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55580
M18x R1 Power connected Sli flickering
Just recently my 580m Sli has been acting up, causing all games to constantly flicker.
It's absolutely fine when on one GPU or without the power cable connected.
The flickering isn't red (so its not a sli bridge issue), it just appears black.
I've tried a lot of different Nvidia drivers but none appear to fix it (in fact, I think it was the 310.90 that caused this problem in the first place)
I'm not sure if it is the power cable, any suggestions would be appreciated.
morblore
2.4K Posts
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February 11th, 2013 04:00
See, that is a different story. If the flickering doesn't go away and is always present when SLI is active then it could very well be the SLI bridge. You also just proved that SLI was active when using it in windowed mode :P
It wasn't an argument it was just a convo with passing of information.
morblore
2.4K Posts
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February 8th, 2013 16:00
I had issues with 310.90 on my desktop with SLI too. When you changed drivers did you do a clean install? Remove it using Device Manager and then clean the registry with something like CCleaner. I did that and was golden again. I went back to the 306 driver.
Dayrek
8 Posts
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February 9th, 2013 01:00
Ah, when games are in windowed mode with sli on and the power in, the flickering doesn't happen... hurmmm...
Dayrek
8 Posts
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February 9th, 2013 01:00
Unfortunately that didn't do the trick, I have no idea what the problem could be.
morblore
2.4K Posts
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February 9th, 2013 08:00
That could rule out a hardware problem and points more to software/driver issue. If it was hardware it would do it all the time. Try a few versions of the Nvidia driver and see if one of them resolves the flickering. Also try updating your DirectX.
Mutumba
48 Posts
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February 9th, 2013 20:00
Hi Dayrek, SLI does not work in windowed mode. If you are playing games in windowed mode it is just
like having SLI turned off hence the reason you did not see the flickering when testing.
Hope this helps
morblore
2.4K Posts
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February 9th, 2013 23:00
Hi Dayrek, SLI does not work in windowed mode. If you are playing games in windowed mode it is just
like having SLI turned off hence the reason you did not see the flickering when testing.
Hope this helps
I don't understand why some people still say SLI doesn't work in window mode. Nvidia SLI does work in window mode.
Dayrek
8 Posts
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February 10th, 2013 16:00
After alienrespawning (equivalent of reinstalling the os) Sli worked fine, the driver was reverted to 269.01.
I didn't like being on such a low driver package, so I tested this lot:
313.96 - 310.90 - 310.70 - 306.97 - 306.23 - 301.42 - 295.73
I stopped on 295.73 because it's the only one that worked from that bunch.
310.70 upwards caused Planetside 2 (I used planetside 2 to test all of them) to black screen and send me to desktop with the program stalled in the background.
306.97 to 301.42 had intense to slow black flickering.
This is for anyone who runs into the same problem.
BJFox
763 Posts
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February 10th, 2013 17:00
More likely than not, the SLI cable needs to be replaced. I think you are ruling out the SLI bridge cable too quickly. It does not need to be red flickering to be the SLI bridge. The fact that it does not occur with SLI disabled (i.e. windowed mode, which does not use SLI or CrossFire) is a strong indicator of this. Also, considering you have tried numerous drivers and none have an effect, that also suggests the SLI bridge.
If the machine in still under warranty, Alienware will send one for you to install if you are comfortable doing so. If the machine is no longer under warranty, grab one from Parts-People.com and pop it in. It's not difficult to install.
morblore
2.4K Posts
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February 10th, 2013 17:00
More likely than not, the SLI cable needs to be replaced. I think you are ruling out the SLI bridge cable too quickly. It does not need to be red flickering to be the SLI bridge. The fact that it does not occur with SLI disabled (i.e. windowed mode, which does not use SLI or CrossFire) is a strong indicator of this. Also, considering you have tried numerous drivers and none have an effect, that also suggests the SLI bridge.
