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RAIDR Express and SLI

Nate152
Moderator
Hello ROGer's,

I started this thread because one of our ROG members is doing a build with the RAIDR Express and SLIing two GTX 780's. I saw a review on Newegg that someone said the RAIDR Express keeps your machine from recognizing SLI and was confirmed by Asus support. Comments?
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Nodens
Level 16
This as a blanket statement is certainly wrong. It may happen on a specific chipset due to bug or chipset limitation. Which particular board are you talking about?
RAMPAGE Windows 8/7 UEFI Installation Guide - Patched OROM for TRIM in RAID - Patched UEFI GOP Updater Tool - ASUS OEM License Restorer
There are 10 types of people in the world. Those who understand binary and those who don't!

RealBench Developer.

Nodens
Level 16
Am I supposed to see something in that thread that answers my question? Because I can't see it. Like on this thread, there's only a mention of a random comment on Newegg... no mention of which board this was reported on, that I asked. RAIDR completely disabling SLI, that is certainly false. I already told you that. Issue with one particular chipset or board? Maybe. But until you tell me which board this was reported with I can tell you nothing more.
RAMPAGE Windows 8/7 UEFI Installation Guide - Patched OROM for TRIM in RAID - Patched UEFI GOP Updater Tool - ASUS OEM License Restorer
There are 10 types of people in the world. Those who understand binary and those who don't!

RealBench Developer.

Nate152
Moderator
Sorry about that Nodens,The person who wrote the review does not list any hardware.

I dont have SLI but what i do have and have tested on a maximus VI formula is that a raidr express will have no impact whatsoever on an GTX780ti on the same mb. The switching the 780ti from 8x to 16 x meant absolutely nothing. Thus effectively its impossible to see the PCIE as the limiting factor. Dont know about in Sli but if by default all SLIs on dual PCIE modes switch to 8x then it can not matter. The only difference for sli would potentially be on the new z97 boards IF the Sli graphics in that scenario can load the pcie fully. Atleast that is my conclusion after the testing ive done this week.
It started with a VIC-20... and now it is. Maximus Formula VI Intel 4770K 4.6GHz ASUS GTX780Ti 3GB Corsair Platinum Dominator 16GB 2400MHz Raid Express 240GB Samsung EVO 512 GB SSD Corsair 900D EK watercooling Corsair RM1000 ASUS PB278Q



Hi all!

It can depend on what socket your motherboard has, or your motherboard in general. The number of available PCI-E lanes for devices such as GPU's or PCI-E SSD's, and the layout of the slots does differ between CPU socket types, and even motherboards on the same socket. On the Intel platform, LGA1150 and LGA1155 CPU's only offer 16 PCI-E lanes. This is why if you connect one Graphics card to your motherboard, it will run at X16, but if you put 2 in there, they will both run at X8 lanes each. Nvidia cards require a minimum of 8 lanes, so if you have a board that supports 2-way SLI, 3-Way Crossfire, you might think "Oh, I have 3 slots here, I can put the RAIDR in slot 3" - no. Here's why:

With Crossfire, when you install 3 cards, they run at these speeds
Card 1: X8
Card 2: X4
Card 3: X4

Total: 16 lanes.

With nvidia cards, as previously stated, they require a minimum of 8 lanes

Card 1: X8
Card 2: X8

Total: 16 lanes - no lanes left to support a device in Slot 3.

This means, that with 2-way SLI on an LGA1150, or LGA1155, the CPU does not offer any more lanes to support a device in the third slot. If you try to put something in there, there are no longer enough lanes for the video cards, and things stop working.

Some motherboards have an additional PCI-E X4 2.0 slot, which is controlled by the Motherboard chipset, not the CPU; the smaller X1 slots are controlled this way too. If your motherboard has this, then you should be able to run 2 nvidia cards in SLI, as well as the RAIDR.
However, if you do put the RAIDR in there, the X1 slots will most likely no longer function.

I personally chose to go for the Rampage IV Black Edition for my motherboard, as it's the LGA2011 Platform, and I'm using nvidia GPUs. LGA2011 CPUs support a total of 40 PCI-E lanes, instead of the usual 16 lanes in other socket CPUs.

I have my graphics cards in slots 1 & 3, with the RAIDR in slot 2 as shown below:

Card 1, Slot 1: X16
RAIDR, Slot 2: X8 (the RAIDR only uses 2 lanes, but the slot has 8 available to it)
Card 2, Slot 3: X16

Total: 40 lanes, but only 34 in use (if you take my meaning). I could also drop a third card in, but then my second card would no longer run at X16. SLI would still work though, as the lanes would be allocated to the slots in the following way:

Card 1, Slot 1: X16
Card 2, Slot 2: X8
Card 3, slot 3: x8
RAIDR, Slot 4: X8 (But again, it only uses 2 lanes)

Total: 40 lanes.

If your Motherboard is LGA1150, or LGA1155, supports 2-way SLI, OR 3-Way Crossfire, and doesn't have the separate PCI-E X4 2.0 slot, then in order to use a RAIDR, and 2 cards, you are pretty much limited to AMD Graphics cards. Remember, AMD/ATI cards, need a minimum of 4 lanes, so it would work out like this:

Card 1, slot 1: x8
Card 2, Slot 2: X8
Slot 3: Empty

Total: 16 Lanes

OR, With the RAIDR, and 2 ATI Cards:

Card 1: X8
Card 2: X4
RAIDR: X4

Total: 16 Lanes

I hope this helps. I was originally going to wait for the Maximus VII Formula, but after reading this, I hope you understand why I got the Rampage IV Black instead 🙂

InFAMAS-ONE wrote:
Hi all!

