What is SLI? How to Build an SLI PC?

How to Enable SLI Antialiasing

How to Build an SLI PC

To assist the do-it-yourself community, NVIDIA provides the following guide on how to set-up an NVIDIA SLI PC.

Note: This guide assumes the reader has basic knowledge of how to build or upgrade a PC. If you do not feel comfortable building or modifying your own PC, please refer to our list of pre-built NVIDIA SLI systems from select NVIDIA system integrators.

STEP ONE Determine whether you've met the component and operating system needs for building an NVIDIA SLI PC. The following components are required to build an NVIDIA SLI PC:

1.An NVIDIA SLI-certified nForce motherboard with NVIDIA SLI Connector* 2.Two NVIDIA SLI-certified add-in cards (with matching GPUs!) 3.Windows XP operating system (Home or Professional)

* The NVIDIA SLI connector is only used with GeForce 6600 GT products and above. SLI-certified graphics card featuring GeForce 6600 and GeForce 6600 LE GPUs do not require an NVIDIA SLI connector because they do not require the bandwidth that other, faster GeForce graphics cards do.

Check here for a list of NVIDIA SLI-certified motherboards and add-in-cards, for the best gaming and 3D application experiences.

STEP TWO Determine your power needs

When building an SLI PC, NVIDIA recommends using an SLI-Ready certified power supply. Check here for the complete list of certified power supplies. As an additional recommendation, NVIDIA provides the following power supply guidelines for SLI PCs:

Ultra High-End SLI PC*:
You must have a power supply that can provide a minimum of +12V @ 22A of dedicated power for the two graphics cards. Of this 22A requirement, +12V @ 5.5A must be available to each of the two PCI Express 6-pin auxiliary power supply connectors. The remaining 11A must be supplied to the motherboard for dedicated graphics card use.

High-End SLI PC*:
Minimum of 500-600W Power Supply with a minimum of +12V @ 30A for all PC components.

Mid-Range SLI PC*:
Minimum of 450-500W Power Supply with a minimum of +12V @ 26A for all PC components.

Low-End SLI PC*:
Minimum of 400-450W Power Supply with a minimum of +12V @ 22A for all PC components.

*Note: These power supply recommendations are based on the following test configurations using standard component clock speeds:

Ultra High-End SLI PC Configuration:
Dual GeForce 7900 GTX or Dual GeForce 7800 GTX 512MB
AMD Athlon 64 FX-60 2.6 GHz or Intel Pentium EE 955 3.46 GHz
NVIDIA nForce4 SLI X16 motherboard with 2GB system memory
Two HDDs in Raid 0 configuration
Two optical drives
PCI Sound Card
LCD at 1600x1200 resolution

High-End SLI PC Configuration:
Dual GeForce 7800 GTX 256MB or Dual GeForce 6800 Ultra
AMD Athlon 64 FX-57 2.8 GHz or Intel Pentium EE 840 3.2 GHz
NVIDIA nForce4 SLI X16 motherboard with 2GB system memory
Two HDDs in Raid 0 configuration
Two optical drives
PCI sound card
LCD at 1600x1200 resolution

Mid-Range SLI PC Configuration:
Dual GeForce 7900 GT or Dual GeForce 6800 GT or Dual GeForce 6800
AMD Athlon 64 4000+
NVIDIA nForce4 SLI motherboard with 1GB system memory
Single HDD
Two optical drives
PCI sound card

Entry-Level SLI PC Configuration:
Dual GeForce 7600GT or Dual GeForce 6600 GT or Dual GeForce 6600
AMD Athlon 64 4000+
NVIDIA nForce4 SLI motherboard with 1GB system memory
Single HDD
One optical drive

For systems with the 7900 GTX, 7800 GTX, 6800 Ultra, 7800 GT or 6800 GT, please make sure the power supply also contains two PCI Express 6-pin auxiliary power supply connectors:


STEP THREE Installing your NVIDIA SLI-Certified Components Now that you have obtained the necessary NVIDIA SLI Certified parts and confirmed your power supply needs its time to configure the system.

1. Install the NVIDIA SLI Certified Motherboard (per instructions in the accompanying manual)

Check here for a list of NVIDIA Certified SLI Ready motherboards.

2. Install both of the NVIDIA SLI Certified graphics cards (per instructions in the accompanying manual)


3. Connect the PCI Express supplementary power connectors to each of the graphic cards (where applicable):


4. Install the NVIDIA SLI connector* to connect the two graphics cards:

Check here for a list of NVIDIA Certified SLI Ready Add-in Cards.

* The NVIDIA SLI connector is only used with GeForce 6600 GT products and above.

Once the new NVIDIA SLI-certified components have been installed in the system, they will be recognized by the operating system upon Windows boot-up. A Found New Hardware message will be displayed:


You must now install the NVIDIA SLI software in order for the system to recognize the new hardware.

STEP FOUR Installing the NVIDIA SLI Software

As part of the NVIDIA Unified Driver Architecture, NVIDIA drivers include a full set of controls for SLI systems.

Once you have installed the NVIDIA SLI components and booted up your system, do the following:
1. Install the nForce drivers (provided with the motherboard)
2. Reboot the system
3. Uninstall any old NVIDIA graphics drivers from the system and reboot the computer. If there are no NVIDIA drivers installed, go to Step 4
4. Install the latest NVIDIA graphics drivers (provided with the add-in cards or from the SLIZone Downloads Page)
5. Reboot the system.

After reboot of the system to the Windows desktop, you will see an SLI Capable System message.


STEP FIVE Enabling NVIDIA SLI

1. Click on the SLI capable system message (noted above) to open the following window.

2. Select the checkbox Enable SLI multi-GPU, then click Apply and OK to save the settings.


You can also access these settings by opening the Display Properties, clicking on the Settings tab and the Advanced button. Click the tab associated with your graphics card, then select NVIDIA SLI from the left-hand menu options.

The system will automatically reboot, and you will be greeted with the SLI has been enabled message:


You now have an NVIDIA SLI-enabled system and are ready to take advantage of scalable games and applications!

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How to Create a Custom SLI Game Profile

The following steps allow you to create a new SLI application profile for a title not currently supported:

Step 1. If you already have Coolbits installed, you can skip to Step 2. Otherwise, click on your Start Menu in the Windows Task Bar and select Run. When the command box opens, type "regedit" (without the quotes) and press OK. With the registry editor open (shown below), go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \SOFTWARE \NVIDIA Corporation \Global \NVTweak (expand the menu using the "+" expansion buttons to locate this menu item). Click on "NVTweak" in the menu. Next, right-click on the empty space inside right window and choose "New>DWORD value". Name the value "Coolbits" (without the quotes).


Step 2. Within the Registry Editor, right click on Coolbits and choose Modify. Change the Value data to "8" (without the quotes) and click OK. Exit the Registry Editor.

Step 3. Open the NVIDIA Display Control Panel and select "Add Profile"(located on the Application profiles section under Performance & Quality Settings):


Step 4. Create your new profile name and then click "Browse" to associate the profile to the application executable (the application that you are creating the profile for). Check the box for this executable and Click "OK".


Step 5. Highlight the "SLI rendering mode" found under Advanced Settings setting and choose your desired SLI rendering mode. The available rendering modes are: