a highend card like the 260, it is negligible though and you only lose 1 or 2 fps.

The purpose of Hybrid SLi with on high end cards like the 260/280GTX is Hybrid Power, to shutoff the dedicated graphics when just webbrowsing and stuff. But even Hybrid Power doesn't work properly with the 2XX series, it saves a measly 5W of power (which come from turning off the fan) but makes the card very very hot.

[GOZ]

Originally Posted by particleman

But even Hybrid Power doesn't work properly with the 2XX series, it saves a measly 5W of power (which come from turning off the fan) but makes the card very very hot.

What have you been smoking??????????

[particleman]

http://www.silentpcreview.com/article853-page6.html

Take a look at the numbers in that review.

I get the same thing on my Hybrid SLi 280GTX setup, there some others on the web who have confirmed this as well.

Originally Posted by GOZ

What have you been smoking??????????

[bacon12]

Wow pretty useless, and I was considering buying a 780i asus board someone has for sale to use as a lan/htpc. I thought the power savings would be a whole lot more than that.

[Quick420]

Originally Posted by watermelonman

Sorry, I meant "hybrid". I was reading about it and it has something to do with using onboard graphics in conjunction with your nvidia graphics card.

Here is a link about it:


http://www.nvidia.com/object/geforce_8100mgpu.html


"Turbo-charge your GeForce GPU
Turbocharge the performance of your GeForce GPU. Plug it into a GeForce 8100 motherboard to enjoy GeForce Boost and enhanced graphics performance."




I was wondering if this stuff actually boosts performance.

Too bad the link doesnt show **** info SOunds like a gimmick to me....

[Bman212121]

Originally Posted by bacon12

Wow pretty useless, and I was considering buying a 780i asus board someone has for sale to use as a lan/htpc. I thought the power savings would be a whole lot more than that.

A 780i board doesn't have any of the power management features on it. Only the 780a/g (AMD) boards have it at the present time. The graphs in that chart are old, but there is additional reasons why hybridpower won't make that big of a difference. With the GTX 2XX series Nvidia implemented a seperate downclocking feature on the cards, so they only consume 25W when idle regardless of the board. If you took an older card like an 8800GTX that uses a lot more power when idle there would be a larger gain. (Not sure if older cards do hybridpower though) Obviously their review the GTX 260 wasn't able to completely power off, but if it could you'd still only shave off another 20W.

Guru3d sums this up really well here:

Idle/2D power mode: approx. 25W
Blu-ray DVD playback mode: approx. 35W
Full 3D performance mode: varies - worst case TDP 236W for GTX 280
Full 3D performance mode: varies - worst case TDP 182W for GTX 260
HybridPower mode: effectively 0W
Using a HybridPower-capable nForce motherboard a GeForce GTX 200 GPU can be fully powered off when not performing intensive graphics operations and graphics output can be handled by the motherboard's IGP.

So though the processor can peak towards 225-235 Watt with hefty gaming, the reality is that it's just as much as a GeForce 8800 Ultra, yet you have double the performance and the overall picture of this GPU in more common situations seems to be very energy efficient.

http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforc...-review-test/5


@watermelonman: Unfortunately no you won't see any increases in performance with a setup like that. Hybrid SLI was only meant for really low end graphics processors. You're GTX 260 is easily 10x the graphics card that the onboard is, so it will actually slow performance way down due to the way SLI works.

[bacon12]

I thought that hybrid was power management. Any way I got a good deal on the board, and it will go in my HTPC. It is 780a not i, I made a mistake there.

According to the ASUS page it is a hybrid board.

Hybrid SLI™
Hybrid SLI™ technology is a unique hybrid multi-GPU technology. It includes two primary features: GeForce® Boost and HybridPower™. GeForce® Boost turbo-charges performance of discrete graphics cards when combined with the motherboard GPU. HybridPower™ unleashes graphics performance for demanding 3D applications and enables low-power operation for everyday computing needs.

The hybrid link at the bottom says the site is down, but anyway here is the main page. I am gonna test it with my gtx 260 just to make sure the pcie slots are working, but I don't have a kill-a-watt tester to read from the plug.

http://usa.asus.com/products.aspx?l1...97&modelmenu=1

[Bman212121]

Originally Posted by bacon12

I thought that hybrid was power management. Any way I got a good deal on the board, and it will go in my HTPC. It is 780a not i, I made a mistake there.

According to the ASUS page it is a hybrid board.



The hybrid link at the bottom says the site is down, but anyway here is the main page. I am gonna test it with my gtx 260 just to make sure the pcie slots are working, but I don't have a kill-a-watt tester to read from the plug.

http://usa.asus.com/products.aspx?l1...97&modelmenu=1

Yea Hybrid is power management. I might have poorly worded what I wrote, but the 780i/790i (Intel boards) don't support hybrid SLI. There aren't any intel boards made by Nvidia capabale of supporting either Hybrid power or Hybrid SLI. The 780a and 780G AMD boards however do support both Hybrid power and Hybrid SLI because they have the 8xxx Integrated graphics processor.