What do i need to mount another GPU?

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ahmodity

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Jul 7, 2017
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Hello, good day. I'm wondering if k need anything extra if i want to mount another GPU to my PC and use two GPUs instead of my single GTX1080 ( or is it even possible? )
Specs:
intel i7-7700,
ROG Strix GTX1080 A8G 8GB GDDR5X,
ROG Strix Z270F Gaming motherboard,
x2 Kingston 8GB DDR4 RAM,
TP-Link PCI-E wifi card N 300Mbps,
Asus DVD Writer,
CoolerMaster V650 80+ Gold PSU,
Seagate Barracuda 2TB HDD 7200rpm,
Kingston 240GB SSD M.2,
CoolerMaster RC-K282 KWN1

although there's an SLi bridge in my motherboard's box, is there a use to that which could possibly be useful for my extra GPU upgrade?
 
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J
Using two GTX1080s is possible here as your motherboard supports 2-way SLI. I should right off the bat mention that you didn't provide your monitor so I really do want you to be aware that if you have a 1080p monitor that this is not a good idea. A single GTX1080 is sufficient for 1080p, even at 144Hz, and SLI does not double your frame rate (more like +50% if the game supports it, otherwise no gain). SLI GTX1080 does make sense for something like 1440p 144Hz or 4K 60Hz.

That out of the way, you'll need to upgrade your power supply. The GTX1080 cards use an 8-pin + 6-pin connection and your PSU only offers two 6+2 pin connections so you'd be unable to even connect the second GTX1080. nVidia recommends a 500W PSU for a single...
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joex444

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Using two GTX1080s is possible here as your motherboard supports 2-way SLI. I should right off the bat mention that you didn't provide your monitor so I really do want you to be aware that if you have a 1080p monitor that this is not a good idea. A single GTX1080 is sufficient for 1080p, even at 144Hz, and SLI does not double your frame rate (more like +50% if the game supports it, otherwise no gain). SLI GTX1080 does make sense for something like 1440p 144Hz or 4K 60Hz.

That out of the way, you'll need to upgrade your power supply. The GTX1080 cards use an 8-pin + 6-pin connection and your PSU only offers two 6+2 pin connections so you'd be unable to even connect the second GTX1080. nVidia recommends a 500W PSU for a single GTX1080, but an additional one takes 180W and you should try to scale your PSU so that it's about 60-70% at load which means to add a 180W card you should add 260-300W to the PSU's capacity. This means you should be looking at 750-800W PSUs with at least four 6+2 PCIe connections (or at least two 6-pin and at least two 8-pin connectors, but most PSUs use 6+2 since they're universal).

That out of the way, the SLI bridge is to enable an extra communication channel between GPUs to increase the GPU<->GPU bandwidth. You can technically use SLI without it, but you'll want to connect it between the GPUs. Typically on the top of the card towards the backplate there are a pair of connectors that look similar to the PCIe interface, just much smaller. The bridge would connect between those, and there may be a little plastic dust jacket you need to remove to reveal the interface.

EDIT: Just noticed your M.2 drive. I believe that drive uses a SATA protocol so it's not a concern. If it had used NVMe you'd have to verify that the lanes came from the PCH. If they came from the CPU, then you'd have x8 for GPU1, x4 for GPU2, and x4 for the M.2 drive which isn't enough for SLI (it needs x8 or x16 for every GPU).
 
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atljsf

atljsf

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on current games at certain resolutions there is no use whatsoever

only at 4k and above

if you don't have a 4k monitor it will not help you

in the current generation of games there is a good ammount of games that will not use the second gpu becuase most games are developed to use only one gpu

some games do use the second with mixed results including graphical problems, framerate problems and performance problems

very few games support sli and get improvements from sli

almost always you get more from a single stronger gpu that two strong gpus

if you plan to use those gpus for other purposes like bitcoin mining, for video editing, it migth be useful

in general, you do can put a second gpu and use the sli bridge but very often you don't need it at all

if i had the 1080 and felt the need for a stronger gpu i would wait for what amd offers with vega or nvidia to replace the 1080ti, other than that you are on a good spot and can keep the machine as it is for at least a year, unless you plan to jump to 4k on multiple monitors
 
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ahmodity

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Jul 7, 2017
23
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510
joex444

currently i see a PCI-E 8×2 slot below my GTX1080's 16×8 PCI-E slot, so does that mean I'll place the secondary GTX1080 there?

and yeah the SSD is SATA.

about cooling: i haven't thinked of cooling just yet, any suggestions? the case is a mid tower case so i might consider changing that.

and you mind helping out another thing? i want to upgrade my RAM too, its just a mere 16GB of RAM, there's extra two slots for RAM though, but I'm not sure about the CPU, will it support more than two RAMs? ( I'm sorry, i just started in PC gaming and this is my first custom PC.. so I'm sorry if I'm being a complete noob. )
 
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