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Aurora 3 video cards
So I've had my Aurora 3 for about 3-4 years and I've been having some issues with the video cards. I currently have 2 Geforce GT 545's running, but it feels like 1 is always taking all the load when running games. I've tried to run them in SLI mode and it seems like it overwhelms or overheats the system and reboots. I've cleaned out the inside and checked that everything was slotting on the motherboard, but still unable to change it to SLI mode, so I had to put it back to how it was running. It's currently running with 8 gig of ram and an Intel i5 cpu so i'm not sure what the issue is. It used to run smoothly, obviously it'll never run as smooth as when I first got it. I am currently running the MSI Afterburner software to monitor hardware activity and it says the GPU2 doesn't really take any of the load from any games I've played. Are there any settings I can change to properly run it in SLI mode or anything to balance the load the system is taking when running games?
Thanks for any advice and tips in advance.
Tesla1856
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December 7th, 2016 14:00
Strange config with two lower-end cards in SLI. Not being able to SLI cards points to a hardware problem if you have latest BIOS and drivers (check that first).
Aurora-R3 has always been tempermental.
If you instead decide to install a single powerful card ... If you have 875w PS and can verify motherboard is "solid" I guess you can continue if you have time and money.
Search forum for Aurora-R3. It has BIOS issues and Windows-10 issues.
http://en.community.dell.com/owners-club/alienware/f/3746/p/19642358/20960212#20960212
and this is the standard response I quote about video cards for Aurora-R3 (if you end-up needing or wanting a new one). It was mostly reported/focused around AMD cards, so not sure if NVidia cards display the same issues.
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It should work if you have 875w PowerSupply, and it has the proper-pinned power-plugs natively.
Since it's Aurora-R3 you better get one with a Dual-BIOS switch that supports both Legacy and UEFI Hybrid.
Aurora R3 is maybe just EFI (not true uEFI) so it can't decide which it needs. Save yourself a lot of trouble and get one with a switch on the video-card.
Reportedly, some newer MSI & Sapphire cards have the switch.
You might have to un-snap and remove the Aurora's plastic video-card air guide if new card exhausts into case.
I also have this from my notes that someone wrote:
Just wanted to say that the R9 380 does work. But you have to buy a hybrid BIOS graphic-card like "Sapphire R9 380 Nitro". The Sapphire cards are able to switch the BIOS boot from UEFI to legacy BIOS. There is a small "switch" at the corner of the card you can use. It works fine without any issues.
JRBernier
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December 8th, 2016 04:00
Hmm, that's what I was afraid of; hardware issues. I'll give it a go and report back my findings. I was thinking about upgrading GPU for this machine (to just a single card), but wasn't sure at the time.
JRBernier
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December 9th, 2016 21:00
So just a quick update; I managed to read through that thread and continued to research my issue. I had done a reformat and reinstall about a year ago and having done so my GPU drivers weren't properly installed, basically I forgot to update the driver for the other card. This is an older build from back in 2012 and were never top of the line, but it got the job done at the time. I updated the drivers and set up the SLI on the cards. I stress tested with some Overwatch for a couple hours with no issues. I did install the MSI Afterburner as suggested to handle custom fan settings.
Thank you for the fix!
Tesla1856
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December 10th, 2016 11:00
Good work.