Let's figure out how to make a DIY eGPU (previously DIY ViDock)

[User Retired 2]

Nvidia 40nm-based Fermi release - March 2010

Guru3d got to do some hands on with a fermi-based Nvidia GF100 here. Eg: Far Cry 2@1920x1200 has GTX285/GF100 FPS of 50/84. Ie: GF100 is 68% faster!! Fermi also adds DX11 support. Impressive.

So we'll soon see some Nvidia performance offerings to challenge the ATI HD5xxx series.

[Aidanvii]

Hey guys, first of all apologies for the cries for help to get this working.

progress from my a few posts ago, i have gotten rid of error 12 for both cards with 4GB RAM. I can hotplug the card now by hibernating/suspending the system, plug then resume without any major problems. The laptop screen flashes somewhat and the new hardware sound bleeps a few times (first with the good sound, then a few disconnection sounds). My desktop background wallpaper then turns black. both devices then appear in device manager and Everest as shown in the first picture.

Then when i try to extend the display through the screen resolution window, i try either extend displays or display only on 2. The laptop screen then flashes off and on. the 2nd image is from my laptop screen although it should be from my monitor. There is no output on my monitor however.

Upon clicking keep changes, the screen resolution options revert back to display 1 active where as display 2 is not in use.

Could symptoms like these be the cause of driver issues? the nVidia card is wddm 1.1 although im not sure about the Radeon HD 5000 series. I read that the catalyst has 1.1 support for HD 4000,3000,2000 series cards although no mention of 5000 (cant check it in dxdiag). I know you said (nando) to add support in atiilhag.inf for this card which i will try again failing this. I did read somewhere that 1.0 and 1.1 drivers dont cooperate.

Any help on what the issue could be here, if >2.5gb could still be causing the problem or driver issues or whatever, it would be much appreciated.

Thanks

[User Retired 2]

Could symptoms like these be the cause of driver issues? the nVidia card is wddm 1.1 although im not sure about the Radeon HD 5000 series. I read that the catalyst has 1.1 support for HD 4000,3000,2000 series cards although no mention of 5000 (cant check it in dxdiag). I know you said (nando) to add support in atiilhag.inf for this card which i will try again failing this. I did read somewhere that 1.0 and 1.1 drivers dont cooperate.

Any help on what the issue could be here, if >2.5gb could still be causing the problem or driver issues or whatever, it would be much appreciated.

Vista/Win7 ATI driver

I found the Vista/Win7 ATI Catalyst driver was a WDM 1.0 driver and did not work at all with my X3100+HD4670 setup in Win7. So instead I used the HD46xx driver that comes with Win7, found automatically upon installation. Does Windows Update find a driver for your HD5770? If not, try applying this workaround.

Same point applies about your Nvidia driver - ensure it's WDM 1.1. When I have the HD4xxx driver installed it clearly says WDM1.1 in Device Manager against the device. Would also suggest remove RAM and do initial testing with <=2.5GB. Removes an extra variable in the equation.

[Aidanvii]

hey, i managed to get it working with 2gb like you said. works like a charm, although ill still try for 4gb at a later date, and most likely x2.

thanks

[Malumake]

OK, I am currently suffering from premature WOOTage. So, I have no problems when booting with the unit plugged in, but this only works to external monitor. If I try to hotplug, I get the infamous Code 12.

Luckily, I actually dual-boot Linux Mint and W7 Ult. 64, so implementing the pcie scripts shouldn't be a problem (yay GRUB2!). My only issue is what exactly do I need to put in. I have looked at Nando's explanation of the MCFG thing and it totally confused me (granted it was 3 AM and I was wicked tired). So, any help with that would be greatly appreciated.

I am currently working on a traceback on the Northbridge Filter Driver and USB Filter Driver to find out which one actually controls the XGP indentification. The reason for this is because whatever identifies the XGP capability is NOT in the atiilhag INF.

Much Mahalo in advance, and lets keep plugging along people!

[User Retired 2]

hey, i managed to get it working with 2gb like you said. works like a charm, although ill still try for 4gb at a later date, and most likely x2.

Great. Was the solution to just removing RAM or did you need to massage in WDM 1.1 MS driver support for your HD5770? I'm wondering too if the bios is not being frugal with it's allocation of resources - whether the PCI resources [above TOLUD] could be manually re-allocated prior to OS boot to provide 2x256MB windows for both cards to work with > 2.5GB?

OK, I am currently suffering from premature WOOTage. So, I have no problems when booting with the unit plugged in, but this only works to external monitor. If I try to hotplug, I get the infamous Code 12.

Benchmarks please. Especially if Everest is reporting x1 2.0.

The behaviour your noting indicates that the bios does an extra step in allocating bridge resources when it detects your HD5770 connected on bootup. When you hotplug, those resources had not been pre-allocated by bios since the HD5770 wasn't detected, therefore the error 12.

So idea is to force that allocation regardless of whether the HD5770 is detected on bootup or not to allow hotplug on demand in Win7. Two ways could do this, both requiring the DIY ViDOck USB Bootdisk from the DIY ViDock Repository.

1. setup PCI bridge parameters and test. I would expect the requirement to be like shown below but with the Intel Port1 is 0/1C/00 replaced by your AMD chipset's port1 PCI device. Once confirmed working, convert to grub2.cfg mem writes. grub2 developers have a recent patch to do 'setpci' command writes instead, making it easier.

:: Intel ICHxM port1=0/1C/00
:: 0/1C/00 - Bridge 4KB I/O Window
setpci -s 00:1c.01 1c.w=2020         
:: 0/1c/00 - Bridge 256MB Memory Window
setpci -s 00:1c.00 24.l=CFF1C001

2. compare PCI Config when HD5770 is bios detected and when not. Ie boot the DIY VIDock USB Bootdisk, run 'pcitool /DB:HP' to save a PCI Config binary dump, then download PCIScope Trial, load the two dump files and use it's compare feature to quickly identify what the differences are in PCI Config.

In any case, you are the pioneer here for the RS780M chipset

[Malumake]

I have already done some quick Benchmarks and it fits exactly where you put it in the chart...which disappoints me greatly (8848/46.5). I think that once I get the XGP figured out it will work, I also have done ZERO game tweaking for W7.

FYI hotplug works fine with 2GB of RAM, as stated I just need to figure out the XGP thing.

[User Retired 2]

I have already done some quick Benchmarks and it fits exactly where you put it in the chart...which disappoints me greatly (8848/46.5).

Those benchmark results would indicate your HD5770 is running x1 1.0, regardless of what Everest is telling us. At x16 2.0, a HD5770 gets 3dmark06=16509. x2 1.0 is about 80% of that, so would get 13k-14k. 8848/46.5 is quite a respectable result

If you can get the AMD filter driver to display using the internal LCD, it would make the AMD chipset quite desirable for DIY ViDock purposes.

[Malumake]

An FYI for 5770 Vapor-X owners. Run gpu-z to make sure your are getting all 800 shaders. Mine and many others shipped with only 720 turned on. There is a firmware update on Sapphire's site that turns the other 80 back on. Also make sure you DL the instructions, which are right above the firmware itself.

[Max_Headroom]

Those benchmark results would indicate your HD5770 is running x1 1.0, regardless of what Everest is telling us.

This may have been mentioned earlier in this thread; the doubled data rate usually associated with PCIe 2.0 ("Gen2 speed", 5 GT/s) is actually an optional feature. The motherboard chipset may very well implement PCIe 2.0 with only Gen1 speed (2.5 GT/s) in order to save power. You would still have a PCIe 2.0 link to the graphics card, as indicated by Everest, but running at Gen1 speed.