I have 7 AMD 5770 gpu's, 1 AMD 5870 gpu, 1 AMD 6850, 1 AMD 4670 gpu, 1 Nvidia 9600 GSO gpu and 1 Nvidia 9800GT gpu all crunching for various projects now. I have put some newer cards on my Christmas list but who knows if the wife and kids will listen?!

Question for the GPU experts... if there is a GPU enabled project, would that mean that I could crunch the GPU enabled project AND a CPU enabled project on the same computer/box ? (if I have the proper GPU to participate).

Thanks,
CJSL

YES you can do that on most gpu projects, BUT the limiting factor is Boinc itself! The older versions of Boinc have ISSUES with doing that because both the cpu and gpu need to have a cache of workunits to crunch. The older versions of Boinc used a PER PROJECT cache setting not a PER DEVICE setting. That meant the gpu would run out of work because the cpu had plenty of units and Boinc would not ask for more units. The brand new versions of Boinc are better, it is an evolving process, but the new 7.?.? versions do not work on all projects! To be honest I have found it best to NOT do that but instead do it over several machines...so machine A would crunch for gpu project G and cpu project L while machine B would do the opposite.

I use a dremel making sure not to chew into the pins or the board itself. This allows the card to seat. My old socket 775 Intel DG35EC motherboard allowed me to do it and I have successfully used a GT520 (just installed last night), 8400GS, and 210 to run in it. I usually test the 1X slot first using a riser cable that converts from X1 to X16 so that I don't waste time and risk killing the board. The major limitation I have found in using the X1 slots is that manufacturers find it convenient to place the battery (and other components) behind at least one of these which prevents a card from seating there.

Edit: I don't do it myself, but I have read from others that the way to get ATI/AMD and nVidia cards to work in the same machine is to run multiple instances of BOINC.

Also for those who are curious, the board I mentioned before has ran up to 3 GPU capable cards even though it only has one X16 slot. I couldn't tell you if there was any loss of potential performance due to the slower slot because they were older cards. However, I was still able to run the cards and did see an increase in points. I will let someone else break down efficiency and such as far as that goes.

Edit2: Not the same ones I bought, but this gives people an idea of the extension cable.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/PCI-E-Extension-Cable...0&hash=item19c8d5b458

Basically a 16X card in the 1X slot just bottle necks the bandwidth which is important for gaming. However, I don't know exactly how bad when it comes to crunching. Again, I have only typically done it with older cards, so not sure how drastic it really ends up being. Either way, it puts old cards to use.

http://www.interfacebus.com/Design_PCI_Express_16x_PinOut.html
http://www.interfacebus.com/Design_PCI_Express_1x_PinOut.html


Edit: Here is a helpful youtube video showing how others have also done it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_9eUbBU1cY&feature=related