If the machine in still under warranty, Alienware will send one for you to install if you are comfortable doing so. If the machine is no longer under warranty, grab one from Parts-People.com and pop it in. It's not difficult to install.
First off. SLI WORKS IN WINDOWS MODE. You are the 2nd person in this thread to say this and it's simply not true.
With that FACT it means that the flickering went away with SLI enabled, it also goes away when not using the 3xx drivers. The 3xx drivers had/has some SLI issue. Even I ran into them.
Sometimes when going back to older drivers and then all of a sudden it works can mean hardware. New drivers can push a GPU more which in some cases can be just enough to make the issue pop up. But given the info about the 3xx drivers and the fact of not using them DID make the issue go away does not point to this. Could it be a bad SLI bridge? Could be. Buy it and see.
A bad SLI bridge is bad regardless of driver. I've gone through enough of them to know this. Could it be bad? Sure. So could the GPU. If he called Dell they will make him put the Dell 269.03 driver in and call it fixed.
Dell's stance would be they certify their drivers to work with their systems. The 269.03 driver is almost 100% going to work and they would leave it at that. They would not replace the bridge or the GPU's just because the system didn't work with some non Dell drivers when tested with only one game.
Now knowing the fact that SLI works in Windows Mode and that his flickering went away in Windows Mode and with an older driver plus the fact that there are reported SLI issues with the 3xx drivers that even I encountered what would you say is the most likely cause of his flickering issue? Wow long sentence lol. I would never rule out hardware but when you suggest rolling back a driver and then it works?
1) When not plugged in or SLI off , ( not plugged in would turn off the dedicated and SLI ) the flickering stops. Sounds like Hardware
2) With any driver under 3XX, SLI on or off and plugged in or not the flickering stop. Sounds like a driver issue.
3) When going Windows Mode ( and you know SLI works in windows mode ) the flickering stops. Sounds like a driver issue.
Now back to this SLI in Window Mode. SLI WORKS IN WINDOWS MODE> just want to say that again.
If you don't want to believe me then here:
6 Page thread titled: Does SLI Work In Windows Mode?
http://www.overclock.net/t/907572/does-sli-work-in-windowed-mode
" err, it will work whether its windowed or not, it's not something your game enables, as long as you have sli enabled in ur nvidia control panel you are fine.
fyi, you'll need psu with more juice "
" FYI, CFX must be full screen! Go team Green! "
THIS GUY IN THE THREAD ALSO SAID SLI WINDOWS MODE DIDN"T WORK BUT QUICKLY CORRECTED IT AFTER OTHERS POINTED OUT IT DOES
" Err, SLI works in windowed mode, yet you'll lose some performance
CFX only works in FS "
If that is not good enough then go test it yourself. Turn on the SLI indicators in the Nvidia control panel and then fire up a game and run it in window mode. To your AMASMENT it will be running in SLI> Gawd.
To verify that NVIDIA SLI technology is enabled and
working
From the NVIDIA Control Panel navigation
tree pane, under 3D Settings, select Set SLI configuration.
From the menu bar, click 3D Settings,
then click the drop-down menu item Show SLI Visual
Indicator.
The following images indicate that SLI technology is active.
A vertical green bar with the text "SLI" appears on the left
side of the game screen if SLI AFR rendering is enabled and working.
The antialiasing level with the text "SLI" appears on the game
screen if SLI antialiasing is enabled and working.
A green square appears on the primary - or focus - display when
the game is viewed in full-screen mode.
If no image appears, then the system is not in SLI mode
This is me playing my Sith in SWTOR in Window Mode while reading this thread with SLI clearly enabled and working. This is with only 2 GPU's. 3rd is in Wife's computer at the moment. I usually have it on another monitor when doing this ( I run a multi monitor setup ) and will set SLI focus to whichever one I put it on. If you look at the top left corner you can see the SLI indicator plus there is no fullscreen indicator showing it is in fact in Windows Mode. On my G19 keyboard I was showing about 22% GPU usage on the cards when I took the SS. Of course when playing it jumps up to much more then that.
morblore
2.4K Posts
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February 10th, 2013 19:00
@ Dayrek
Test it with other games or benchmarks. Make sure it's not just Planetside 2. You can try changing the SLI rendering modes to see if that changes anything.
