980Ti SLI Freezing Woes

T

The Donut

2[H]4U
Joined
Jan 28, 2003
Messages
3,121
Hey everyone,

I've had 2x980Ti's for a while now and for a long time they've worked great. However, over the past 6 months I've had to disable SLI mode because leaving it on results in a game freeze just seconds in to a game (occassionally minutes).

Using the Heaven Benchmark with SLI enabled causes a hard freeze in just a second.

I have tried the following and am now at a loss, so looking for advice:
  • Windows / Driver reinstall - no change/freeze
  • Single top card active - runs fine
  • Single bottom card active - runs fine
  • New SLI bridge (x2) - no change/freeze
  • Underclock both cards - no change/freeze
  • Apply a tiny bit more voltage - no change/freeze
  • Ensured temperatures are OK
  • Updating motherboard BIOS and resetting
Does anyone else have any ideas? I've googled and tried all the various solutions out there. The cards work fine by themselves and previously worked fine in SLI.

Thanks
 
Araxie said:
to me it point to a PSU problem.. it may be dying..
Click to expand...
My thoughts as well.

Simplest way to test this is to replace the PSU with a known good one, but if you're equipped, you could conceivably test the voltage at the supply pins by measuring with a volt meter as you start up a game (I'd probably suggest a canned benchmark, so it's hands-free). If the voltage you measure drops below 11.9, then you know that the PSU is suspect, and you should swap it out with a known good one and retest.
 
Thank you both.

I purchased a new PSU, fitted temporarily and it resolved the issue. While removing my current PSU I noticed the two modular connectors for PCI-E were plugged in next to each other, despite having 4 available slots -- so I tried my old PSU and put the two connectors in slots further away from each other and it now works with the old PSU too. I suspect when I did a cable-cleaning rebuild a while ago, I simply plugged them in next to each other and I assume they share the same rail or something and it was drawing too much power.

Either way, thank you both!
 
Could also be that the contacts in the connector at the PSU (sounds like it's a modular one?) were dirty or corroded, and moving the cables around scraped some of the corrosion off.

Either way, I'm glad you got it fixed. :)
 
How does 980ti sli performance work for you real world with modern games? I just grabbed a 980ti from evga b stock for my second rig, considering sli but figuring at that price I'd be dumb for not getting a 2070 or 1080ti instead
 
Honestly, I'd not bother. It's far more trouble than it's worth and most of the games the performance gain is minimal. My next solution will be a stronger single card - I'll never be doing SLI again.
 
MultiGPU does suck.

But what I usually do is slightly down clock each component, ram, Ect one by one. Sometimes things get finicky over time as capacitors degrade, ect. Especially if you have OCs.
 
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