Nvidia recently announced the support of SLI technology on selected non-Nvidia chipsets such as X58 Express chipset through a SLI certification program and seems like board makers are starting to send their boards to Nvidia for verification already. Firstly, the manufacturers will have to submit a certification package to NVIDIA that includes hardware to test with (such as board, CPU, and memory) and a self-certification checklist. Next, Nvidia will test the board using a special SLI-enabled driver and multiple GPU configurations to ensure compliance both electrically and physically.

Thirdly, Nvidia returns a passing certificate and an approved SLI “key” for certified boards. The key is embedded into the BIOS of a certified board and the use of the certified key with the certified motherboard will enable SLI. However, use of the key with other motherboards will violate the SLI certification agreement and lead to the decertification of all vendor motherboards. It is important also that the BIOS correctly configure both the vendor ID in PCI config space and the PCIe link width for SLOTs enabled for SLI. NVIDIA’s SLI enablement algorithm will check for correct configuration on these fields before enabling SLI.