Just in case, check your GFX card's PCIe speed

[Flappie]

I've just had a great time laughing at myself tonight. I do hope this post will make you laugh with me.

 

I need to show you this because I might not be the only one realizing that my GFX card was plugged on the wrong hole the whole time... better late than never! In case of doubt, get TechPowerUp GPU-Z and take a look at your GFX card's true PCIe speed.

 

 

All is well that ends well. Now that my card is enjoying the x16 highway, I get ~12% more fps. :D

 

[dedde01]

Oh God... am I hallucinated or am I seeing this for true, or maybe both?:huh::doh::megalol:

Maybe I just have to go to bed...

[Devrim]

Thanks so much for heads up Flappie!

 

Well; It's interesting and happy end on your side, but it's very strange on my side.

 

Check the images. My GTX970 is installed on x16 slot, but GPUZ says it's on x8 or what?

[Falcon_S]

...My GTX970 is installed on x16 slot, but GPUZ says it's on x8 or what?

 

1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x16 (PCIEX16)

* For optimum performance, if only one PCI Express graphics card is to be installed, be sure to install it in the PCIEX16 slot.

1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x8 (PCIEX8) * The PCIEX8 slot shares bandwidth with the PCIEX16 slot. When the PCIEX8 slot is populated, the PCIEX16 slot will operate at up to x8 mode.

 

https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/GA-Z68X-UD4-B3-rev-10#sp

[mmtaraval]

Oh man! I had mine on the wrong slot - thanks Flappie!

[Flappie]

Thanks so much for heads up Flappie!

 

Well; It's interesting and happy end on your side, but it's very strange on my side.

 

Check the images. My GTX970 is installed on x16 slot, but GPUZ says it's on x8 or what?

:thumbup:

 

As Falcon pointed out, this is normal if you have another peripheral plugged into your PCIe x8 slot. If this is true and if that peripheral isn't another graphic card or some NVMe SSD, you might want to move it to a PCIe x1 slot.

 

If, however, your PCIe x8 slot happens to be empty, you should take a look at your BIOS. It sometimes allow to set the PCIE bus maximum speed (you want "Gen3" or "3.0").

 

According to this tech website, you might not see any difference between x8 and x16. But I think you should give it a try anyway.

 

Oh man! I had mine on the wrong slot - thanks Flappie!

;) I guess you wanted to give your PC some air, as I did when I mounted my GTX980. :doh:
Edited February 15, 2018 by Flappie

[Nealius]

Mine is telling me @ x16 1.1. Should it be @ x16 3.0?

[Flappie]

Mine is telling me @ x16 1.1. Should it be @ x16 3.0?

You're fine. It says so when the graphics card is barely used. You can easily change this by clicking on the question mark, on the left, and then clicking the button that appears: it will stimulate the GPU and hence show the maximum (which should be 3.0).

[Devrim]

1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x8 (PCIEX * The PCIEX8 slot shares bandwidth with the PCIEX16 slot. When the PCIEX8 slot is populated, the PCIEX16 slot will operate at up to x8 mode.

 

As Falcon pointed out, this is normal if you have another peripheral plugged into your PCIe x8 slot. If this is true and if that peripheral isn't another graphic card or some NVMe SSD, you might want to move it to a PCIe x1 slot.

 

If, however, your PCIe x8 slot happens to be empty, you should take a look at your BIOS. It sometimes allow to set the PCIE bus maximum speed (you want "Gen3" or "3.0")...

 

Thanks for your attention my friends but, as you can see the photo I attached, there's no any peripherals on any slots. Only 970 is installed the upper x16 slot. I just removed to take photo to see what I have got on my motherboard.

 

I checked my BIOS. You believe me or not, no any PCI-bus related option there. :\

 

By the way; My CPU is 2600. Not even K. That can be a problem?

[Flappie]

My Gigabyte motherboard does this: it limits the speed to x8 whenever it is used with a Sandy Bridge CPU (see here).

 

The PCI Express x16 slot supports up to PCI Express 2.0 standard when an Intel 32nm (Sandy Bridge) CPU is installed.

But yours doesn't seem to do so.

