DIY eGPU experiences

[tankzilla]

I will be in a dire need to get rid of my desktop since I will be moving around a lot but I still want to game.

What I have right now is: gtx 570 1280mb, ocz 500w psu. So what exactly do I need to get this show on the road? I got a gpu, I got a PSU. I want to run it via the expresscard so I guess it's PE4H ver2.4 with EC2C for me then? I want to run it in x2 link mode for maximum performance (that's max without TB?) So a SB laptop will be required then? Will the results be better with or without optimus?

Power the PE4H ver2.4 with EC2C with a floppy power connector, got that on my PSU. The mini hdmi is included in the PE4H ver2.4 with EC2C?

I also got a 2 monitors, 1 lg 120hz and 1 dell IPS, will I be able to use both normaly with DVI?

[SimoxTav]

Ok i made a quick test: I took the HP un2430 WWAN card I have in my HP 2560P and installed it in the WWAN slot on the XPS15 L501X.

Attached below (first 2 images) the result. Do i have to guess the WWAN card is on the PCI to USB bus then? (and so the port is UNUSABLE for DIY dock?)

Later I installed back the card on my HP and in eGPU Setup 1.x is still invisible, but on device manager is under a different group (attached too below), that clearly says PCI to USB Host Controller (but in this PC i have the EC slot so it's only a double check for the XPS15 L501).

So how can i check on what bus is on the XPS 15? :P

[User Retired 2]

Attached below (first 2 images) the result. Do i have to guess the WWAN card is on the PCI to USB bus then? (and so the port is UNUSABLE for DIY dock?)

WWAN card = USB
wifi card = pci-e

If you want to test if the WWAN port is usable for DIY eGPU purposes then connect a wifi card to it and see if it appears in the port listing in Setup 1.x. From previous comments in this thread, Dell appears to wire both the USB and pci-e pins to their WWAN/wifi slots.

I want to run it via the expresscard so I guess it's PE4H ver2.4 with EC2C for me then? I want to run it in x2 link mode for maximum performance (that's max without TB?) So a SB laptop will be required then? Will the results be better with or without optimus?

Power the PE4H ver2.4 with EC2C with a floppy power connector, got that on my PSU. The mini hdmi is included in the PE4H ver2.4 with EC2C?

I also got a 2 monitors, 1 lg 120hz and 1 dell IPS, will I be able to use both normaly with DVI?

See Getting Started section on first page. Note: x2 link width cannot be done with a SB notebook. In addition, it requires accessible [port1+2], [port3+4], [port5+6] or [port7+8]. I'd advise purchasing a SB notebook with an iGPU and wait for the pci-e 2.0 kit to arrive. It will give the equivalent of x4 1.0 in bandwidth.

[SimoxTav]

WWAN card = USB
wifi card = pci-e

If you want to test if the WWAN port is usable for DIY eGPU purposes then connect a wifi card to it and see if it appears in the port listing in Setup 1.x. From previous comments in this thread, Dell appears to wire both the USB and pci-e pins to their WWAN/wifi slots.

Thanks. Checking in 5 mins and back :P

Ok, sounds like the WWAN slot is on PCIe bus also on the L501x. Thanks ^_^



Ok: Next step: i REALLY don't get what TOLUD is, or better, I've read that's something related to the max memory the system reserve, so lower it is better it is for an eGPU setup, but actually i can't measure how much good is to have 2.5Gb; what does it mean exactly?

[tankzilla]

See Getting Started section on first page. Note: x2 link width cannot be done with a SB notebook. In addition, it requires accessible [port1+2], [port3+4], [port5+6] or [port7+8]. I'd advise purchasing a SB notebook with an iGPU and wait for the pci-e 2.0 kit to arrive. It will give the equivalent of x4 1.0 in bandwidth.

Okey, I'm a tad confused really but essentialy, get a SB laptop, make sure there are port 1+2, 3+4, 5+6 or 7+8 avaible and wait for pci-e 2.0 kit to arrive. Any timeline when its due to be released? And by iGpu, do you mean internal other than the HD3000 f e 540m?

