# Adding second NVidia GPU to system



## pcwolf (Apr 26, 2020)

Thought I would share some random observations I found interesting bringing a second video card online to the Folding fight.

Base system: Ryzen 3950x in a ASRock X470 Taichi motherboard with GeForce RTX 2070 main card. I run Manjaro Linux.

I have been folding 24x7 for a few weeks now. While the NVidia was pouring out over a million PPD, I consistently saw the CPU thread contribute far less, on the order of 7-8000 PPD. Clearly the effort is advantaged toward GPU processing. Hey! I'm not using two PCIe x16 slots, I'll get another video card.

With this 16 core 32 thread CPU, I am very attentive to the power draw inside the case. I have an AIO water cooler on it, tune my fans carefully, and run BOINC 24x7 at 100% cores and cycles on the ECO power setting in UEFI. This keeps the core temps right around 60c. I like the NVidia RTX 2070 Founders Edition because it is about the top card right now that only requires only one eight pin power connector.

While researching a cheap yet effective second video card to install, I re-discovered that there are modern generation cards that do not require ANY plugs from the power supply - they take up to 75w provided natively by the PCIe slot. I decided on a Zoltac GTX 1650 OC card, which is available new for ~$149. Added a second GPU slot editing the file /etc/foldingathome/config.xml and off we went.

My findings: The card is no slouch. It is delivering over 200,000 PPD to the effort, while producing 60w at 70c. Adding 15-20% to my output.

My universal power supply reads a total consumption of 0.480 Kwh when everything is cranking at full blast.


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## mstenholm (Apr 27, 2020)

pcwolf said:


> Thought I would share some random observations I found interesting bringing a second video card online to the Folding fight.
> 
> Base system: Ryzen 3950x in a ASRock X470 Taichi motherboard with GeForce RTX 2070 main card. I run Manjaro Linux.
> 
> ...


u
You got the team number wrong - should be 50711 . Just so you can compare - 2x2060 stock PPD 2.3-2.7M, Linux, max 530 W including WCG on 2700X (20k PPD).


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