 

I have three leads:

1. Maybe you should consider updating the BIOS of your motherboard.

2. Or maybe you should try this:

 

the problem was with the BCLK frequency, when it is disabled and at stock, it is 100MHz in the BIOS, but it actually runs at 99.70 MHz, and apparently, PCIe x16 requires BCLK to run at 100MHz at all times, so I went into the BIOS, and changed the BCLK control to Enabled and set it to 1003 instead of 1000, giving me a stable 100.1 MHz in both OS and I now have PCIe x16 speed!!!

EDIT:

 

3. Or try deactivating "USB 3.0 'Turbo'" in the BIOS.

Edited February 15, 2018 by Flappie

[bulding]

thanks for info guys

 

I would never have thought to look at her I also had a little worry about the outline for gpuz

my problem came from the bios he was on auto and had to put it on manual 3.0

dumb bios :thumbup:

[BitMaster]

Guys,

 

RTFM, that's all that comes to my mind reading this.

 

All mainboard manuals explain this topic in detail, tho it does not really make much difference if you run 8x/8x or 16x/0x. What does matter is if you run PCIe-vers.1 or 2 or 3. Running version 2 with 8x is 1/4 of your natural bandwidth, THAT MATTERS. Whereas vers. 2 + 16x wont really impact performance.

 

The devil is in the detail..and YOUR mainbaord manual covers all that:book:

Edited February 15, 2018 by BitMaster

[Flappie]

You are right, we're morons. But thank god, you arrived just in time to enlighten us. Please forgive our many mistakes, thou who are never wrong.

 

On a more serious note, it never occured to me before that a motherboard showing two large PCIe slots could not share a x16 bus on both of them. Hell, couldn't they simply use different colors? It's probably intentionally misleading.

Edited February 15, 2018 by Flappie

[Ganesh]

Good advice for many :thumbup:

Note, however, that when reading PCIe-version at idle, the values may differ from full load due to powersaving modes.

[toutenglisse]

Devrim, just a remark to be sure : you should carefully check pour pcie2.0-16x slot to see if a tiny brooch is bend at the very bottom of the slot.

I had this issue on an other motherboard (the computer was bought assembled... but not well). I had to put the brooch back in shape with a tweezers. My gtx970 was running x8 before the fix and x16 after.

(On your pictures it doesn't seem to be the case but it's not obvious to see)

Edited February 15, 2018 by toutenglisse

[lobo]

Flappie I thank you, and at laugh at myself!!

 

:doh: After reading your post I opened my case and found the same thing! Swapped it and it has now gone from x8 to x16.

 

I stuck the card in the wrong PCIe slot due to issue fitting it into the x16 slot. Assumed they were the same... double DOH! After adjusting cables etc. was able to get it fixed.

 

Thank you. :thumbup:

 

Rep inbound.

Edited February 16, 2018 by lobo**
Added a DOH

[hansangb]

Good advice for many :thumbup:

Note, however, that when reading PCIe-version at idle, the values may differ from full load due to powersaving modes.

 

 

Yeah, GPU-Z had a "?" icon that allows you run a little rendering to make sure the GPU kicks it up a notch.

[prccowboy]

I've just had a great time laughing at myself tonight.

 

Isn't it funny how DCS helps you identify PC issues? I just discovered that I have been underclocking my memory for years because I missed a BIOS setting when I built the rig. I would never have seen it had I not been trying to get a little more fps for DCS. Not sure if I actually get any performance bump from it, but it makes me feel better that my memory is now running at advertised speeds.

[BitMaster]

You are right, we're morons. But thank god, you arrived just in time to enlighten us. Please forgive our many mistakes, thou who are never wrong.

 

On a more serious note, it never occured to me before that a motherboard showing two large PCIe slots could not share a x16 bus on both of them. Hell, couldn't they simply use different colors? It's probably intentionally misleading.

 

We have had this topic more than once before.

 

It isnt usualyl a big issue but can become one if you have Gen2 and 8x or lesser, that's when Murphy kicks in.

 

RTFM is a valid statement. Everyone who builds or expands his PC should know what he is doing before going to work. I constantly need to catch up with new stuff hitting the market, and what gets me there is the manual and webpages, reading and reading, over and over, for 25 years now.