Building a Desktop with C 1060 and GTX 295

Accelerated Computing CUDA CUDA Programming and Performance
1

Hi guys,

I have been thinking of building a desktop with both GTX 295 and Tesla C 1060. The whole point is to allow a single GPU computation environment as well as for multi-GPUs. I have read several threads and came up with the following parts. Any suggestion on these? Can this mother board support for both the GTX 295 and C1060? Also, a real quick question, do those two cards work with the latest Nvidia drivers in the latest Ubuntu 9.04?

Thanks a lot!

Mother Board : ASUS P6T7, WS Supercomputer
CPU : Intel Core i7 920 Nahalem 2.66GHz
Power Unit : Coolmax CUQ-1350B, 1350W
Case : ThermalTake Armor+, Full Tower
Memory (×2) : Kingston 4GB DDR3, SDRAM
Graphics : Nvidia Geforce GTX 295
GPU : Nvdia Tesla C 1060

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If you are going to spend that much on a computer, at least go triple channel (3xwhatever) with the RAM. :)

3

Are you planning to install 4x GTX295 at some point? (Your mobo, PSU and enormous case allow this…)

If not, the 1350W power supply is total overkill for these two cards. 800-900W should be plenty for these parts. C1060 draws 188W max and the GTX 295 draws 289W max. Round that off to 500W, and give the CPU/Mobo/RAM/HD a generous 300W, and there you go.

Also, probably worth mentioning: if you are just experimenting and don’t need 4GB of device memory, the GTX 285 is just as fast as a C1060 and way cheaper.

4

Hi seibert,

Yes, I might put couple more cards in it in the future.

Huh… sounds like a good idea! let me think about this. But what about the OS issue, Does the latest Ubuntu support for both of GTX 295 and C 1060 ( or possibly GTX 285)?

Thanks for the reply!

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No idea for Ubuntu 9.04, though I don’t see why there would be any problem. (The most common complaint I’ve seen in the forums is Ubuntu trying to be smart and installing its NVIDIA driver over the newer one you download and install by hand.)

At the moment I’m using RHEL5 with a variety of systems with various combinations of GTX 260, 280, 285, and 295 cards in the same box. I do have a system with the P6T7 motherboard, and that mobo really impressed me. Excellent BIOS, no strange device issues (unlike my ASRock Supercomputer system…) and it worked with 4x GTX295 first time. But, again, I haven’t used Ubuntu on these systems yet, so I don’t know if there are distro-specific issues.

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I run a similar system with Ubuntu 9.04 64b with both a C1060 and a GF 280 with no problems.

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I have 2 GTX 295s in a P6T (not P6T7) motherboard with Ubuntu.
Everything worked first try. It even was smart enough to figure out what card display port to use (You have 4 connectors, which should you pick? I picked one of the 4 DVI ports randomly and it seemed to work by default)

There is indeed an annoyance… it’s Ubuntu wanting to upgrade its kernel every week or two. If you ACCIDENTALLY tell it OK (it’s like nagware!) then it’ll do that, reboot, and you lose your video drivers (which are compiled against a specific kernel). It’s a 10 minute hassle to re-install the driver.
I’m sure there’s a way to turn off the nag, and I bet someone’s even made an automatic driver re-installer… I just mention it because that’s the only OS specific issue I’ve had.

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This is encouraging!

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Thanks for sharing the info! I think I am gonna go for ASUS P6T7!

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Thanks for sharing the info! I think I am gonna go for ASUS P6T7!

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Thanks for sharing the info! I think I am gonna go for ASUS P6T7!

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I agree! I don’t mind install those drivers manually, but it would be perfect if the latest Ubuntu can recognize those two cards by just running envy. heh heh… Thanks though!