[Arwin]

Hi All,

I'm trying to fix the weakest link in an older, 2007 PC, by upgrading its GPU. The current GPU is a GeForce 8300GS with 128MB of DDR2. The CPU is a Pentium D 925, and it has 2GB of DDR2 RAM. System is running Vista, upgraded to the latest SPs etc. Performance index indicates that in all respects, the GPU is by far the lowest performing part.

I thought I was smart, and just throw in something like a MSI R6670 with 1GB of DDR3 (actually I first thought I'd even try the awesome passively cooled ASUS Radeon EAH6770 DC SL/2DI/1GD5 - 1GB, which I think is a fantastic thing of beauty, but it just didn't fit, 2cm too long, and I'd have to mess up the inside skeleton of the casing far too much).

When I put the card (R6670) in there though, it just doesn't work. The PC powers up fine, and the fan on the card spins, but that's about it. No output from VGA, DVI or HDMI. Then I tried the card that came with my own desktop, a simple 4350 from 2009, but that one has the exact same result and that also excludes the already small chance that this was a power issue I think (that R6670 DDR3 card has pretty modest requirements and there's basically nothing else in the desktop machine but one harddrive, one DVD RW, and one modest case fan).

So now I'm wondering what I am doing wrong. Anyone any idea? Is the BIOS on this machine too old maybe? I thought it would just work.

Anyone any ideas?

[swaaye]

Google reveals forum chatter about 5000+ AMD cards not liking PCIe 1.0. What motherboard do you have?

[Arwin]

It's an Acer Aspire M1600 AE71 ... Not sure what the motherboard is ... has a SiS chipset from 2006, and Phoenix - Award BIOS is 6.00 PG / R01-B3 from 2007, reports Main Board ID F671CR ... does that help at all?

(My ATI 4350 doesn't seem to work in it either)

[swaaye]

CPUZ is your friend. But I did some searching and it seems that it uses SiS 671, which according to a manual is PCIe 1.1. Maybe there's something specific to that board or the chipset that is causing problems. There's not a lot of chat out there about SiS chipsets because they became rather uncommon.

[Davros]

there where compatability issues with pci-e 2.0 cards and either pci-e 1.0 or pci-e 1.1 (not pci-e 1.1a (or b)
) my memory is fuzzy thats why amd pci-e 2.0 cards (at least the early ones) started up in pci-e 1.0 mode

edit: after looking at wiki I think the problem was with 1.0a mboards and pci-e 2.0 cards

From wiki :

PCI Express 2.1 supports a large proportion of the management, support, and troubleshooting systems planned for full implementation in PCI Express 3.0. However, the speed is the same as PCI Express 2.0. Unfortunately, the increase in power from the slot breaks backwards-compatibility between PCI Express 2.1 cards and some older motherboards with 1.0/1.0a, but most motherboards with PCI Express 1.1 connectors are provided with a BIOS update by their manufacturers through utilities to support backward compatibility of cards with PCIe 2.1.

edit 2 : could be your slot is not providing enough power

PCI Express cards are allowed a maximum power consumption of 25W (×1: 10W for power-up). Low profile cards are limited to 10W (×16 to 25W). PCI Express Graphics 1.0 (PEG) cards may increase power (from slot) to 75W after configuration (3.3V/3A + 12V/5.5A).[9] PCI Express 2.1 increased the power output from an x16 slot to 150W so that some high-performance graphics cards can be run from the slot power alone.[10] Optional connectors add 75W (6-pin) or 150W (8-pin) power for up to 300W total.

I have a pci-e 1.0 board and it has a 7600gt working great seen bechmarks where the 7600gt gets twice the framerate of a 8500gt so it might be worth you getting one from ebay

edit 3: rather than replace the gfx card it may be cheaper to replace the board its socket 775 and you can get them with pci-e 2.0 slots plus they support core2 quads

[swaaye]

I ran my 6950 on my Intel P35 mobo for a year and that's PCIe 1.1. But it's made by Intel so the PCIe is probably built right.

[Squilliam]

Does this mean that effectively the Radeon 7770 and other SKUs could operate off PCI-E alone?

[Albuquerque]

Originally Posted by Squilliam

Does this mean that effectively the Radeon 7770 and other SKUs could operate off PCI-E alone?

The Sapphire 7750 in my HTPC does not require an external power supply connection; I am reasonably sure that other 7770 options exist that also do not require the 6-pin connector.