Also, don't use any of the drivers after 306 because they have even more issues. Trust me lol.
Planetside 2 Flickering/Flashing Screen Issue: http://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/index.php?threads/flickering-flashing-screen-issue.48867/
Planetside 2 Sli Flickering
[View:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zilQMlcLlQ]
BJFox
763 Posts
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February 10th, 2013 23:00
Well, perhaps you and I define the term "works" very differently.
The way I define works is both cards run at full core and memory speeds and the system fully performs in a window exactly the same as it does full screen. Although both GPUs are functional in window mode, in almost all cases the secondary card runs in 2D performance mode and contributes next to nothing.
If you don't believe me, take your SLI or CrossFire system and run 3DMark, 3DMark11, Vantage or almost any other 3D graphics benchmark full screen, then run it in a window. You will almost always see a massive plummet in performance and a much lower score when run in a window.
Take any game that works correctly with SLI (or CrossFire) and run it in a window with MSI Afterburner or EVGA Precision-X OSD and you will see that one graphics card basically takes a big nap, with the core and memory running in 2D mode. There are a few exceptions, sure. Furmark is one of them. Most people don't run Furmark as a form of gaming entertainment. As an additonal example, games that are poorly optimized and do not effectively utilize a multi-GPU setup will perform about the same whether full screen or window mode, single-GPU or multi-GPU, but that still does not mean it works by my definition. It only means those games are not optimized to take advantage of a multi-GPU setup and they do not work correctly.
If you disable SLI running a game in a window and the framerate stays more or less the same as with SLI enabled and the game running in full screen, that pretty much tells me that it doesn't work correctly.
SLI (and CrossFire) does not work *correctly* in a window with almost every game and benchmark that exists. That has been the case as long as multi-GPU systems have been in existence. I have about 140 games and neither SLI nor CrossFire work correctly with any of them when they are run in windowed mode. Considering the drop in framerate and reduction in performance, I stand by my comment that SLI does not work in windowed mode. If we need to add the word "correctly" to that comment, then so be it. I'm not too concerned about the one-off exceptions that do.
SLI bridge and CrossFire cable failures are fairly common and flickering is one of the tell-tale signs. They are inexpensive and easy to install. If that doesn't fix it, it never hurts to have a spare on hand. The fact that the system works good with an obsolete driver doesn't mean it is fixed no matter what Tech Support says. So far, I have never seen them refuse to replace an SLI or CrossFire cable to fix a flickering problem regardless of what driver was installed. They have never asked because the symptom tends to speak for itself when it behaves the same way across multiple driver versions.
morblore
2.4K Posts
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February 11th, 2013 00:00
Again, you are 100% wrong.
The 2nd card does not take a " NAP ". Doesn't happen. I am using EVGA Precision Tune. That is how I was able to tell you that my cards were running at 22% when I took the screen shot.
You can Google SLI Window Mode and see it does work and has worked for years. You are going by very old information. What you posted is not the case anymore for Nvidia owners. Granted it still requires a game to support windowed mode, some old games won't even let you use the windows key or alt/tab much less run in windows mode no matter what GPU configuration you are running but this is becoming the exception, not the rule. And of course it must support SLI.
You need to take your own advice and fire up EVGA Precision tune and then a game or benchmark in windows mode so you can see all GPU's are active and being pushed at the same levels. Nvidia SLI works in windowed mode and has for some time now on most game titles.
EDIT: I just took this SS below. The game is Star Wars the Old Republic and it is opened on the right in windowed mode. EVGA Precision X is opened on the top left and then this forum topic is opened behind the EVGA. Look at that GPU usage :) I also left my taskbar in view so you could see what I have open. IE, SWTOR and EVGA.
