HTC VIVE Elite Dangerous experience with 1080ti SLI

[lukenpc]

Hi,

After owning a single 1080ti for a few months I decided to upgrade to SLI, surprisingly it makes more of a difference than I first thought it would.


It enables me to crank up SS even more - my FPS is doubled in most areas, but is it worth it for the £700? No. This is because of a stuttering that I have begun to encounter ever since I have run ED with this setup, after a few tweaks made through the nVidia control panel this was reduced in its frequency, however it's still there and is visible inside SteamVR's handy frame monitor.

Other titles I play have seen a drastic improvement in performance since getting SLI, but ED just seems to suffer.

In conclusion, it's not worth it for ED solely.

 

[Pville_Piper]

I didn't think SLI or Crossfire was recommended for VR as it exacerbates the tendency to stutter.

 

[Andrej]

Did you say that 1080TI SLI+Elite+VR actually work?

When I own 970 SLI it was don`t work so great in Elite.

Now I wonder, should I buy another 1080TI when my kickstarter package arrive?

 

[TorTorden_VR]

Did you say that 1080TI SLI+Elite+VR actually work?

When I own 970 SLI it was don`t work so great in Elite.

Now I wonder, should I buy another 1080TI when my kickstarter package arrive?

Since Volta will probably be releases maybe 1-2 months after 8k kickstarter gets released I might be more inclined to wait for that.

 

[lukenpc]

I didn't think SLI or Crossfire was recommended for VR as it exacerbates the tendency to stutter.

Every other VR title I play such as Project Cars 2, Onward and Assetto Corsa all strive under VR, I see a large performance increase. If I had not I would have refunded!

Since Volta will probably be releases maybe 1-2 months after 8k kickstarter gets released I might be more inclined to wait for that.

Yea that's the best approach, maybe even wait an extra year. The way I see it is that it's not worth upgrading unless you're two versions behind, one version does not make too big of a difference to warrant the money

 

[TorTorden_VR]

Yea that's the best approach, maybe even wait an extra year. The way I see it is that it's not worth upgrading unless you're two versions behind, one version does not make too big of a difference to warrant the money

Yeah, that was my original plan, to stay on my 980ti until Volta released.

But I just couldn't help myself and got the 1080ti, and it was a good upgrade. Basically going from low settings to high.
Technically I suppose I could say the 1080ti is two versions from the 980ti, but I personally consider it a polished 1080.

 

[lukenpc]

Yeah, that was my original plan, to stay on my 980ti until Volta released.

But I just couldn't help myself and got the 1080ti, and it was a good upgrade. Basically going from low settings to high.
Technically I suppose I could say the 1080ti is two versions from the 980ti, but I personally consider it a polished 1080.

Yes bang on my thought process, I did the exact same thing.

1280ti is eagerly awaited! hehe

 

[VR Mr Teatime]

Thanks for this post lukenpc

Having read over the last year that SLI doesn't work in VR, I've always been skeptical about that, as I've been running a pair of 780GTX's in SLI with the Rift I bought in Oct 2016. I don't seem to get stutters, but do occasionally get weirdness in planet surface rendering (sections being rendered into the sky leaving holes in the surface) - other than that its been a good experience, especially given the "vintage nature" of my GPUs.

Of course I'll have to go for a 1080ti or Volta now that the PiMAX 8K kickstarter is funded (and then some).

 

[lukenpc]

Thanks for this post lukenpc

Having read over the last year that SLI doesn't work in VR, I've always been skeptical about that, as I've been running a pair of 780GTX's in SLI with the Rift I bought in Oct 2016. I don't seem to get stutters, but do occasionally get weirdness in planet surface rendering (sections being rendered into the sky leaving holes in the surface) - other than that its been a good experience, especially given the "vintage nature" of my GPUs.

Of course I'll have to go for a 1080ti or Volta now that the PiMAX 8K kickstarter is funded (and then some).

No problem.

A bit more clarity around the stutters, initially I was getting them constantly until I tweaked with some settings inside the nVidia control panel which included Threaded Optimisation being forced 'On'. This reduced the issue but I still get stutters when I enter different instances (IE dropping into a station, dropping into a different system), basically when objects are loaded.

I removed the 2nd 1080ti and the problem dissipated, so for now I disable SLI when playing ED.

