Best PSU solution for 4 x GTX 295

Hi, I’d like to hear Your opinion. I’m currently running 3 x 295 system and building 4 card system. What is the best PSU solution to system, employing 4 x GTX 295 cards. Each has 6-pin and 8-pin PCI-E and consumes about 290 Watts.

main questions:

  1. have I go to 1 large or 2 smaller PSU-s?
  2. is 40 Amp 12 V rail enough for 2 cards?
  3. what is best solution for syncing 2 PSU-s?
  4. What is vest price(performance PSU in EU market, 230 Volts?

thanks in advance

Hi, I also am interested in using a system with multiple GTX985, so we can get in touch. First of all I am looking for a system with 2 GTX295 into a single workstation, but if possible also systems with 3-4 boards will be wellcome.

Can you tell me how have you manage to arrange 3 GTX295 into a single workstation?

Thank you.

Neoron:

Please read my personal supercomputer blog and You’ll find all the answers how to run system with 6 GPU-s.

http://estoniadonates.wordpress.com/our-supercomputer/

Jaak

We’ve been using the new Enermax Revolution PSU (1050W - North American 115V version) with good results on systems with three GTX280s (TDP 246W each). The PSU is quiet and 85%+ efficient.

The top European model at 1250W http://enermax.de/en/products/power-supply/revolution85.html would almost certainly be enough to power your four 295s with 87%+ efficiency @230V. It provides eight 8-pin PCI-E power connectors on modular cables.

Testing an X58 Intel system with three GTX280s at full power, we have never seen a system power draw of more than 800W. It appears to be difficult to reach full rated power consumption in GPGPU applications.

The real challenge of multi-GPU setups is not the PSU, but rather cooling!

Thanks for valuable tip. Enermax look very potent…

Jaak

I’m not sure if the two 30A rails for mainboard and CPU will deliver enough power to the PCIe bus. Keep in mind that those cards in total will draw up to 300W from the PCIe bus!

My recommendation (following the FASTRA recommendation) for a 4xGTX295 setup still is the Thermaltake ToughPower 1500W. My system has been running for the past two weeks non-stop at full load without a single issue.

joar

Hi

Sorry, I don’t have the answer - I have another question instead. Can you tell the exact configuration with which it is possible to have 4 x GTX 295 in one box? We’re planning to buy these, but not sure about other hardware needed.

Thanks

Artem

Right motherboard is the key – MSI K9A2 Platinum, having 4 PCI x16 slots with space in between to house double-fat cards. Power supply is another key - it should be 1250-1500 Watt unit with enough PCI-E connectors. Case must support 8 cards, not 7 as usual. And last, operating system should be either XP x32 or x64, not Vista, not Win 7. Driver compatibility is real issue.

Please read my folding blog to find specific models and solutions.

http://estoniadonates.wordpress.com/

Jaak

Good point.

I’m not sure what kind of motherboard you are using (MSI?), but for the Asus M3A79-T there is a BIOS entry for “GPP Slots Power Limit” which comes with the default value of 25W. I would guess the same option exists on all boards with a 790FX chipset.

The questions are:

Is this limit in BIOS effective? Does it really limit power draw from the motherboard?

and

Can a GTX295 run with only 25W from the motherboard? It appears that dual-GPU cards from ATI/AMD may need more.

This might be a problem (at least in theory). The spec sheet says the GTX 295 has a maximum power draw of 289W. The 6-pin PCI-E connector is rated to supply 75W, the 8-pin connector is rated for 150W, and the PCI-E slot itself provides another 75W. If the slot is limited to 25W, then the most that can be delivered to the card is 250W.

That said, I doubt the GTX 295 actually hits 289W in practice, but I don’t know what happens if you start to bump up against this limit.

Ok, I went for 2 PSU solution because of 2 main reasons, covered here: [url=“http://estoniadonates.wordpress.com/”]http://estoniadonates.wordpress.com/[/url]

One rack module:
External Media

Entire rig:
External Media

Synchronising 2 PSU-s works well and no problems whatsoever…

Jaak - You’ve been a big help to us all and I want to thank you for that. I hear you on the dual PSU solution and that is what we do in the lab when running four GTX 295’s. Unfortunately, for use within enclosed cases with limited room it has to be a single PSU to fit inside the box. We would like to find a good single PSU solution that can run four GTX 295s.

The best so far appears to be the Enermax Jaak cites on his truly superb and useful web page, but it is only available in the US in a 1050W version. This apparently is exactly the same PSU, with a different AC power cord, that is sold as a 1250W unit in the UK. It is good for 1250W when run on European 220V power but is rated only at 1050W when run on lower US AC voltage.

So far we’ve not been able to find a 1250W to 1500W PSU in the US that has four six-pin and four eight-pin PCI-E cables. I think the problem is that it is difficult to get UL approval for the higher wattage PSUs in the US. Does anyone know of such a PSU?

how does the master / slave psu work? I see the pictures on your site; you said something like “One solution is to make cable”… more details would be interesting if you have time.

