Configuration types
From PhysX Wiki
PhysX compatible GeForce GPUs can be organized in several types of configurations, allowing users to balance graphics/physics performance and system cost.
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Pure NVIDIA
Set of configurations officially supported and recommended by NVIDIA. Available variants can be viewed and activated via PhysX Control Panel.
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Single card |
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2-Way SLI |
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3-Way SLI |
In SLI mode, only one GPU (main, connected to monitor) is calculating PhysX. Frame processing goes like this (in case of 2-Way SLI, as example):
- GPU1 and GPU2 start rendering their frames
- GPU1 is doing the PhysX calculation
- GPU1 and GPU2 start rendering their frames
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Dedicated PhysX card |
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2-Way SLI + dedicated PhysX card |
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3-Way SLI + dedicated PhysX card |
Adding extra card purely for PhysX processing is a popular way to boost performance in intense GPU PhysX games. Even unequivalent GPUs can be coupled (for example, GTX 470 and GT 240) - but in this case, you won't be able to use dedicated GPU anywhere besides PhysX or CUDA applications. While not utilized, dedicated PhysX card won't shut down completely, but will use power saving features, if supports them.
Such configurations do not impose special requirements on motherboards - only several free PCI-E slots are required (SLI and Crossfire support does not matter, no need to connect main and dedicated card physically). PCI-E x8 or PCI-E x4 slot is enough for dedicated PhysX card to work normally[1].
Only one GPU can be used for PhysX calculations simultaneously, thus dedicating dual-GPU cards (like 9800 GX2) is not reasonable.
AMD + NVIDIA
While it is not possible to run PhysX in hardware on AMD GPUs, compromise solution is available - ability to utilize NVIDIA GPU for PhysX while AMD GPU is used for graphics rendering. Such configurations are known as Hybrid PhysX.
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Hybrid PhysX - single AMD card |
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Hybrid PhysX - Crossfire |
Hybrid PhysX configurations are not officially supported, and even chased by NVIDIA - if AMD GPU is detected in the system, NVIDIA card will lock its PhysX processing functionality. Special hack (Hybrid PhysX mod) must be applied to NVIDIA drivers to bypass these restrictions.
Other requirements are same as for dedicated PhysX cards in pure NV + NV setups.
Ageia PhysX PPU
Ageia PhysX expansions cards are working normally with both NVIDIA and AMD GPUs.
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NVIDIA card + Ageia PhysX PPU |
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AMD card + Ageia PhysX PPU |
However, since Ageia PPUs are not officially supported by NVIDIA now, are outperformed by GPUs in terms of performance and are not recognized by latest GPU PhysX games (based on PhysX SDK 2.8.3 and above) - it is not recommend to use them in your system, unless you want to use play some old titles from PPU hardware accelerated games library.
Compatibility with NVIDIA 3D Vision and AMD Eyefinity
- Single GPU and Multi-GPU PhysX configurations (consisting only of NVIDIA GPUs) are fully compatible with 3D Vision stereo system.
- It is also possible to use multi-monitor Eyefinity technology and Hybrid PhysX[2].
Gallery
 GTX 275 + GTS 250 as dedicated PhysX card |
 2x GTX 580 in SLI + 9800GT |
 Hybrid PhysX: HD 5870 + GTX 275 |
 Hybrid PhysX: 2x HD 5870 + GTX 480 |
References
- ↑ Dedicated PhysX GPU performance dependence on PCI-E bandwidth. PhysXInfo.com.
- ↑ Eyefinity + PhysX! Batman Arkham Asylum Benchmark Run. YouTube
External links
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