I could imagine if I was not in VR it would not be too distracting, however with the headset on it does become quite nauseating after a few 1000ly's.

 

[TorTorden_VR]

Granted i have no experience with sli.

But I suppose it is possible that Nvidia now turns off sli mode on its own when vr is turned on. and then offload physics calculations or other such things to the second card.

As for stutters.
I don't have them.
Even jumping into stations or coming down on settlements or tharg bases.

I might have long load between exiting cruise and arriving if there are a lot commanders in the instance but that's a networking issue and same for all.

However the main difference on that was to disable supersampling.
I render purely to native target in ED.
With project cars 2 however I'm running an ss of 1.2-1.5.
usually can't tell much difference between the two so sticking with 1.2 for now.

 

[Dibiase]

Nvidia defiantly supports SLI and VR through VRworks but the game also has to support this and my understanding is elite does not.

 

[TorTorden_VR]

Nvidia defiantly supports SLI and VR through VRworks but the game also has to support this and my understanding is elite does not.

So far and still a year and a half after VRworks. only title to actually have that support is Nvidias self developed funhouse.
Not even the newly released project cars 2 supports VRworks.

 

[Dibiase]

So far and still a year and a half after VRworks. only title to actually have that support is Nvidias self developed funhouse.
Not even the newly released project cars 2 supports VRworks.

That's disappointing, seems like a cool option for those willing to spend the cash. If Elite supported it and the Pimax 8k delivers on the hype I'd buy a second 1080 Ti to have an amazing ED experience.

 

[GraXXoR]

Did you say that 1080TI SLI+Elite+VR actually work?

When I own 970 SLI it was don`t work so great in Elite.

Now I wonder, should I buy another 1080TI when my kickstarter package arrive?

I used to run 2 x 780 in SLI and upgraded to 2 x 970. Most things were ok and indeed Elite VR was fine initially but then, one driver update came and borked it. Even after rolling back the driver SLI in VR never worked again. So I was forced to get a 1080 and then upgrade to a 1080ti... Very clever move by NVIDIA, if you ask me.

As for stutters, I usually get one sizeable stutter about half a second after entering any system. This seems to be unconnected with VR since I get the same stutter when using my monitors...

It might be EDDISCOVERY or some other 3rd party tool like EDEngineers...

 

[TorTorden_VR]

Ah well I don't bother running ant third party tools whatsoever.

 

[NW3]

Yeah, that was my original plan, to stay on my 980ti until Volta released.

That's my plan too. Time will tell, if I can actually stick to the plan.

 

[Zephyriel]

Back when I had my Rift DK2, I played Elite supersampled at 1440p with all settings on max (to the best of my recollection), and had no issue and a buttery smooth framerate with my 970 SLI. I'm hoping performance hasn't worsened since then because I just broke the piggy bank and backed the Pimax 8K, which basically runs at 1440p x 2... I hope I'll get decent perfs in Elite, I can't justify changing my graphics cards yet, they still run everything very well.

Edit : Oh, that post a little above mine isn't very reassuring. Are you sure it wasn't a different issue on your computer ? I don't see why your performance would remain bad after rolling back your drivers... Unless something changed in the game itself.

 

[TorTorden_VR]

Back when I had my Rift DK2, I played Elite supersampled at 1440p with all settings on max (to the best of my recollection), and had no issue and a buttery smooth framerate with my 970 SLI. I'm hoping performance hasn't worsened since then because I just broke the piggy bank and backed the Pimax 8K, which basically runs at 1440p x 2... I hope I'll get decent perfs in Elite, I can't justify changing my graphics cards yet, they still run everything very well.

Edit : Oh, that post a little above mine isn't very reassuring. Are youbsure it wasn't a different issue on your computer ? Ibdon't see why your performance would remain bad after rolling back your drivers... Unless something changed in the game itself.

Its not the vertical resolution of 1440 that worries me.
it's the horizontal res going from 1080 to 2560.

 

[Zephyriel]

True. But the devs are aware of these issue a'd work on creative ways to compensate for framerate dropsnin a way that doesn't make users sick. Hopefully the Pimax will have a satisfying solution. Otherwise I'll need to upscale and lower settings until I can afford and justify to update my hardware. I probably won't before the GTX 11xx or 12xx generation.