[Squilliam]

Originally Posted by Albuquerque

The Sapphire 7750 in my HTPC does not require an external power supply connection; I am reasonably sure that other 7770 options exist that also do not require the 6-pin connector.

Ahh so I just stick it in at it'll work? That's pretty cool actually... So even if it has a 6 pin I can decide not to use it right?

[Davros]

depends on the slot, v1.0 only supplies 25w

[Arwin]

The 6670 I have doesn't have a separate power connector either.

Getting the impression that replacing the motherboard could be worth it, except my time may be too expensive This case doesn't look that easy to take apart, but I could be wrong. There are these round things instead of screws that I'll have to look up how to take apart, for removing the chassis that holds the drives. Incidentally that is set up rather nice, looks like it would make a very good fileserver with 4 drives.

Thanks a bunch for your input so far. Getting the impression that I'll have to replace this thing after all. Am I crazy or is this a bad time for buying a PC? They almost seem more expensive than my PC from 2009, for not that much more performance, and sometimes worse (e.g. My quad core Q8200 holds up surprisingly well against many current dual core i3 and even i5 processors?

[HMBR]

Originally Posted by Arwin

The 6670 I have doesn't have a separate power connector either.

Getting the impression that replacing the motherboard could be worth it, except my time may be too expensive This case doesn't look that easy to take apart, but I could be wrong. There are these round things instead of screws that I'll have to look up how to take apart, for removing the chassis that holds the drives. Incidentally that is set up rather nice, looks like it would make a very good fileserver with 4 drives.

Thanks a bunch for your input so far. Getting the impression that I'll have to replace this thing after all. Am I crazy or is this a bad time for buying a PC? They almost seem more expensive than my PC from 2009, for not that much more performance, and sometimes worse (e.g. My quad core Q8200 holds up surprisingly well against many current dual core i3 and even i5 processors?

q8200 is a lot slower than any i3 in single thread performance, and close enough when using 4 cores (this is against a dual core CPU with HT)... so... i5 is much faster.
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/52?vs=289

if you want a lower cost upgrade, just go with a Celeron G530, it's as fast a a e8400 and you can buy one for less than 50 USD... you can also buy a H61 MB for 50 USD,
the Intel HD graphics from the Celeron is faster than your old 8400GS I think... and much faster than the Pentium D... and power usage is very low.

or you could try some AMD APUs, A6 should be a great upgrade in terms of CPU and GPU performance.


about your problem, I have read about some AMD/ATI (PCIE 2.1) cards having compatibility issues with some older chipsets/boards... so you could try some nvidia card, like the GT 430...

[Arwin]

Originally Posted by HMBR

about your problem, I have read about some AMD/ATI (PCIE 2.1) cards having compatibility issues with some older chipsets/boards... so you could try some nvidia card, like the GT 430...

Thanks, this could be worth a (last) shot.

Thanks for the other tips as well. I know single core performance is much faster, but I was very much surprised to see that there were still quite a few tests where the old quad core device beat the newer dual core devices. But i5 is probably fast enough, not like the CPU is a bottleneck for many tasks these days, with a few rare exceptions for some games and video compression.

[mczak]

Did you try a newer bios? Some quick search seems to indicate there's a R01-C0 bios.
Otherwise I'd just ditch the board (I'd never touch anything with a P4 in it in the first place...).

[Blazkowicz]

Originally Posted by Davros

depends on the slot, v1.0 only supplies 25w

wrong, what you've quoted says it supports 75W like other well-behaved 16x slots do.

what may get you in trouble is cards walking the limit. gt240, gt430, 9800GT/9600 "green", 4670 and sadly the 6670 may be considered "suspicious" for use. not the cards by themselves, a low quality, underprovisioned motherboard may be to blame.

BIOS upgrade is a must. that 4350 should definilty not suffer of the power problem.

then depending on use, the 8300GS might be not so bad. I have a 8400GS, admittedly with 512MB and 16 SP rather than 8, but the same low memory bandwith.
my PC is bottleneck by my 2GB memory, then the slow hard disks.

it runs google earth admirably, silly opengl accelerated things (i.e. using 3D hardware for 2D purpose, like Aero on vista), lightweight games

your card is really bottom of the barrel, but you still get to run high quality drivers and maybe even have it decode H264.