Pcie capabilities.

[Taburnak]

i have a older motherboard GA-MA74GM-S2 rev 1.0 it has a pice 16x currently with a 280x in it and a 1x slot empty. i want to know if i can put a second 280x in it in the 1x slot with a riser?

also i want to build a new pc and similar question. can i use all the pcie slots at the same time? i havent decided what board i want but i do want 3 280x running.   

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[Olly_K]

pci-e x1 provides enough bandwidth for mining

[Taburnak]

pci-e x1 provides enough bandwidth for mining

yes that i knew but i remeber back in the day you could get into irq issues with cards on a pci board. depending on the hardware you were useing you may not of been able to use all the slots because of the irq.

basicly say i had a board with 2 16x slots and 3 1x slots can i use all 5 slots. my current board has a 16x and a 1x so can i use both at the same time or only one?

[Olly_K]

I'm 99% sure you can use both together without an issue.

[HellDiverUK]

yes that i knew but i remeber back in the day you could get into irq issues with cards on a pci board. depending on the hardware you were useing you may not of been able to use all the slots because of the irq.

IRQs haven't been an issue since the days of Pentium 3 machines and Windows 2000.  So, about 15 years more or less.

[nybbler905]

Another way of looking at it, with PCIx slots, the farthest from the CPU is the one you get a screen to watch, it auto configures the IRQ lines ( if it detects a card in the slot so NO VGA PCI cards if you are mining ), ' dummy ' plugs ( 3 resistors in the HDMI connector, IF it has one on the card ) for the 2nd card ( and more if you have the slots ).  The only potential issue is some GPUs reqire either pci slot  re-wiring ( pinouts.ru has a pic for what wire to add to the pcix1 to pci x16 adapter ) for the card to not only be read, but used by the motherboard.  You may also want to load a USB Bootable thumb drive ( instead of a hard drive/CD ) with Linux ( personally, i use Ubuntu ) as that cuts down the power required by the whole system.

There are alot of sellers of aluminum frames that mount the motherboard and power to a base and a riser card section for the GPUs to ' hang ' above it allowing for each PCIx slot to get an adapter and airflow between crazy numbers of video cards.

[Taburnak]

Another way of looking at it, with PCIx slots, the farthest from the CPU is the one you get a screen to watch, it auto configures the IRQ lines ( if it detects a card in the slot so NO VGA PCI cards if you are mining ), ' dummy ' plugs ( 3 resistors in the HDMI connector, IF it has one on the card ) for the 2nd card ( and more if you have the slots ).  The only potential issue is some GPUs reqire either pci slot  re-wiring ( pinouts.ru has a pic for what wire to add to the pcix1 to pci x16 adapter ) for the card to not only be read, but used by the motherboard.  You may also want to load a USB Bootable thumb drive ( instead of a hard drive/CD ) with Linux ( personally, i use Ubuntu ) as that cuts down the power required by the whole system.

There are alot of sellers of aluminum frames that mount the motherboard and power to a base and a riser card section for the GPUs to ' hang ' above it allowing for each PCIx slot to get an adapter and airflow between crazy numbers of video cards.

thanks thats some good advice. i dived into linux a few year ago its a nice os but i was just too fresh for it even on a user friendly version like linux mint. so i have shelved the idea for no. maybe ill take a course in linux someday but win 7 is working fine for the moment.

[nybbler905]

If you are old enough to understand Win 3.11 for workgroups, Win 95/98 and some of the ' quirks '  Ubuntu is a nice graphical environment where ya can drop in to a DOS type shell ( in a window ) for when you need to actually type commands.  Just remember that some times you need Admin access to commands so in Linux " Sudo ( command ) " will get you temporary access to do it and will need a password.  How does this relate to PCIx capabilities?   Sometimes the command to start mining for me starts with ' sudo ' since it needs  root access to do the mining.

Edtited to add:

PLUS Ubuntu install CDs MAKE your hard drive dual boot ( if you got any OS on the partion already ) complete with ram test as an option on boot!

[InCoinsITrust]

You can do it, just use powered riser.