Performance from a PCI PNY 8400 GS for PhysX?

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houseofbugs

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I was curious as to if it would even be worth adding in a PNY PCI 8400 GS to my system just to process PhysX. I picked it up super cheap so I figured it wouldn't hurt having an extra decent PCI video card. But I can fit it in between my 2 GTX 260's on my 750i FTW.
 
It's too weak to make any difference. That particular model 8400 has enough RAM to satisfy the requirements for Physx, but I don't know if the GPU is supported. Besides that, your 260's are infinitely capable of doing SLI + Physx without a problem. SLI doesn't scale linearly (2 cards, 2x the performance), so that unused GPU power is put to good use by a mildly intensive and constant load like Physx.

When an addon Physx card is called for, you should really consider a 9600GT or greater - although MANY people started off utilizing old 8600GS/GT's that way.
 
I would just try it, what do you have to lose? Run some benches with and without the card and see if it makes a difference.
 
Well, if you don't have a PCIe slot available, your outta luck, hehe.

But yeah, for PhysX, a 9600GT is about the minimum you should go.
 
This will make your setup actually slower since slow PhysX card will be bottlenecking your system.

9500gt is bare minimum you should use and the more sp the better.
 
what about using an 8500gt ddr2 512mb pcie for PhysX?

would it work? and also if you have your main card like an ati 4870 and then use an 8500gt as the physx (with the drivers in windows 7 so it will work), will each card run at 8x pcie on a motherboard like an intel p45 chipset? just wondering bcs i know crossfire works at x8

thanks for the info
 
shamgar said:
what about using an 8500gt ddr2 512mb pcie for PhysX?

would it work? and also if you have your main card like an ati 4870 and then use an 8500gt as the physx (with the drivers in windows 7 so it will work), will each card run at 8x pcie on a motherboard like an intel p45 chipset? just wondering bcs i know crossfire works at x8

thanks for the info
Click to expand...

It would work, but it will not be cabable of really pushing much in the terms of Physx.
 
shamgar said:
what about using an 8500gt ddr2 512mb pcie for PhysX?

would it work? and also if you have your main card like an ati 4870 and then use an 8500gt as the physx (with the drivers in windows 7 so it will work), will each card run at 8x pcie on a motherboard like an intel p45 chipset? just wondering bcs i know crossfire works at x8

thanks for the info
Click to expand...

Like the previous poster said the 8500gt is probably too weak to do any good. I'm running a GT 220 for PhysX and it struggles a little during the most physics heavy parts of batman.

This chart is good for checking the relative speed of different cards, and it gets updated every month:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/geforce-310-5970,2491-7.html

On my p45 board, ASUS P5Q Pro Turbo, each card runs at 8x pcie, I'm not sure if this is the same for other p45 boards though.
 
Also, to note:

Older (G86) 8400GS: 16SP (faster, too, despite the lower clocks)
Newer (G98) 8400GS: 8SP (slower, despite the higher clocks)
 
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