[SimoxTav]

Okey, I'm a tad confused really but essentialy, get a SB laptop, make sure there are port 1+2, 3+4, 5+6 or 7+8 avaible and wait for pci-e 2.0 kit to arrive. Any timeline when its due to be released? And by iGpu, do you mean internal other than the HD3000 f e 540m?

iGPU = HD 3000
dGPU = GT540m
eGPU = "your external card"

[kizwan]

EDIT: Never mind, I finally got it working! I borrowed my roommate's LCD which allows for DVI input and connected it to the GTX 560 Ti, booted up and it worked immediately, tested it with 3dmark06 and got a score of 17296

However, I am still unable to use my internal lcd with the graphics card for some reason. When I try booting up with the GPU disconnected from the monitor, I simply have the same problems as described in the quote above. Does anyone have a solution for this?

Look like when windows starting, it set eGPU as primary video card. Did you installed any modified/3rd party ACPI/DSDT table(s) before? Did you try reset BIOS settings to defaults? Did you try fresh windows installation? (By "fresh" means not using recovery/restore disk/partition.) Does Intel HD Graphics iGPU show up in Device Manager if your notebook boot with LCD connected to eGPU?

P/S: Please answer all questions. Thank you.

Ok, finally. I think I got everything fixed. My final issue was a poor PSU. Fixed with 2 until I can get a good single one. I'll be posting results and setup issues shortly below.

I never thought it is PSU issue since it work OK when on x1.

Dell XPS Studio 1640 Intel Core 2 Duo P8600 @ 2.4Ghz
eGPU ATI Radeon HD 4850 @ 1280 x 960 @x4
iGPU HD3670

Spoiler :

For Dell XPS Studio 1640 users, I was able to get my system running at x4 with a few issues that needed worked out.

The process that I follow to run my eGPU at x4 follows:
1. Install Setup 1.x
2. Checked mPCIe ports with wifi card and all were active.
3. Took off bottom cover and installed PM3N cards.
4. Switched jumper on port 1 mPCIe card to the opposite side which was the right side. This was due to my computer not booting at all. It would power up then turn off within a few seconds.
5. For power, my original PSU was not adequate because my card was shutting down after a few minutes. Changing PSU's fixed this problem.
6. After booting into setup 1.x, I activated ports 1-4 then selected x4. Then PCI compaction for both internal and external cards.
7. Due to chainloading failing for both MBR and Windows 7, I needed to use just the Reboot option at the bottom. This was due to computer chainloading to a black screen.
8. I have the express port 4 connected to port 4 on the PE4H.
9. Card is turned on and connected when started.
10. I need to change the activate and change ports to x4 on each boot.
11. I also need to use F8 and disable driver signature each boot after Reboot from setup 1.x
12. I also had an issue with the DNA driver once I had x4 working. I needed to uninstall then reinstall the latest DNA driver and then my eGPU was working correctly and my external monitor was good to go.

This should fix any problems you may have. I've posted results below and will post some pictures shortly. I'm not to happy with my 3Dmark scores, but have a GTX 560ti Hawk edition on the way and will like to see the difference from my HD4850 will be, plus I'll be able to benchmark some dx11 games since my HD4850 is only dx10. Hope this helps and anyone can post with opinions.


Detailed scores (Mark06 iGPU)

3DMark Score 4425 3DMarks
SM2.0 Score 1574
HDR/SM3.0 Score 1895
CPU Score 2000
GT1 - Return To Proxycon11.67 FPS
GT2 - Firefly Forest14.57 FPS
CPU1 - Red Valley0.63 FPS
CPU2 - Red Valley1.02 FPS
HDR1 - Canyon Flight16.72 FPS
HDR2 - Deep Freeze21.18 FPS

Detailed scores (Mark06 x1)

3DMark Score5257 3DMarks
SM2.0 Score2086
HDR/SM3.0 Score2149
CPU Score2023
GT1 - Return To Proxycon14.31 FPS
GT2 - Firefly Forest20.46 FPS
CPU1 - Red Valley0.64 FPS
CPU2 - Red Valley1.02 FPS
HDR1 - Canyon Flight17.21 FPS
HDR2 - Deep Freeze25.77 FPS

Detailed scores (Mark06 x4)

3DMark Score7476 3DMarks
SM2.0 Score3152
HDR/SM3.0 Score3541
CPU Score1865
GT1 - Return To Proxycon22.1 FPS
GT2 - Firefly Forest30.44 FPS
CPU1 - Red Valley0.58 FPS
CPU2 - Red Valley0.96 FPS
HDR1 - Canyon Flight32.36 FPS
HDR2 - Deep Freeze38.46 FPS

Detailed scores (Vantage iGPU)

3DMark Score 1378 3DMarks
Graphics Score 1138
CPU Score 3733
Jane Nash 2.6 FPS
New Calico 4.1 FPS

