PCIe 8X slot Graphics cards

OliverQueen

Limp Gawd
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Thanks to AMD not continuing with drivers for their legacy graphics cards (ES1000), I am stuck with the Basic Display Driver within Windows Server 2012 which is doing my head in having to look at a bland & stretched image on the monitor attached to it!!! I need to find a PCI-e 8X SLOT capable graphics card that has drivers for Server 2012. No point recommending cards with physical 16x connection as the only slots on the Server are 8x & 4x physical slots. The only other slot is a PCI-X 64bit 3.3v slot which I need to install a PCI USB controller card that I have sitting around looking all pretty & ish (although I could buy a PCI-e USB 3.0 controller card instead but then would need a PCI-X or PCI graphics card with the drivers for 2012).

Any serious suggestions that are not going to cost me a fortune that I should be looking out for? I had a look on eBay for such cards & nothing came up other than 16x to 8x adaptors which I would not be able to use as the physical slots on the mother board would get in the way of fitting the card in place (no horizontal back slot plates)
 
It works, but you have to make sure something won't also physically get in the way behind the slot (usually something tall, like a CMOS battery).
there is nothing behind the slots as it is a server board & a plastic shroud sits around the slots anyway allowing full length cards to be installed if required
 
Just been up in to the loft to check the slots & the plastic shroud that Dell (it is a PowerEdge 2900) puts around the expansion slots will stop a physical 16x card from being installed without removing most of the other bits to take the shroud off (if it isn't glued on that is knowing Dell & their infinite wisdom).

The riser card solution is also no good as no rear slot covers other than for the physical slots (no horizontal back plates either) & with the shroud in place..
 
Amazon product ASIN B0039XPS5W
Can also do what you are looking for, though you will need a low profile card for this to work.

EDIT: if it doesn't load for you, it's a "pcie low profile riser."

EDIT2: You probably can find something closer to what you are looking for, if you are willing to sludge through Ebay et al.
 
Amazon product ASIN B0039XPS5W
Can also do what you are looking for, though you will need a low profile card for this to work.

EDIT: if it doesn't load for you, it's a "pcie low profile riser."
The GT620 I will be putting in if I can get a 16x card installed (just want a proper resolution & display!) is a low profile card but have no low profile bracket for it. If I could get away with a solid adaptor to go from 8x to 16x instead of the cabled type, I would simply remove the mounting bracket from the rear of the card & let it sit upright on it's own as it wouldn't be moved once connected up
 
Could look for something like this https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/dell-rx-560d-oem-oc-2-gb.b5128 and just Dremel the bottom of the GPU... It is electrically only x8, the back 1/2 has no traces on the board. I just sold one on here for $40 shipped... Should be able to find similar. This would keep from having to hack your MB. I'm sure there are other models that similarly only have x8 traces. Just another option.
 
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If it's just for viewing, you can put a GT 710 card x8 in it. There are many of that kind. Look at the slot length on Amazon.com to see which are good (those that are shorter).
https://www.amazon.com/s?k=pci+express+x8+graphics&ref=nb_sb_noss_2
Like that one :
https://www.amazon.com/EVGA-64bit-S...pci+express+x8+graphics&qid=1581087807&sr=8-4
If you have a low profile X16 card, you can use this :
https://www.amazon.com/Estone-Expre...s=pci+express+x8+to+x16&qid=1581087230&sr=8-6
Just pplus the x16 the card over it.
You may have to work a little bit to set the adaptation and fix the card but it will fit.
 
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Thanks to AMD not continuing with drivers for their legacy graphics cards (ES1000), I am stuck with the Basic Display Driver within Windows Server 2012

The ATI ES1000 is essentially a 20 year old RAGE/Radeon core with all 3D functionality stripped and die shrunk to be a cheap basic display adapter. Being it only supports DirectX 6.0, the latest version of Windows it will work on is Windows XP/2003.
 
The ATI ES1000 is essentially a 20 year old RAGE/Radeon core with all 3D functionality stripped and die shrunk to be a cheap basic display adapter. Being it only supports DirectX 6.0, the latest version of Windows it will work on is Windows XP/2003.
Totally not true. It's limited to Windows 7/Vista and Windows Server 2008R2. The latter is the main problem.
However, as said previously, for only viewing with some modern capabilities, GT710 will be fair enough and there are plenty cheap and made for X8 slot.
 
In fact if this is a server, why even bothering about the GPU. The GT710 is the maximum option just in case you need to visualize some HTML interface. Other than that just don't install the graphics drivers and use the basic ones delivered by MS. Normally whatver the graphics card you should have the option to configure several non accelerated possible screen up to whatever the IGP can handle and that would be something like 1600X1200 or even Full HD.
 
Totally not true. It's limited to Windows 7/Vista and Windows Server 2008R2. The latter is the main problem.
However, as said previously, for only viewing with some modern capabilities, GT710 will be fair enough and there are plenty cheap and made for X8 slot.

