2nd video card (non-SLI) useful in DCS?

Is there any way in DCS to devote individual video cards to specific tasks or viewports? For example, is it possible to have a 1080Ti running the camera while a 2nd card (980Ti) runs MFCDs?

And if so, is it then possible to run the camera in Fullscreen mode while the MFDs are still output to the other card/display?

Further, is a 2nd non-SLI video card of much benefit in DCS for general performance (Windows 10)? Or does it create other problems (compatibility issues, driver/OS/DCS conflicts) that result in a performance loss or headaches? Is that not really where the bottleneck is with multi-monitor setups in DCS? Or would it definitely help in this case - regardless of whether or not DCS has the ability to assign dedicated viewports to specific cards?

I don't think it help at all.

Hi Rangoon,

I have 3x 27" WQHD displays at my GTX 1070. As Nvidia only can handle 4 displays in total at one card I used my integated graphics unit from the CPU to fire my 2 external MFCDs. This worked quite good for a while but with an Windows 10 or intel update I had many FPS issues. Finally I quit using the integrated graphics unit and went for a GTX 1030 instead. This works good and solved my problem. So 2 cards from the same company (nvidia or AMD) should work quite good.

If there is a benefit speed wise if you are below 4 displays is something you need to test. If your goal is to unload the main card this could fail. When I use the 3 displays only I have good frames. Exporting the MFCDs cost me 10FPS even though it is fired by the small GPU. The workload of the 1070 is 100% and the 1030 has 70% (MSI Afterburner). So the small one does anything.

But I'm happy like it is now. I hope this helps.

Xoxen

As far as I know, and I could be very very wrong, the rendering for a display is done by the GPU it is connected to. However, if you use multiple displays to make 1 big display, then it has to be completely computed on 1 GPU.

SLI makes multiple GPUs work as 1. If you use multiple screens that are not working as 1, I don't think SLI is necessary for greater performance with multiple GPUs.

DCS is not as graphically demanding as it is CPU instructions per clock dependent. So your bottle neck is likely to be the CPU until you get to the 8 mega pixel mark.

But DCS really hasn't supported SLI in earnest. Always been more problematic than not.