Detailed scores (Vantage x1)

Graphics Score3204
CPU Score3861
Jane Nash8.86 FPS
New Calico9.93 FPS

Detailed scores (Vantage x4)

3DMark Score5335 3DMarks
Graphics Score6215
CPU Score3744
Jane Nash18.17 FPS
New Calico18.25 FPS

Resident Evil 5 DX9 x1
30.4
Resident Evil 5 DX9 x4
59.9 B
Resident Evil 5 DX10 x1
24.3
Resident Evil 5 DX10 x4
58.8 B
Devil May Cry DX9 x1
Scene 1- 48.21
Scene 2- 35.90
Scene 3- 52.57
Scene 4- 35.53
Devil May Cry DX9 x4
Scene 4- 77.18
Devil May Cry DX10 x1
Scene 1- 33.55
Scene 2- 26.92
Scene 3- 35.51
Scene 4- 26.93
Devil May Cry DX10 x4
Scene 4- 61.63

Congratulations for successful eGPU x4 implementation.

I downloaded a couple of versions and installed them but now the 5770 doesn't show up at all after a 32-bitA compaction. If I plug it in after everything boots, then I get an error 12.

Do you mean, eGPU was detected in Setup 1.x but disappear after doing 32-bitA compaction? Please post screenshot of Setup 1.x main screen (instruction is available at Setup 1.x page).

Hello All,

I'm considering building my first eGPU setup. I've been reading and searching this thread for information on building an SLI package. I haven't found anything yet and wondered if it was because it is not technologically possible or not cost effective vs the performance gain .... diminishing returns.

If it is possible, I have in mind to build it with two MSI GTX 560-448 Ti's. If anyone could point me in the right direction or tell me I'm going down the wrong path that would be great. I would like to stay out of hot water with my budget manager (wife).

I currently have a Sager NP9261 that just isn't keeping up anymore graphically and this would be a great way to get a little more life out of her. I couldn't even get through the second test with 3Dmark Vantage. It was a great system 4 years ago, but only marginal now.

She has the following specs:

Win 7 Ultimate x64 | Q6700 @2.66 GHz | 8GB PC5300 | 2 nVidia 8700M GTs 512 MB in SLI | 3 Western Digital Black 500GB HDDs (Raid 0 and a data drive).

Oh, and if I yank out the TV tuner I never use I can do at least x2 with the extra mPCIe slot.

timohour have tried CrossFire & SLI setup but so far unsuccessful. To get best performance from eGPU, prefer doing x2 setup (of course with single graphic card). To be able to do x2 setup, your notebook must have two accessible & usable PCIe slots, either two mPCIe ports or ExpressCard+mPCIe. The PCIe port number must in this combination:-
- PCIe port#1 & port#2
OR
- PCIe port#3 & port#4
OR
- PCIe port#5 & port#6

You can use AIDA64 to know/check the PCIe port number.

Hey guys, I have been lurking this thread for a couple months now, but now that I finally made my first good attempt at doing an eGPU implementation, i wanted to post my findings and experience and see if you guys can help me.

I am starting with a 2008 era Dell Latitude D830 Core 2 Duo with a T9300 2.3ghz with 4.00 gb of ram and 256mb NVidia Quadro NVS 140m. Also running a 120gb SSD in the HDD bay and a 500gb mechanical HDD in the media bay so no DVD player. Running Windows 7 64-bit.

Spoiler :

I started out by trying to use my old Radeon 4870HD which required a lot of power and I could not get it to work with the P4EL that I got from Harmonic Inversion. http://www.harmonicinversion.com. After trying for a week and being unable to make my 4870 spin, i gave up, figuring the card was probably dead.

For a replacement card i chose to go with an MSI R6570 due to low power consumption, and also wanting to use ATI to avoid any driver conflicts with my onboard NVidia drivers and using an Nvidia eGPU (i am curious if this was an unwise choice, please give me some feedback on that)

For power I got an Antec Earthwatts 500W because it was pretty cheap.

Also I did not like the stability of the P4EL so I ordered a P4EH from Harmonic Inversion and I like it a lot better.

