Z97 Gaming 9 ACK -> GTX980 SLI -> 1st and 3rd slots. Is it possible?

[Deleted member 296778]

Hi everyone, I currently have the Z97 Gaming 9 ACK motherboard with 1 GTX 980 installed, but soon I am planning to buy another GTX 980 and connect the two in SLI. I am wondering is it possible to use the 1st and 3rd PCI slots of the motherboard to configure the SLI. My concern is the heat that will be generated if the 2 cards are plugged in the 1st and 2nd slots, because they will be too close and one of the cards will be getting very little amount of air. My mobo specs for the PCI are the following: 16x/0x/0x, 8x/8x/0x, 8x/4x/4x. I am asking because when I googled this, it seemed that sometimes it is very motherboard specific, and I am confused. Is it possible to run the cards like this 8x/0x/8x corresponding to the slots 1st/2nd/3rd, or will it run 8x/0x/4x, or maybe it won't run at all. As a last resort I would put them in the 1st and 2nd slots, but I really want to have some air between the cards so I can run them optimally.

Thanx

 

[flobelix]

No, that is not possible. Only using the two upper PCI-E slot an x8/x8 config is possible. Populating the third slot will (in any case) result in X8/x4/x4 what disables SLI. The lane setup is predefined and hardware wired. No change is possible.

 

[Deleted member 296778]

Thank you for the answer flobelix! If that is the case, I guess that I have no other choice. Can you share some experience in that field? Do you think the upper GPU in slot 1 will get substantially warmer and throttle down, or will it just run a bit warmer compared to the one below?

 

[badboy2k]

typically the upper card will run around 10C higher temps or maybe a little more so it may not boost quite as high!

 

[flobelix]

In case of the distance between the slots on Z97 Gaming 9 ACK (just one slot /usual SLI boards: two slots) temps of the are to be expected a lot higher than just 10?C as there will be barely any space between them. Boost abilty might be eliminated at all. A card wider than two slots can not even be used. Unfortunately Z97 Gaming 9 AC(K) boards are so far the worst choice for SLI of MSI's entire Z97 lineup.