Another thing about your comment on SLI support. Again that is old info and not how things are today. Almost any game you buy now has SLI support with or without windowed mode and GOOD SLI support to boot. The last game I can remember playing that didn't have SLI support was APB.
Also if you are taking a performance hit with SLI in windowed mode then some of that is a configuration issue. For example using Windows 7 with Aero on will cause a hit, best to disable it when using any windowed mode game even on 1 GPU. Since the GPU's are rendering the desktop in addition to the game in windowed mode there will always be a performance hit but certain things can be dealt with if using the proper settings. In the end though windowed mode will always be a little less then full screens performance but if you have a good enough GPU and a proper configuration you will never notice it unless benchmarking.
This first SS I took clearly shows both GPU's performing to the same level in SLI while running in windowed mode. The SLI indicator also shows equal usage on both cards in SLI...just like my last SS did. If there was only one card performing then ( going from the middle of the bar ) one of the two graphs would be flat or in the middle.
GPU1 usage is 27% and GPU2 usage is 24%. So again look at this SS. SLI is working and is scaling nicely in windowed mode. You can CLEARLY see that both cards are being used and that the graph goes up and down for both cards at the same time. I want to also add that when I fire up all my monitors and then play the game in surround I get around 90% GPU usage. The game just doesn't push my cards when in windowed mode on a single monitor.
You can also look at my taskbar and see the temps. The top temp on my taskbar is coretemp showing the temp of the highest core on my CPU. The bottom left temp is GPU1 and bottom right is GPU2. The temps clearly show that nether GPU is idle. Idle temps are 28-30c.
SLI Windowed mode works these days and it works well.
Unigine Heaven Benchmark3.0
Single GPU Windowed Mode - Score 2733
Dual GPU 2-way SLI Windowed Mode - Score 3688
Dayrek
8 Posts
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February 11th, 2013 04:00
AAAAHHHHH Dammit Morblore (Recommending test a different game) and BJFox (Saying the drivers my only prevent it in one game)! Your quite right, the drivers only work with certain games, so it IS a hardware issue.
Probably the bridge is a little lose, but as I only ever work with desktop PCs, locating the thing is annoying, infact I haven't even found where the GPUs are.
You guys have helped a ton, thanks so much.
Also the time sli worked in windowed mode, it still had flickering in the edge of the draw distance (I just wrote it off at the time as me looking for problems) sorry for causing that argument for nothing. >.<
morblore
2.4K Posts
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February 11th, 2013 04:00
You added this paragraph after I replied to you so I will just reply to this one.
I never said it wasn't the SLI bridge but we have a couple issues here that can point to something else. It's also much easier to try these things then it is to take apart the laptop and replace the SLI bridge.
The first thing to stand out is the bridge does work with certain drivers and in SLI mode. If it failed you would expect it to always fail and not only with a few drivers. I am also not saying that it can't have an intermittent issue.
Next are the drivers. The Nvidia drivers went under major changes with the 3XX series and have some issues. Plus the Dell drivers are tested and certified with the M18x system. I am willing to bet they work flawlessly with his system because of the drivers the OP tested and said worked. I'm not saying tech support would refuse to replace the bridge but they will insist on installing the Dell driver for trouble shooting and if the issue goes away when doing that then there is god chance they will stop there. They will blame a non-Dell certified driver.
The last and biggest issue here is it seems he only tested it with one game after doing the respawn. You always try more then one to make sure it's not the game and I'm sure he knows that. Plus that game has a known flickering issue, the very issue the OP is having.
I think the OP needs to make sure he is using a fresh driver install, not one from doing a respawn. Then he needs to confirm his settings. After that he needs to try a few games, videos and maybe even a free benchmark. If the bridge is bad or making a bad connection the issue should be present during all of the tests. Only then would I buy an SLI bridge and tear apart the M18x to replace it.