Nvidia 8600GTS 512Mb cards x 2 = Weird Video Issues

[Geboran]

I recently built a gaming PC and am running Vista Home Edition with two (2) Nvidia 8600GTS 512Mb cards in SLI mode and have been having issues with the video.

It seems that at certain "peak" rendering times, whether it is data loading when zoning in to a new area or some heavier spell casting animations are going on (i.e. battlegrounds, PvE raiding environment, etc.) my video will "refresh", casting a blank screen for 2-5 seconds where I can't do anything but watch and then WoW pops back on.

Or.... my video will completely crash altogether, locking up my system.

I have the latest Nvidia drivers, the latest DirectX 10, the latest Vista updates, the latest Nvidia "hotfixes"..... any other suggestions?

Seems like some sort of garbage collecting issue.... but I don't know how to deal with it.

any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Kalos]

Try breaking the SLI and run with only one card. For WoW, SLI is slower, not faster.

[IRID1UM]

Kalos: not true, but yeah.. one card is enough to play WoW.
Saves some electricity too, so do a good thing and disable a card, might work.
Things to check: Power supply and cables - does everything fit tightly? Using two different cables for the two cards? Don't hang both cards on one cable, use two separate cables, one supplying one card only and nothing more.
Temperatures? RivaTuner can monitor them and even display them at the G15 display if you have one

[Kalos]

Kalos: not true
According to what I've seen and heard, it's true.

I'm willing to say that with some Geforce cards, it improves WoW performance, but with most, not so. Some people get lucky and it works better, I didn't find that to be correct with a pair of 8600's, so I'm assuming it depends on which cards you have.

At least some people on these forums had the same issue: http://forums.slizone.com/lofiversion/index.php?t3270.html

[IRID1UM]

Aha, interesting. I'll just add that I run a 7900 GX2 (sli on one card) and a notebook with two 8600M GT and they both work flawlessly and faster in sli mode.
I guess it does depend on luck then ;)
Cheers!