Weird PCI-e slot phenomon

[trents]

So I've been replacing my AMD stuff with Intel and today went to put it all in my case. System no boot. No video. Took the ATI 9850 out and put an old Nvidia GeForce 210. Voila! Put the 9850 back in and no boot, no video. Moved the 9850 down to the middle PCI-e slot and voila again. Video and boot. Anyone ever heard of a given GPU working in some of the PCI-e slots but not others? Board is the Asus P8P67 Deluxe B3. Latest bios.

 

[EarthDog]

What is a 9850? Sounds like an old card? For that mobo does the manual.say to put it in that slot?

Edit: typo? 6850 like in your Sig?

 

[trents]

I'm sorry. You are correct ED, I meant to type, "6850". Haven't checked the manual but why would the old Nvidia card work in the first slot but the ATI 6850 not work in that same slot? What difference does it make to the board?

 

[EarthDog]

It shouldn't. But I have seen weirder things in my time...

 

[Bobnova]

Betcha one of the last eight pairs of PCIe coupling caps got knocked off the GPU. This does assume that the middle PCIe slot is an 8x and the first is a 16x.
Look along the edge connector (the thing that goes into the PCIe slot). You'll find 16 pairs of little tiny tiny capacitors. My guess is that one or more or those pairs is missing a capacitor.

 

[trents]

Betcha one of the last eight pairs of PCIe coupling caps got knocked off the GPU. This does assume that the middle PCIe slot is an 8x and the first is a 16x.
Look along the edge connector (the thing that goes into the PCIe slot). You'll find 16 pairs of little tiny tiny capacitors. My guess is that one or more or those pairs is missing a capacitor.

I will do that but it was working in the 16x slot of the Asus socket AM3 board I just took it out of yesterday.

 

[EarthDog]

16 physical or 16 electrical as well? Look on the back of the board... if the solder points run the full length of the 16x slot, its 16x electrical. If half, 8x... and so on.

 

[trents]

Actually, after consulting the manual it appears that all three PCI-e slots are 16x on the P8P67 Deluxe, at least when a single card is in use. But when I look on the socket AM3 board I can see what you mean in that all three slots are labeled "PCI-e 16x" but only the first one has soldered points the whole length. I don't know that I want to pull the P8P67 out again just to check that, however.

 

[EarthDog]

16x Physical is not the same as 16x electrical.

I don't know that I want to pull the P8P67 out again just to check that, however

I'm more than sure the internet has that answer...

 

[trents]

Does this help? That suggests to me the first two slots are the same. Nonetheless, the card was running fine in a 16x electrical slot just yesterday. Unless I damaged a cap when transferring it . . .

 

[EarthDog]

No(they always say physical in specs I believe). See my edit above on how to find out.

 

[Bobnova]

Damage while transferring is the most common (only, really) way for those caps to get nailed.
They're hard to hit directly because they are so small, but they are very fragile if you do whack them on/with something.

Generally the second slot is only wired for 8x even when the newegg/etc. specs say 16x. I suppose you could probably have a successful lawsuit against them on that.

 

[trents]

My attachment pic came straight from Asus' website, if it matters.

 

[EarthDog]

Here, I went to newegg and found your motherboard. I bet it shows the back of it...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131701

 

[trents]

Here, I went to newegg and found your motherboard. I bet it shows the back of it...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131701

Yep, you are correct. The second and third PCI-e slots have shorter solder point footprints. The only thing left to do now is to inspect the card and/or install it in another board in the "electrical" 16x slot to see if it works.

 

[trents]

Okay, the 6850 works just fine in the 16x electrical PCI-e slot of another motherboard and I tried several other video cards in the 16x electrical PCI-e slot on the P8P67 Deluxe board. Among those was a newer low end ATI card and an Nvidia 8800 GTS. So I guess my conclusion is that there is some sort of incompatibility issue between the motherboard or it's bios and that particular MSI 6850 card.

 

[EarthDog]

I know ASUS had some compatibility issues with some cards. I recall Hokie and Lvcoyote having a card that didn't work in an ASUS board but worked in everything else.

Why... no idea.

 

[wagex]

i had an asus board that would not run any 5xxx cards never figured out why, just got a new mobo.

 

[trents]

i had an asus board that would not run any 5xxx cards never figured out why, just got a new mobo.

Right now I have a Raedon 5450 HD installed and it works fine.

 

[EarthDog]

Let's take a step back from the granularity here... some AMD cards on some asus boards do not work for whatever reason. Not sure which ones, or which boards... but it is known to happen. Perhaps this is the case?