It can depend on what socket your motherboard has, or your motherboard in general. The number of available PCI-E lanes for devices such as GPU's or PCI-E SSD's, and the layout of the slots does differ between CPU socket types, and even motherboards on the same socket. On the Intel platform, LGA1150 and LGA1155 CPU's only offer 16 PCI-E lanes. This is why if you connect one Graphics card to your motherboard, it will run at X16, but if you put 2 in there, they will both run at X8 lanes each. Nvidia cards require a minimum of 8 lanes, so if you have a board that supports 2-way SLI, 3-Way Crossfire, you might think "Oh, I have 3 slots here, I can put the RAIDR in slot 3" - no. Here's why:

With Crossfire, when you install 3 cards, they run at these speeds
Card 1: X8
Card 2: X4
Card 3: X4

Total: 16 lanes.

With nvidia cards, as previously stated, they require a minimum of 8 lanes

Card 1: X8
Card 2: X8

Total: 16 lanes - no lanes left to support a device in Slot 3.

This means, that with 2-way SLI on an LGA1150, or LGA1155, the CPU does not offer any more lanes to support a device in the third slot. If you try to put something in there, there are no longer enough lanes for the video cards, and things stop working.

Some motherboards have an additional PCI-E X4 2.0 slot, which is controlled by the Motherboard chipset, not the CPU; the smaller X1 slots are controlled this way too. If your motherboard has this, then you should be able to run 2 nvidia cards in SLI, as well as the RAIDR.
However, if you do put the RAIDR in there, the X1 slots will most likely no longer function.

I personally chose to go for the Rampage IV Black Edition for my motherboard, as it's the LGA2011 Platform, and I'm using nvidia GPUs. LGA2011 CPUs support a total of 40 PCI-E lanes, instead of the usual 16 lanes in other socket CPUs.

I have my graphics cards in slots 1 & 3, with the RAIDR in slot 2 as shown below:

Card 1, Slot 1: X16
RAIDR, Slot 2: X8 (the RAIDR only uses 2 lanes, but the slot has 8 available to it)
Card 2, Slot 3: X16

Total: 40 lanes, but only 34 in use (if you take my meaning). I could also drop a third card in, but then my second card would no longer run at X16. SLI would still work though, as the lanes would be allocated to the slots in the following way:

Card 1, Slot 1: X16
Card 2, Slot 2: X8
Card 3, slot 3: x8
RAIDR, Slot 4: X8 (But again, it only uses 2 lanes)

Total: 40 lanes.

If your Motherboard is LGA1150, or LGA1155, supports 2-way SLI, OR 3-Way Crossfire, and doesn't have the separate PCI-E X4 2.0 slot, then in order to use a RAIDR, and 2 cards, you are pretty much limited to AMD Graphics cards. Remember, AMD/ATI cards, need a minimum of 4 lanes, so it would work out like this:

Card 1, slot 1: x8
Card 2, Slot 2: X8
Slot 3: Empty

Total: 16 Lanes

OR, With the RAIDR, and 2 ATI Cards:

Card 1: X8
Card 2: X4
RAIDR: X4

Total: 16 Lanes

I hope this helps. I was originally going to wait for the Maximus VII Formula, but after reading this, I hope you understand why I got the Rampage IV Black instead 🙂


Oh well, Maximus VII Formula has a 4x PCI Express on the bottom that is separate from the CPU Lanes and use the Motherboard lanes for that purpose instead.

As I'm thinking of merging to Haswell from Sandy Bridge-E

(Reason: I feel like I did a overkill thing without realising the needs, that I only needed for gaming and normal workloads. if I known any better I would of spent less than $3000 on a gaming rig compared to the board I am at at the moment. Where 1 Rampage IV Extreme Failed to boot after 6 months of having it, then I got my refund, then got the same one from another shop but problem still came but I didn't get my refund back. Then Rolled to the Rampage IV Formula.)

I'd just hate doing upgrades less than 3 years, because of new tech, that comes out from Intel side of things.

So hopefully when I get the Maximus Vii Formula, I should be A Okay with my Raidr on this board with Sli. ^-^

Hello first to all. I have the folowing system:
Motherboard : Maximus VII formula
CPU : I7 4790k
Ram : Kingston DDR3 16384MB (4 x 8192) 2133MHz CL11 HyperX Predator
SSD : Kingston HyperX 3K 2.5 SATA3 240GB
PSU : Enermax Platimax 1000W
Video Cards : 2 x Gtx 680 MSI Lighthing

Im planing to buy the Asus ssd RAIDR Express and the sound card Sound Blaster ZxR .Now my question is : Will work all this 4 devices ? 2 x gtx 680 in sli + Asus Raid Express + Sound card Sound Blaster ZxR ?

RanDyz wrote:
Hello first to all. I have the folowing system:
Motherboard : Maximus VII formula
CPU : I7 4790k
Ram : Kingston DDR3 16384MB (4 x 8192) 2133MHz CL11 HyperX Predator
SSD : Kingston HyperX 3K 2.5 SATA3 240GB
PSU : Enermax Platimax 1000W
Video Cards : 2 x Gtx 680 MSI Lighthing

Im planing to buy the Asus ssd RAIDR Express and the sound card Sound Blaster ZxR .Now my question is : Will work all this 4 devices ? 2 x gtx 680 in sli + Asus Raid Express + Sound card Sound Blaster ZxR ?


No, it will not work. As soon as you add anything to the third pci express slot it will drop the 2nd pci express lane to x4 and cancel out your SLI.

You could do it with AMD cards as they only need x4 to work, nvidia needs x8. You could have 2 amd cards and the raidr express, I'm not sure if you could add a sound card too.