Will this work... Surround, SLI but different memory with 2 cards?

[Zorro]

This is the rub. 1st card running 1 monitor having a memory of 1.50 GB, the second card, memory of 3072mb running 2 monitors. Both EVGA 580's. Monitors Res 1920 x 1200. Samsung BW 245. Would the 3GB of the second card help running the 2 monitors? Using this for X Plane and FSX. Do both cards have to be exactly matched, will the drivers reconize the extra memory of the second card? Any reply's welcomed.

[thales100]

No, afaik itll work but using 1.5 Gb of VRAM, the "extra" VRAM of the second VGA wont do anything, as video memory in SLI is mirrored.

[Zorro]

To use 3 x 27" monitors, the 3 GB Nvidia card x 2 much better? Thanks for the reply.

[Paradigm Shifter]

To use 3 x 27" monitors, the 3 GB Nvidia card x 2 much better? Thanks for the reply.

Yes. If you're talking about running 3x2560x1400, 3GB would take a lot of pressure off.

SLI/CrossFire treats VRAM like RAID1 does HDDs - data is mirrored, and the total available is the amount of VRAM available to the card with least.

[Kayden]

Here's my question on this. If I get a 3072mb 580 make it the first card in SLI, have my 2 other 580s with 1536mb be the 2nd and 3rd. Will the SLI configuration take advantage of the extra memory of the first card, since SLI doesn't share memory across the cards or will it be limited to what the other cards are at 1536mb?

[thales100]

Here's my question on this. If I get a 3072mb 580 make it the first card in SLI, have my 2 other 580s with 1536mb be the 2nd and 3rd. Will the SLI configuration take advantage of the extra memory of the first card, since SLI doesn't share memory across the cards or will it be limited to what the other cards are at 1536mb?

It''ll be limited at 1536mb.

[Delphium]

Here's my question on this. If I get a 3072mb 580 make it the first card in SLI, have my 2 other 580s with 1536mb be the 2nd and 3rd. Will the SLI configuration take advantage of the extra memory of the first card, since SLI doesn't share memory across the cards or will it be limited to what the other cards are at 1536mb?

You will be limited to the lowest value, in this case being 1536mb.

[Kayden]

Thanks for the quick reply guys. It's what I was figuring, unfortunately I guess that's what I get for jumping on EVGA's 580 WC cards right away. I'm not having any problems right now but since I went to Surround I was thinking it would be best to have the larger memory, but if it wont do me any good guess I'll stick with getting another 1536 for the 3 way.

[ugzz]

im not understanding why you have 3x 580s?
i get 2x for sli, and i get having another card so you can break the nvidia driver limitation of 2x monitors in sli or 3x in surround, but the extra monitor wont run games anyway, so why use a 580 on it? usually i see sets like 2x 580s and 1x 220 or something

*edit:
ah i c, 3 way-sli. i guess since 3 way sli board and 3x high end gpus are out of my price range ive never really researched it any haha. but i see now

hell if you have the cash for more 580s, just toss one my way if you don't need it ;)
hah, but more seriously, if you are all about the video memory, sell off the 1.5gb one and get 2x more 3gb ones and go for broke!

on another side note, take a look at the benchmarks on pretty much.. any game. upping from 1.5-3gb of memory doesnt give a huge improvement anywhere, while i can help.
of course those are benches on single monitor setups. when talking about 3x1 or higher, than maybe you would see more improvement. it would be interesting to see some of the hardware review places start to include some benches like that. to see if it "Breaks" the current set of rules. like specifically the minor increases off a video memory jump

[Moltar]

on another side note, take a look at the benchmarks on pretty much.. any game. upping from 1.5-3gb of memory doesnt give a huge improvement anywhere, while i can help.
of course those are benches on single monitor setups. when talking about 3x1 or higher, than maybe you would see more improvement. it would be interesting to see some of the hardware review places start to include some benches like that. to see if it "Breaks" the current set of rules. like specifically the minor increases off a video memory jump

The 3GB vRam doesn't give you a benefit on normal monitor resoltuions. However, when you start talking about nVidia surround and Eyefinity resoltuions, the extra vRam is a must. The higher the pixel density, the greater the need for vRam in today's demanding games such as BF3 and Crysis 2.