So after checking my TOLUD and finding it to be set at 3.5gb i was very dismayed but I decided to try anyways. With the laptop off I put the express card in and booted up successfully the first time on an external LCD but the card was not recognized and there were IO conflicts

After taking out 2gb of my ram, I booted again with the card in the machine and it went fine. I installed the ReadyDriver Plus according to the recommendations on the DoNotArgue.com site so that my laptop automatically F8's and selects 'Disable Driver Signature Enforcement' every time it boots. Then I installed the AMD DNA drivers from DoNotArgue.com

It worked great, I was able to play my games with remarkable improvement in quality even though I'm sure this is a 1x implementation. I did not have to do any compaction or chain loading or any of the complicated stuff I have read about on this thread that feels beyond my grasp.

A couple things I noticed now...if I boot up with the card in the slot I don't have an internal LCD and can only run off external monitors connected to the eGPU.

However, I can use the method of booting with no eGPU, then putting the laptop to sleep, inserting the expresscard and then waking up. When I do it that way I have the dGPU and the eGPU and I can use both internal LCD and external monitor. I was very happy when this worked, but my elation was short lived when I tried to run my game that way it was slow like before when it ran on the dGPU.

I guess I have a lot more testing to do

First you said it worked great but then it running slow. With ATI, you will not get hardware acceleration on internal LCD. You can play games on internal LCD but in windowed mode only. Performance won't be great though. You still need to use external monitor. With x1 setup, you'll experiencing stuttering & lagging while playing games. To get best performance, better do x2 setup IF PCIe ports are in either of these combinations (you'll need to use two PCIe ports, either two mPCIe ports or ExpressCard+mPCIe):-
- PCIe port#1 & port#2
OR
- PCIe port#3 & port#4
OR
- PCIe port#5 & port#6.

Your notebook doesn't have the required iGPU (Intel GMA 4500MHD) to be able to get hardware acceleration on internal LCD if you decided to use Nvidia Fermi desktop graphic card.

I will be in a dire need to get rid of my desktop since I will be moving around a lot but I still want to game.

What I have right now is: gtx 570 1280mb, ocz 500w psu. So what exactly do I need to get this show on the road? I got a gpu, I got a PSU. I want to run it via the expresscard so I guess it's PE4H ver2.4 with EC2C for me then? I want to run it in x2 link mode for maximum performance (that's max without TB?) So a SB laptop will be required then? Will the results be better with or without optimus?

Power the PE4H ver2.4 with EC2C with a floppy power connector, got that on my PSU. The mini hdmi is included in the PE4H ver2.4 with EC2C?

I also got a 2 monitors, 1 lg 120hz and 1 dell IPS, will I be able to use both normaly with DVI?

You can use PE4L (or here) too because you only need one PCIe port. It much cheaper than PE4H but PE4H have sturdier base though. x2 setup is not possible on SB notebooks due to hardware/BIOS limitation. So, to get best performance from eGPU, you can do x1.Opt setup (with Nvidia Fermi desktop graphic card) which is slightly better than x2 setup & you can use internal LCD (with eGPU hardware acceleration). Opt=Optimus make this possible & it also provide PCIe data compression which boost performance over PCIe x1 link. For now the available eGPU kit only supported PCIe Gen1 (2.5Gb/s at each direction, 5Gb/s concurrent) speed. When PCIe 2.0/Gen2 kit (5Gb/s at each direction, 10Gb/s concurrent) available, you'll get much better performance, equivalent x4 PCIe 1.0/Gen1 speed. The SB notebook (with ExpressCard slot) you need to get must have Intel HD 3000 iGPU to take advantage the Optimus setup. You also can get SB notebook with Nvidia Optimus. SB notebook with Nvidia Optimus definitely don't have TOLUD issue because you can disabled/turn off the internal Nvidia graphic card (dGPU) & the free PCI space can be use by eGPU.

• You need to connect the floppy power connector from PSU to PE4L/PE4H.
• If graphic card have two PCIe power ports, you need to connect PCIe power connectors to both ports.
• miniHDMI cable is included in the package. If you buy from HIT, you might need to select miniHDMI cable when ordering.
• You can use two external monitors with eGPU.

[MrSantarina]

hi i have dgpu 330m and intel gma graphics which is disabled by sony.. how do i enable it to do 1x Opt? i have an egpu gtx 460.. my computer model is sony CW thanks!

[kizwan]

Most probably you can't. The disabled Intel HD Graphics iGPU most likely not electrically connected to output.

[Gnomepatrol]

Greetings everyone,

So I was reading the new update about the thunderbolt eGPU (because I have to use a mac at school grrr) and it says according to the Bplus section that it will be available around Nov/E (the PE5H v1.0 that is).

Well its december and we have yet to see it. Is it out or am I mistaken with the date?

No one seems to answer this question.