Motherboard recommended for 4 cards?

[Rik]

OK so I'm not looking to build a 12 card multi megawatt ultrabucks render monster (would if I had the funds though)
Rather, I'm trying to find options for motherboards capable of supporting 4 dualslot cards, could me intel or amd.
Is anyone happily using 4 cards on one (reasonably priced) motherboard?

It seems there are mobos out there with plenty of slots but not enough physical room to fit loads of cards. Why do they bunch all the slots together
Don't want to start using pcie expanders/risers/ribbon cables etc as I think it should be possible to fit 4 cards without resorting to that palava.

Does the version of the pcie make much difference to us Octane types? Seems there's lots of flavours - pcie2.0, pcie3.0, x4, x8 x16

Found this list of intel motherboards but kind of ended up more confused now there's the number of 'lanes' to worry about as well.

http://uk.hardware.info/reviews/5600/2/ ... -crossfire

Ps. Any due date for the cloud? Might not need to upgrade if that ever gets sorted...

Cheers

[RobSteady]

I can recommend the MSI X99 Boards.
But you wil need very good case cooling if you want to use four cards.
And only reference design cards if you don't want to use watercooling; other cards dump the hot air into your case.

My two cents...

[georgesemmanuelarnaud]

take a look at this one

MSI Z97 XPOWER AC

[smicha]

It all depends of what cpu you already have - if none z87/z97 seems to be best value for money. Otherwise you may go with 2011 socket. If you want to watercool 4x titans Z you can cool your mobo too.
http://www.ekwb.com/shop/blocks/motherb ... ickel.html

Otherwise you'll handle 'only' 3xtitans Z - they have triple brackets! But to handle 3 of them you need extra 5th slot between standard 2nd and 3rd - look at EVGA boards - they usually have 5 pci e slots. Or go with asus ws x99 with 7 slots to handle 3xtitans Z.

And go with a very very very well ventilated case for air cooling.

GA Z97 soc force costs 50% of high end gaming mobo. All asus ws give you what you are looking for.

And look at these builds
http://render.otoy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=43992
http://render.otoy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=42540

If this is not to be on raisers I strongly recommend watercooling.

[gazukull]

Don't want to start using pcie expanders/risers/ribbon cables etc as I think it should be possible to fit 4 cards without resorting to that palava.

Without water cooling, I am not sure I would just have 4 cards stuffed in a case. In that config, the middle cards will hit like 90c almost instantly.

Risers are the cheap way to get good cooling.

[smicha]

Without water cooling, I am not sure I would just have 4 cards stuffed in a case. In that config, the middle cards will hit like 90c almost instantly.

Yes - and will loose 40% of rendering power compared to watercooling config.

[glimpse]

watercooling is one of the possible solutions =) however for those who would like to consider different route here's an alternative:

2xTitanBlacks & TitanZ (4GPUs in total as Z is dual GPU card) - this option is simply awesome: Blacks throw the heat out & only half of Zs heat is circulating inside - so if You have good enough airflow in the case, it's not a problem. Plus with extra spacing You have enough room for GPU to breath =)

another options is go DUAL TitanZ - in this case You'll have the same 4x GPUs, but more heat is going to be dumped into case, thus better airflow is recommended =)

Going first route You need x79 or x99 mobo that have extra 5th slot in the middle of "typical, four PCIe, dual spacing arrangement.
The second option is bit more relaxed, You only need more than 3slot spacing (as TitanZ is triple slot card).

Not to be the "go to" solution, but an option. However if You're looking for 4xGPU, water-cooling is advisable & as Smicha pointed You can get extra performance that will cover the expenses - in the end You'll have 5card GPU performance (or nearly 10 if You go with Zs) in a single 4way capable motherboard.

[Rik]

Thanks for the replies guys. Very interesting reading.
Suppose I should have mentioned I'm trying to do this on a budget though

There don't appear to be any AMD board which have the 4 slots well/equally spaced so looks like I may need to switch to intel - there are a few motherboards with well spaced out slots for under £150 which is great. Like the GA Z97 soc force (thanks Smicha)

This should let me use the 2 old cards currently gathering dust which I had failed to put on ebay which would give me 3gb 580, 1.5gb 580, 2.5gb 570 and a 2gb 560
So I'd have 1840 CUDA cores but a limit of 1.5gb which may not be a problem if I'm disciplined with instances and textures.

Will definately have to get creative with a couple of risers by the sound of it.

Thinking about it, rendering time's aren't the only limit to speedy workflow so money I save will go towards a shiney new hdd to speed things up - I hate waiting for programs and files to load and slow autosave interuptions are properly annoying (though essential)

The other thing that slows down the workflow is waiting for the cards to load the geometry and textures everytime I render. I'd buy a 40 lane Intel Core i7 5960X Extreme Haswell-E Unlocked 8 Core Socket 2011-3 Processor to reduce the waiting time but I need a snowboard too

[smicha]

which would give me 3gb 580, 1.5gb 580, 2.5gb 570 and a 2gb 560

Just sell them and get 1xTitan Z - you'll get better speed, and don't need any fancy mobo for just one card. You'll save on power bills too.

PS. I would also replace these four cards with a used Titan - 6gb, less power draw, comparable speed and no extra mobo required.

[gazukull]

Without water cooling, I am not sure I would just have 4 cards stuffed in a case. In that config, the middle cards will hit like 90c almost instantly.

Yes - and will loose 40% of rendering power compared to watercooling config.

I am not entirely sure what you mean by that. All cards run @ 1020 ghz on the processor averaging about 60c... I am cranking 1K samples a second on my current simple scene...

EDIT: Most importantly, for the cost of a water cooling rig / blocks you can buy 3 more cards. /shrug