No, XP/2003 is the last OS that supported old DirectX 6.0 video chips. If the ES1000 had driver support for Windows 7, it would work in WS2012, but this is not the case. Windows 7 and forwards requires at minimum a DirectX 9.0 compliant GPU, and even that is running in compatibility mode.


I'd definitely recommend something like this rather than faffing about with weird non-standard internal video cards. I've used several of these in the past and had decent performance out of them. The USB 3.0 models are a whole lot better, the older USB 2.0 had bandwidth issues and applications that had lots of full screen updates tended to slideshow a bit.
 
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No, XP/2003 is the last OS that supported old DirectX 6.0 video chips. If the ES1000 had driver support for Windows 7, it would work in WS2012, but this is not the case. Windows 7 and forwards requires at minimum a DirectX 9.0 compliant GPU, and even that is running in compatibility mode.
The chipset is RN50 and ES1000 for the graphics. The ES1000 graphics is close to Radeon 7000 as I understand.
You may try a legacy Radeon 7000 driver if nothing works.
At Dell, driver for 2008 WServer, may work on 2012 in compatibility mode.
https://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/04/drivers/driversdetails?driverid=k9x3v&lwp=rt
Files for Poweredge 2900 (maybe available) for WServer 2012 :
https://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/04/product-support/product/poweredge-2900/drivers
Latest drivers pack for Poweredge 2900 (maybe available) for WServer 2012 R2
https://www.dell.com/support/home/u...0kjtx&oscode=w12r2&productcode=poweredge-2900
I'd definitely recommend something like this rather than faffing about with weird non-standard internal video cards. I've used several of these in the past and had decent performance out of them. The USB 3.0 models are a whole lot better, the older USB 2.0 had bandwidth issues and applications that had lots of full screen updates tended to slideshow a bit.
GT710 is ultra-standard, used on x8, ultra-standard. In fact in many cases, you use only the x8 from the x16 PCIe on any GPU card, especially when using 2 cards at the same time in sli or crossfire mode for instance.
 
I don’t have anything to add in terms of options, but it does bug me a bit that even though the small Polaris cards RX560, RX 550, WX 4100 and below, were all electrically x8, no one has made a card that was also physically x8.

niche use case I know But I would have expected some kind of option newer than a Gt710 after all this time.
 
Never heard that before. Are you pulling my leg or being serious?
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works fine.
 
I don’t have anything to add in terms of options, but it does bug me a bit that even though the small Polaris cards RX560, RX 550, WX 4100 and below, were all electrically x8, no one has made a card that was also physically x8.

niche use case I know But I would have expected some kind of option newer than a Gt710 after all this time.
I bet you find x8 mainly on servers, so GT710 is a good server card.
 
Of course. x1. Why wouldn't that work as you can put an RTX Titan x16 on a x16 to x1 powered riser and connect it to a x1 slot.
Though you have to take care that the cut is neat and there isn't any metal connection between power lines. I would also advise to put some tape to cover the cut.
And also take care of the power. X1 (and maybe x4 too) is powered at maximum 25W, X16 (and probably X8) at 75W. So the GT710 will work on x1, the GTX 1650 won't without being powered and if you don't it may burn your x1 port or even your motherboard..
 
once installed i normally get everything setup, then just remote into the server pull the gpu entirely, as most servers iv worked with are just hosting files on the network and the company's felt Nas box's were not worth the cost, so we would build servers without the limitations some nas box's have, if you check out reddit there is Home Lab Sales i cant buy from there shipping is way too much, but if your in the US there is always Dell 720's on sale for great prices.
 
once installed i normally get everything setup, then just remote into the server pull the gpu entirely, as most servers iv worked with are just hosting files on the network and the company's felt Nas box's were not worth the cost, so we would build servers without the limitations some nas box's have, if you check out reddit there is Home Lab Sales i cant buy from there shipping is way too much, but if your in the US there is always Dell 720's on sale for great prices.
You can leave GPU in basic settings with no drivers. It won't hurt in case of a problem and you don't have to consider GPU drivers instability.
 
The chipset is RN50 and ES1000 for the graphics. The ES1000 graphics is close to Radeon 7000 as I understand.

The ES1000 is between RAGE and the first Radeon, long before the Radeon 7 series existed. It has more in common with RAGE because it only supports DirectX 6.0, Radeon 7000 drivers aren't going to work.
 
The ES1000 is between RAGE and the first Radeon, long before the Radeon 7 series existed. It has more in common with RAGE because it only supports DirectX 6.0, Radeon 7000 drivers aren't going to work.
Thee Dell drivers are mixing ES1000 and Radeon 7000 drivers.
In fact, despite the name, Rage 6 architecture aka Radeon R100 is better than Radeon RV100 which is Radeon VE also called Radeon 7000. So this is why Radeon 7000 drivers may work on Rage 6 architecture. Rage 6 is in fact the same as Radeon 7200. This is completely deprecated on W7 and won't be accelerated, especially on 64 bit. But the thing is Dell may have in his driver package an inf file that fits how to handle different sizes of displays and I bet it's okay to show on 1200x1600 and probably 1200x1920 on that basic graphics driver (you know that one that works when you install a system and the graphics is unsupported on the system disc and that starts with 480x640 definition). So this may be fair enough for a server.
 
