Loading...
> >

OT: Reusing a GTX 970

Charlie JudgeCharlie Judge Posts: 13,336
in The Commons

 For various reasons including power consumption, heat,  and available space, when I get my new GTX 1080 ti I plan to remove the existing EVGA GTX 970 from my main computer and am trying to decide what do with GTX 970. I also have an an older computer, a HP Pavilion p6710f with 8gb DDR3 memory and an Antec 450w power supply upgrade and am considering adding the GTX 970 to it. However, I suspect I may need to upgrade both the memory (to 16gb) and the power supply to accomodate it. So, I'm not sure if it would be worth it or if I would just be better off selling the GTX 970 on eBay.

Any suggestions? Also any recommendations as to exactly what I would need if I do decide to use the GTX 970 in the old HP?

Thanks,

Charle

Comments

  • BobvanBobvan Posts: 2,653
    edited June 2017

    I kinda got lucky and when I built my new system with 1080ti the 980 in my old machine had crapped out. It was under warranty and got it replaced with what was most likely a refurb. it came sealed in a box and sold it on Craigslist the same say.. I sold it cause after discussing it with the tech who built my new system, I decided that the extra problem potentials such has heat and drain on the power supply was not woth what that card would bring..

    Post edited by Bobvan on
  • alexhcowleyalexhcowley Posts: 2,404

    I started out with a 970 and then bought a 1080 (not ti, alas).  I discovered that doing an iray render with the two cards overheated both so I now use the 970 to drive the monitor. 

    Keep your old 970 for your monitor and use the 1080ti for iray.  You  may need to upgrade your PSU as well, though, to handle both cards.

    Cheers,

    Alex.

  • Charlie JudgeCharlie Judge Posts: 13,336
    edited June 2017
    alexhcowley said:

    I started out with a 970 and then bought a 1080 (not ti, alas).  I discovered that doing an iray render with the two cards overheated both so I now use the 970 to drive the monitor. 

    Keep your old 970 for your monitor and use the 1080ti for iray.  You  may need to upgrade your PSU as well, though, to handle both cards.

    Cheers,

    Alex.

    My newer Cyberpower computer, the one I am putting the GTX 1080 ti in, has good onboard video (albeit not Nvidia) I can use for my monitor so I don't need the GTX 970 for that.

    The real question is whether it is worthwhile to upgrade the older HP Pavilion, which doesn't have an Nvidia card, to accomodate the GTX 970.

    Post edited by Charlie Judge on
  • Takeo.KenseiTakeo.Kensei Posts: 1,303

    It only depends if you want to use it and what would be the use case (DS ?). I have three desktops and one notebook at home. I only use one desktop and one notebook. It may be better to sell the old one because you may end up only using the most powerfull

    The PSU upgrade is not necessary. You only need a 6 pin power connector.

    More RAM would be good but not mandatory. Rule would be PC RAM = 3 x GPU VRAM which make 3 x 3.5 = 10.5

    Integrated GPU are very limited. But if you don't see the difference with the GTX 970 then there is no reason to keep it in the new comp

  • kyoto kidkyoto kid Posts: 42,038
    edited June 2017

    ...the issue I have with using onboard graphics for driving the display is when working in Nvidia Vue mode.

    I have an old 1 GB GT 460 which is defintiely not up to the task so it pretty much falls to the MB's Intel chipset and physical memory (10.7 GB after Windows & utilities) which is woefully inadequate to drive such a rich display along with henadling the scene/programme load. I usually have to wait a long time for screen refreshes and after a short while the Daz programme crashes to the desktop.  This is one of the reasons I do not work with HDRIs as I have to run a bunch of test renders just to get the lighting and backdrop rotated to where I want it.

    Post edited by kyoto kid on
  • marblemarble Posts: 7,500

    Yep - I have a  working 1070 and a faulty 970 which shows a memory error when the high end of the VRAM is accessed. That only happens with IRay so I leave the 970 to handle the monitor. It plays videos and works fine for the DAZ Studio viewport in texture mode (not IRay preview). I have GPU-Z to monitor the cards and can see that the 970 hardly draws any power and has never hit the VRAM error so I don't worry too much abut heat or power usage.

  • outrider42outrider42 Posts: 3,679
    Takeo.Kensei said:

    It only depends if you want to use it and what would be the use case (DS ?). I have three desktops and one notebook at home. I only use one desktop and one notebook. It may be better to sell the old one because you may end up only using the most powerfull

    The PSU upgrade is not necessary. You only need a 6 pin power connector.

    More RAM would be good but not mandatory. Rule would be PC RAM = 3 x GPU VRAM which make 3 x 3.5 = 10.5

    Integrated GPU are very limited. But if you don't see the difference with the GTX 970 then there is no reason to keep it in the new comp

    I know everybody likes to joke about it, but the 970 has 4 gb of VRAM, and for the purpose of Iray the weird partition of 3.5+0.5 does not effect rendering at all. So the equation would be 3x4=12.

    However, Iray is totally different beast. I don't believe system ram is important at all for Iray unless you actually have no gpu and run only CPU mode. There are tests with gtx 1070s with 8gb running Iray on a PC with only 6gb ram, and there is no real difference. (Posted here in these forums in SY's bench thread.) So if a user can run a card that has more ram than their actual machine with no issues, then surely a 4gb 970 would be perfectly fine in a 8gb machine. Don't sweat it. But make sure that psu is good first! If its several years old, it may not be running its peak anymore, I would ditch it. You don't mess around and guess with power supplies. This is your PC's heart.

    I read that even if you used the 1080ti as a secondary card, it would still be capped at 9gb. So the suggestion of using the 970 to drive the monitor to save vram may not work so well. May as well just use the 1080ti as the only card and save on power use.
  • JamesJABJamesJAB Posts: 1,766

    It would all depend on what you plan on doing with the old HP.
    When used as a 4K media player the GTX 970 will do a very good job.  As a 1080p gaming computer it will be good.  As a secondary workstation for Daz Studio... maybe.
    You could prep all of your scenes on the HP and then render using the 1080 ti computer.  As a render box you will be disapointed in the GTX 970 after seeing how fast the 1080 ti renders Iray.

  • Charlie JudgeCharlie Judge Posts: 13,336
    edited June 2017
    JamesJAB said:

    It would all depend on what you plan on doing with the old HP.
    When used as a 4K media player the GTX 970 will do a very good job.  As a 1080p gaming computer it will be good.  As a secondary workstation for Daz Studio... maybe.
    You could prep all of your scenes on the HP and then render using the 1080 ti computer.  As a render box you will be disapointed in the GTX 970 after seeing how fast the 1080 ti renders Iray.

    That second option is kind of what I thought I might do with the old HP. Use the old HP working with both DS and other programs like Photoshop when my newer CtberPower computer is busy rendering.

    Post edited by Charlie Judge on
Sign In or Register to comment.