The way power supplies (PSUs) work is that you plug them into the motherboard through the main 24 pin socket and then when you turn on the motherboard that tells the PSU to turn on. If you have two standard PC power supplies, only one of them is plugged into the motherboard. How do you get the other one to turn on? The solution is to have a little bridge adapter cable that brings out a second 24 pin socket into which the second PSU plugs into to make it think it is attached to the motherboard. The power on signal from the motherboard is the only wiring to that second socket.

You can wire that up yourself or buy pre-made units like this:

http://www.frozencpu.com/products/5637/cpa…pter_Cable.html

They work great. Power up the motherboard and both PSUs turn on.

By the way, on my other post I got some private emails suggesting the ENERMAX GALAXY EVO EGX1250EWT-01, at 1250W. This is not as efficient as the Revolution, but it seems to have a total of 8 6+2 PCI-E cables. Anyone using that?

Also, on the water-cooling front we have… http://www.koolance.com/water-cooling/prod…?product_id=665 with a review at http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html…W50aHVzaWFzdA== … however, looking at how they load power to the 12V rails from the review it looks like despite having up to 1300W you can’t split that four ways with enough amperage to each of four GTX 295 cards. :-( What do other folks think about that? Am I missing something?

Thanks!

From 80plus.org, it looks like some of the gold certified (90% efficiency) power supplies are going to start being sold in a few months; it seems like most are around the 750w range though (and the enermax revolution is already very good).

Manufacturers and models suitable for 4 tough cards:

    [*]Thermaltake ToughPower 1500W: 4 x 6-pin + 4 x 8-pin P, 12V rails total 120 Amp’s

    [*]Cooler Master Real Power Pro 1250W: 6 x 6-pin + 3 x 8-pin, You have to combine two 6-pin to one 8-pin, 12V rail total power 128 Amp’s;

    [*]Enermax Revolution 1250 EGT: 8 x 6+2-pin PCI-E, 6 rails a’ 30 Amp.

Since the power sockets in most US homes are only rated for 110-120V, 15A, reaching these high powers (after efficiency losses) is very hard to do while still staying compliant with the electrical codes here. The ToughPower and the Revolution appear to be 220V-240V only devices which are going to be hard to find in the US.

The Cooler Master does appear to be available here, although there are two models with almost the same name. If you just search for “Cooler Master Real Power Pro 1250W”, you will find some models with only 4x6-pin and 2x8-pin. You have to add “Quad-SLI” to the search in order to find the model with 6x6-pin and 3x8-pin. Interestingly, this PSU claims to draw 16A @ 115V, which sounds like it technically is over-spec for a standard US plug with parallel prongs. (20A sockets in the US usually take a plug with one prong turned 90 degrees.) This might explain why this PSU has certifications from a long list of electrical certification boards except one in the US.

Anyway, I’m hardly an electrician and not qualified to assess the practical safety of one of these devices plugged into US wiring. I just know my employer (an organization which is super-paranoid about such safety issues) would not allow me to use the Cooler Master because it lacks a UL certification in the US. (Figured I’d throw that out there in case anyone else has similar electrical safety standards at their workplace.)

I should point out that another option (besides moving to a 220V country, using two full PSUs on a tray, or slightly overloading one power socket) is to use a standard PSU to drive three cards, and then drive the 4th card with an auxiliary power supply like this one:

[url=“FSP Group Booster X5 450 W Dedicated Multi.GPU Power - Newegg.com”]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16817104054[/url]

It installs into a 5.25" bay, and feeds its own power cord out one of the rear slots. This might be a better fit if you are building a quad GTX 295 inside a tower case, rather than on a rackmount tray. I believe there is a high-end Lian Li case with 10 rear slots, so you would have room both for the four cards and the power supply feed through plate. The Antec Nine Hundred Two (no idea why they insist on spelling it out) only has 8 slots, but appears to have two round cable ports on the back panel, so you could probably feed the second power cord directly through there.

(Disclaimer: I haven’t built any of these configurations… yet.)

That’s a great idea! It’s also a great way of using the free space from all those otherwise pointless 5.25" slots one gets in tower cases. :-)

Our guys are going to give it a try with the Enermax 1250 Galaxy, available from frozencpu.com at

http://www.frozencpu.com/products/8806/psu…ml?tl=g11c26s87

I’ll report how it goes with that unit and four GTX 295 cards. We use very compact cases for travel so we don’t have any 5.25" slots at all in them.

One last thing: if the desire is not to overload an AC power socket, using a supplemental power supply like the 5.25" bay unit won’t help if both power supplies are plugged into the same circuit. You have to plug them into different circuits. That’s the same deal with any dual PSU solution. So far our engineers have been just plugging this stuff willy-nilly into whatever AC sockets happen to be around in the labs or their cubicles. That will have to change as everyone moves up to four card rigs. They’re already planning for it as part of a move to new, bigger facilities where all the engineering spaces will have massive numbers of independent 20A circuits, more cooling capacity in the HVAC, etc.

This is a good point. Fortunately our lab has plenty of separate 20A circuits near each other, so my biggest obstacle is finding UL-approved power supplies.

Out of curiosity, what compact case are you using that can hold four GTX 295 cards? I want one! :)