Asus Strix X299-E very low SLI scaling after going from X99 to X299

[xarot]

I posted this question on NVIDIA forums too but perhaps there's a chance someone else might have the same issue. I cannot tell if this a UEFI or driver problem?

I have a strange problem with Strix X299-E motherboard and SLI with the latest NVIDIA driver 384.76 (actually, with any driver but the X299 platform is brand new and hit retail around week ago so I guess this is the correct to use).

The thing is, SLI scaling is only around 45 % to 75 %, usually sits around 60 to 66 % per card only. The 1080TI cards and PSU have been working perfectly fine on old X99 before I swapped the motherboard and CPU. Everything else is the same. I have tried Windows 8.1 and Windows 10 to no avail, changed all UEFI settings, checked PCIe lane speeds, tried HB and single SLI bridges, disabled G-Sync, disabled V-sync, changed game settings, disabled antialiasing, updated UEFI, changed motherboard voltages and what else. Nothing else to try I guess.

Only some titles like Metro 2033 seem to work somewhat normal, the rest don't. Even Fire Strike 1.1 doesn't but then again Fire Strike Ultra does? In Fire Strike 1.1 combined test the scaling is around 35 % per card and the scores are way off. 😞

Setup:
i9-7900X
Asus Strix X299-E motherboard
64 GB DDR4-3200 MHz (yeah, a single kit, CMD64GX4M8B3200C16)
Asus Strix 1080 TI OC SLI
Asus motherboard bundled HB bridge
Corsair AX1500i
Asus PG279Q G-Sync

[valzero]

Korth wrote:
To be fair, you need to compare tested SLI performances on these games (GTA V, Fallout 4, Witcher 3, Deus Ex) on X299-E vs other X299 motherboards and other non-X299 chipsets (X99, Z270, Z170, Z97, etc) before concluding that weak SLI scaling is based on X299-E.

The NVIDIA driver is a big component of this performance. And it's somewhat specific to each chipset/processor architecture.

But the games themselves often have lousy SLI implementations which make poor use of multi-GPU resources.

These are games I played with my x99 using the same video cards. GPU usage is low, sometimes less than 50% at 4k resolution.

[Raja]

valzero wrote:
These are games I played with my x99 using the same video cards. GPU usage is low, sometimes less than 50% at 4k resolution.

You need to report SLI performance anomalies to NVIDIA.

[Zurvv]

SLI seems fine to me now after the driver. I did some 3dmark tests and i'm coming in top 20-30 (hall of frame) for 2 card SLI.
i didn't test much, but Wildlands is working great, PUBG SLI works again so i can put 4k with AA on ultra.

(i'm using gigabyte gaming 9 x299 till the Apex is out)

[abvolt]

I would sure love to get this board with a 7820 but the consensus seems to wait on x299 or maybe even pass on it, would that be a true statement just asking cuz I don't know, Thanks & enjoy

[Korth]

abvolt wrote:
I would sure love to get this board with a 7820 but the consensus seems to wait on x299 or maybe even pass on it, would that be a true statement just asking cuz I don't know, Thanks & enjoy

lol just reading through this thread top-to-bottom is enough to show that there is no consensus.

[Vlada011]

abvolt wrote:
I would sure love to get this board with a 7820 but the consensus seems to wait on x299 or maybe even pass on it, would that be a true statement just asking cuz I don't know, Thanks & enjoy

If you have Z270 platform better wait 8th Generation i7-8700K.
He will have six cores and maybe is for gaming better option.
i7-7820X is better on Apex or similar boards and than increasing frequency as much possible for better gaming performance.
Frequency to the end, to the last MHz. If someone have luck to reach 4.7-4.8GHz with all cores on i7-7820X he become gaming
beast and better option than i7-8700K.

[abvolt]

Thanks for the answer seems a lot of people don't care for x299 good advice Vlada011 guess I'll wait for the next gen..enjoy

[Zurvv]

honestly i regret going with the x299. So far i'm seeing little point over the x99 10 core system i had before. That said, if you wanted a 10 core and the 6950 was to much money (it was!) then this setup is cheaper. 🙂

[Raja]

Zurvv wrote:
honestly i regret going with the x299. So far i'm seeing little point over the x99 10 core system i had before. That said, if you wanted a 10 core and the 6950 was to much money (it was!) then this setup is cheaper. 🙂

Unless you're doing a lot of core-intensive work with the system, platform upgrades never make a lot of sense.

[Korth]

lol, I'm still running early X99 and Haswell-EP - never even upgraded to R5E10 and Broadwell-E(P) because it always seemed like too much cost for too little gain.

I'm finding that initially-amazing 8C/16T is actually just not enough for what I do. Holding out on upgrades is getting hard, lol.

But X299/i9 is just not good enough. Too buggy and problematic, obviously rushed, although that's starting to get fixed. Core i9-X processors are basically just rebadged (and limited) Xeons, deliberately designed to segment markets with broken chipset/socket intercompatibility. X299 is great, and ROG is better, but I think I'd rather have ECC instead of OC.

I'm very seriously considering a C62x mainboard with quad LGA3647 Xeon sockets. Most Xeon Gold 61xx CPUs are roughly comparable in all ways to i9-X CPUs (although far more pricey at the top end). But I could always populate the other three sockets with cheap Xeon Silver CPUs (only 8C/16T 2.1GHz~3.0GHz and $500 each, but can always be rescaled/upgraded with better Xeon CPUs later). And up to 1TB or 2TB of DDR4-2666 - with ECC - and six-channel (triple the memory bandwidth of dual-channel).

So I say Intel is killing their own HEDT/Enthusiast/Prosumer/Workstation market with X299 and i9.