is 4-way sli bridge possible on a 3-way sli?

[claydough]

crossposting from the evga boards:

Originally my manual for my ROG Rampage III Extreme states that correct configuration for 3 way sli ( on the REIII @ least ) was supposed to be:

x16
skip
X8
x8

In which case a 3 way sli bridge will not span that distance.
The new directions given by ASUS on their support forums is..
To use the following configuration instead:

skip
x16( supposedly )
x8
x8

Which is then supposedly fine and does not result in slower speeds.
Not that I do not trust getting x16 from the second slot... however For purely aesthetic reasons:
( My motherboard's EK cooling Block looks better exposed with the first configuration. In fact it's porn win with the first configuration )
I would just use the single band sli bridges to span the cards but I have more stable luck with my 3-way sli ( used for dual sli at the moment )
What I would prefer is to span that distance with a 4-way sli bridge if it's possible to use one for 3-way instead.
I am paranoid because the pcb is not quite the same as a 3-way bridges pcb ( while there is solder for every connection on a 3-way bridge the 4-way bridge alternates from one to two connection solder )
Hope that make sense? If not check out the pics:




vs.





I am hoping someone has used the 4-way sli bridge for a 3-way sli that spans the second slot successfully.


come to think of it...
Does anyone know if all 4-way sli bridges are designed this way? Perhaps there is one with a pcb configured for every connection?

would really prefer not to daisey chain ribbons. but if I have to what would be the right way to configure the ribbons to span the second slot?

[Necrosan]

The funniest part of this post is O.P. clearly did no research on these items before he made his relatively expensive yet entirely uninformed purchase.

No, you can't do 3 way SLI with a 4 way bridge.

[xeromist]

Necrosan wrote:
The funniest part of this post is O.P. clearly did no research on these items before he made his relatively expensive yet entirely uninformed purchase.

Uh, he hasn't purchased the bridge yet and he still has a functionally valid fallback plan of moving the card down and using a 3-way bridge. His post is merely inquiring if he can use a solid 4-way bridge for an aesthetically different configuration.

No, you can't do 3 way SLI with a 4 way bridge.

Citation please. This is what he's asking. If you just want to beat up on him without providing any useful citations, that's really not cool.

[claydough]

Necrosan wrote:
The funniest part of this post is O.P. clearly did no research on these items before he made his relatively expensive yet entirely uninformed purchase.

No, you can't do 3 way SLI with a 4 way bridge.

I would actually agree that although my "general" hardware centric research folders weigh in at about 12 gigs worth I still know excrutiatingly little and am as uninformed as I began.
And in this case as well hours of research has turned up a definitive "probably not".

[claydough]

Thanks, the consensus elsewhere seems to be "probably no" as well.
Most retail product descriptions I have read for 4-way sli ( as little info there is ) explicitely state that top and bottom must be correctly oriented.
I guess in the end quad bridge asus rog usage is as rare as xPander boards.

[DjRavix]

According To ASUS North America The answer should be ... Yes

Just Look at this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y08UUHMy9p8#t=570

However .. This one makes me wonder how the SLI Connectors are connected on a 4-way Bridge

I noticed that if you would do a 2-way SLI with this bridge using the 1st (top) and 4th (bottom) SLI Connectors it will not work
and if you use the 1st and 3rd SLI Connectors it will not work ether
when using the 2nd and 4th it actually works
I did not try 1st and 2nd since i like to keep spacing between the cards witch also means that i did not try 3rd and 4th ether
if these last 2 work and the way that is shown in the video doesn't
than I think it should work when you turn the bridge upside-down on your 3 way setup

[claydough]

DjRavix wrote:
According To ASUS North America The answer should be ... Yes

Just Look at this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y08UUHMy9p8#t=570

However .. This one makes me wonder how the SLI Connectors are connected on a 4-way Bridge

I noticed that if you would do a 2-way SLI with this bridge using the 1st (top) and 4th (bottom) SLI Connectors it will not work
and if you use the 1st and 3rd SLI Connectors it will not work ether
when using the 2nd and 4th it actually works
I did not try 1st and 2nd since i like to keep spacing between the cards witch also means that i did not try 3rd and 4th ether
if these last 2 work and the way that is shown in the video doesn't
than I think it should work when you turn the bridge upside-down on your 3 way setup

Awesome!

all that pining and research and forum scouring! and a year and a half later J J posts that youtube video.

Necro for the win! thank you mightily.

about to finally upgrade and I wanted to finalize my rogIII mod as it will probably be my encoding/render workhorse now.
since then I have found 2s1s speciality rigid bridges and flexible tri sli bridges ( each of which are hard to find at a good price )
When all along the 4-way would have worked fine?

I think i'll jump off a bridge now! 🙂