Those old poweredges are money pits. They aren't worth it when you can get like an R710 for $150. Your 2900 should have onboard video though, you can just use that.
 
ok update time. what I ended up doing after giving up with getting the onboard ATI card working with anything other than the Basic Driver, I bought a 8x to 16x connection cable and it still refused to work with a gt640 card I had laying about. Probably not enough power through the socket for it as it would POST ok but stop with a black screen with a flashing cursor in top left corner when attempting to boot Windows Server even after the drivers were installed prior to plugging card in (using the right click inf file way). Bought a very cheap 512Mb Quadro NV300 card off eBay & installed the latest W10 drivers for (3xx series). No problems after that. Just needed it to display 1080 resolution on the monitor as completely killed my eyes & caused serious headaches with the stretched/rolling type effects that it displayed on the lcd. If i had stuck with the Basic Display Adaptor drivers, the maximum res it would give was 1024x768)

Those old poweredges are money pits. They aren't worth it when you can get like an R710 for $150. Your 2900 should have onboard video though, you can just use that.

The onboard ATI ES1000 graphics is the problem. Spent a long time looking for & trying many different so-called W10/Server19 drivers I was still left with only the Basic driver which did not support the LCD 1080 resolution (or any 16:9 resolution only 4:3). The Basic driver stopped some applications working on the server that I wanted to use. The £10 for the PCIe 8x to 16x cable & Quadro NV300 (with dual output splitter cable) card resolved the problem.

This server cost me £45 with a pair of 1.6Ghz dual core Xeons , 4GB FB RAM, 2 x 15k SAS 76GB drives. Changed the CPU's to a pair of 2.66Ghz Quad Core Xeon's for £9 posted. Swapped out the RAM for 12 x 4GB FB DIMM's at a cost of £24 posted but got sent 10 x 4GB modules & 2 x 8GB modules so ended up with 56GB instead. Also bought another 6 x 3.5" caddies to take a bunch of the many 1 & 2 TB SATA drives I had on my shelves (kept the SAS drives as boot array). The PCIe cable & the Quadro card cost under £10. So in all the server cost me £120 including the fuel costs to collect it. I couldn't find anything else remotely close to the specs of the machine I got for anywhere near that. I could buy a pair of 3Ghz quad core Xeon's for another £20 if i wanted to but I wanted to make sure the board supported the 1333Mhz processors first (I could justify a £9 loss if it didn't). I almost forgot the £5.99 cost of the Server 19 license off of eBay.
 
ok update time. what I ended up doing after giving up with getting the onboard ATI card working with anything other than the Basic Driver, I bought a 8x to 16x connection cable and it still refused to work with a gt640 card I had laying about. Probably not enough power through the socket for it as it would POST ok but stop with a black screen with a flashing cursor in top left corner when attempting to boot Windows Server even after the drivers were installed prior to plugging card in (using the right click inf file way). Bought a very cheap 512Mb Quadro NV300 card off eBay & installed the latest W10 drivers for (3xx series). No problems after that. Just needed it to display 1080 resolution on the monitor as completely killed my eyes & caused serious headaches with the stretched/rolling type effects that it displayed on the lcd. If i had stuck with the Basic Display Adaptor drivers, the maximum res it would give was 1024x768)



The onboard ATI ES1000 graphics is the problem. Spent a long time looking for & trying many different so-called W10/Server19 drivers I was still left with only the Basic driver which did not support the LCD 1080 resolution (or any 16:9 resolution only 4:3). The Basic driver stopped some applications working on the server that I wanted to use. The £10 for the PCIe 8x to 16x cable & Quadro NV300 (with dual output splitter cable) card resolved the problem.

This server cost me £45 with a pair of 1.6Ghz dual core Xeons , 4GB FB RAM, 2 x 15k SAS 76GB drives. Changed the CPU's to a pair of 2.66Ghz Quad Core Xeon's for £9 posted. Swapped out the RAM for 12 x 4GB FB DIMM's at a cost of £24 posted but got sent 10 x 4GB modules & 2 x 8GB modules so ended up with 56GB instead. Also bought another 6 x 3.5" caddies to take a bunch of the many 1 & 2 TB SATA drives I had on my shelves (kept the SAS drives as boot array). The PCIe cable & the Quadro card cost under £10. So in all the server cost me £120 including the fuel costs to collect it. I couldn't find anything else remotely close to the specs of the machine I got for anywhere near that. I could buy a pair of 3Ghz quad core Xeon's for another £20 if i wanted to but I wanted to make sure the board supported the 1333Mhz processors first (I could justify a £9 loss if it didn't). I almost forgot the £5.99 cost of the Server 19 license off of eBay.
Doesn't pay the time spent in my case. Not so fund of playing with hardware for the sake of playing with it.
 
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