Having Issues With A 5-Card Setup (2.5 LTC bounty for fix)

[Benny1985]

Hi,

I have just recently attempted to add 2 cards to my rig, for a total of 5 cards. However, one card is constantly having hardware issues in regards to installation. Windows can detect the GPU, but Windows spits out Error 43, and refuses to utilize the device.

The motherboard I am using is a MSI Z77A-45 (7x PCI-E slots).

I've switched around the PCI-E slots (using powered extenders), installed a new BIOS, and still haven't figured out what the issue is. Its seemingly always on slot 6, even if I am not filling that slot with a card.

If anyone can suggest why this is happening, I'd appreciate it. I have an identical rig that I am setting up, and am going to see if it gives me a similar error.

Any help is appreciated. The person that can resolve my problem gets 2.5 LTC.

Thanks!

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[Protagonus]

I'm pretty new and learning but I think running 5 is the issue.  Don't think you can run more than 4 cards on a board atm.

Hope this helps

[Zanatos666]

Stupid question, but have you verified that its not the card itself?  Also, what about updating the card itself?  Maybe its not Windows or the board, but the card itself.

[pheaonix]

i would stick to using 4 cards per pc until you can isolate this problem.

[Beremat]

Running 5 GPUs at a time shouldn't be an issue, it's been done before.

Try completely uninstalling everything with the AMD install manager. Reboot and search for any left over amd .dll files in system32 or other places. Delete them manually, there tends to be a few left over.
Reboot again. Check device manager to see if it's still showing error 43. If it is, uninstall the card through its properties menu and reboot. See if windows update picks something up (the found new hardware dialog?) Then, reboot again and try installing AMD drivers again.

I had the same issue when I was trying to use an HD5870 and HD4850 at the same time. Basically a shuffle of uninstalling AMD and Windows drivers eventually resolved it, and there was never anything wrong with the card or my motherboard.

[pheaonix]

Running 5 GPUs at a time shouldn't be an issue, it's been done before.

Try completely uninstalling everything with the AMD install manager. Reboot and search for any left over amd .dll files in system32 or other places. Delete them manually, there tends to be a few left over.
Reboot again. Check device manager to see if it's still showing error 43. If it is, uninstall the card through its properties menu and reboot. See if windows update picks something up (the found new hardware dialog?) Then, reboot again and try installing AMD drivers again.

I had the same issue when I was trying to use an HD5870 and HD4850 at the same time. Basically a shuffle of uninstalling AMD and Windows drivers eventually resolved it, and there was never anything wrong with the card or my motherboard.

ah, yes. the true way of fixing computers: play with it until it works xD

[Bitsaurus]

Sometimes it needs a good swift kick

[Lacan82]

Check that Windows is Up to date.

You've updated the BIOS
Check the chipset drivers
run a registry cleaner. like ccleaner
Do a clean install of the video drivers

[rograz]

you say it's always the same slot? tried shorting the detection pins?

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=36061.0

[FatMagic]

What's the PSU you are using? Hopefully over 1000 watts w/ a single rail? With a 5 card setup (assuming 79XX), you'll need more than 1200 W most likely. Unless you've undervolted them. You can get a special Y cable from Cablesaurus (and I'm sure other places) to run two power supplies on your rig to help with the power.

[txmasut]

Hi,

I have just recently attempted to add 2 cards to my rig, for a total of 5 cards. However, one card is constantly having hardware issues in regards to installation. Windows can detect the GPU, but Windows spits out Error 43, and refuses to utilize the device.

The motherboard I am using is a MSI Z77A-45 (7x PCI-E slots).

I've switched around the PCI-E slots (using powered extenders), installed a new BIOS, and still haven't figured out what the issue is. Its seemingly always on slot 6, even if I am not filling that slot with a card.

If anyone can suggest why this is happening, I'd appreciate it. I have an identical rig that I am setting up, and am going to see if it gives me a similar error.

Any help is appreciated. The person that can resolve my problem gets 2.5 LTC.

Thanks!

Honestly I have the same setup and couldn't get it to work for the life of me.  I finally got it to work last night.  Fully delete AMD drivers and use their program to delete all remanants of their settings.  Download amd_radeon_hd7900_win7_64 from the first link in google and select custom install.  DO NOT INSTALL CATALYST CONTROL CENTER!!!!  Select everything but control center. Catalyst is having problems in the old drivers with 5 cards, and the newer drivers don't support 5 cards.  If this fixes your problem let me know, otherwise we can look at something else

[rograz]

running catalyst 13.3 with CCC and 6x7950 without problems mining LTC, only strange things is that I cant get cgminer to start on all 6 cards so I had to resort to reaper.

More than likely any problems with installing more than x amount of cards are either power related or it's the detection pins if you are using a 1x extension cables. Even if you use a 1x cable and put it in a 16x slot you sometimes need to short the pins to get the cards to detect/work properly. For peace of mind these days I short the the detection pins on all my 1x cables and it pretty much eliminated all of my problems I used to have to get 5-6 card setups up and running.

There are just to many scenarios where the detection pins seems to come into play, ive had cards that could install but couldn't initialize mining/3d, slots that only needed shorting when all 16x were populated etc. For example motherboards that split their 16x into 2x 8x slots when populating both. When using 1x risers you can use one slot at the time on some motherboards but to get it to split the pci-e lines between the slots you need to short the detection pins.

So take my advice if you are using 1x risers/cables, short the damn detection pins and save yourself a lot of headaches

[txmasut]

running catalyst 13.3 with CCC and 6x7950 without problems mining LTC, only strange things is that I cant get cgminer to start on all 6 cards so I had to resort to reaper.

Weird, I tried every version of drivers and all would show the last card, but it would never actually work until that last driver I linked.

[mitsanaga]

ah, yes. the true way of fixing computers: play with it until it works xD
[/quote]

concur

[Benny1985]

I figured it out on my own.

I installed Win8, and it picked up the cards immediately. Now running 5x7950s on a MSI Z77A-45.

[zvs]

catalyst 11.12 will run 5 gpus in windows (7)