Immediate assistance needed: 9262 w/8800m gtx sli in vista x64

Guys,

We have two NP9262's for work. One is going back to Sager for warranty repair. I pulled the video card on the one being RMA'd and threw it into my laptop.

Hardware was recognized as an 8800M GTX, properly.

I downloaded the 174.85 drivers from Guru3D, and extracted them. At this point, I did not install them.

I uninstalled the currently installed version using the uninstaller inside of Vista x64, then rebooted.

I then ran Driver Cleaner using all nvidia labelled filters, and allowed it to complete.

I rebooted again.

I then installed the Nvidia 174.85 drivers. When prompted (which was twice) to install the drive anyway, I clicked "install anyway" on both instances.

The machine rebooted again.

When I go into device manager, I get this:


The second card is listed correctly on Device Manager, and shows up fine in BIOS as well, but the driver will not start, and thus, I get no SLI option in the Nvidia Control Panel.

I have the card, and I think I've done everything right. I've run SLI and crossfire, and 3dfx sli on my desktop systems, and I am a systems administrator for an HPC shop...but I am stumped. How could there be no resources available for the second card when the laptop and BIOS support using SLI?

I figure, it's probably one of four things:

1.) video card BIOS needs to be flashed (where can I get an updated vBIOS? I hear Sager won't send it to you)
2.) motherboard BIOS needs to be flashed (also, where to get this?). My system reports (at POST), BIOS revision: 1.00.10S LS2
3.) The downloaded drivers (keep in mind, these are Vista x64 drivers, running on Ultimate SP1) need to be swapped out. Perhaps it's all three, I am not sure.
4.) there's some sort of car to card connector that I do not have, since I did not purchase the upgrade kit from Sager.

Dexgo...anyone...any ideas? What did I miss? Thanks in advance!

 

idk if i missed something or not but are those two cards in the machine right now the same???

 

yes, they are. we ordered the two NP9262 on the same sales order, the first week that they were available. the serial #'s of the laptops themselves are sequential. The video cards both have Dec '07 stickers on them. They are both 8800M GTX 512M MXM-IV modules. BIOS and Windows both see both cards properly, it just won't start the driver for one of them (see error message screen shot).

 

sli was not an option the first week they were available so you will need the new bios for sli.

 

Did you try switching cards in slots to see if that worked?

 

That sounds right. If SLi were enabled, the system should have seen the two GPUs as one device, not two devices. It may be the case that the system allocated all of the available graphics-related resources to the first card, and then found it had nothing to allocate to the second, something that would not have been a problem if it saw the two cards as just one logical device.

 

I have not tried this, nor have I heard of this being the potential "fix" for an SLI issue. I guess anything is possible. Anyone else think this is what needs to be done, or is a viable option?

 

Yes I also read something about the BIOS being different for SLi cards in nibitor(?) forum.

 

I asked this to see if the cards when switched worked well ruling out the card problem.If it showed the same problem with both cards,it has to be BIOS IMHO.

 

I suspect that you both may be correct. I just called Sager, and they said that the upgrade kit includes the following:

MXM-IV 8800M GTX module
Heatsink
cable to go from card to card
ulity disk top upgrade card BIOS

I am pretty sure that on the cable part of it, they're full of crap (someone confirm, or deny?). I did not see any indication (visually inspecting the cards) that there was any place for a ribbon cable to go from one card to another. I think all I should need is a vbios flash to get operational. And, you are correct, when SLI is enabled, the system only sees 1 device. Right now, I still see both...just one won't start.

 

sooo...anyone have the vbios and utility around here? or more insight as to what needs to be done it vbios flashing alone won't do it?

 

They are not bs'ing about the cable part. There is a bridge cable you need to place between the two cards. Maybe they sell the cable separately?

 

It probably ultimately depends on each vendor, but I believe that as a theoretical issue, the cable is not strictly necessary for SLi to function - the cable primarily acts as a private bus between the two cards so that they don't have to communicate with each other over the PCI bus, thereby slowing both the cards and everything else down.

 

The cable comes either as an upgrade kit or with the second card.
You can`t have SLI without connecting the two card to act as one.

 

When I upgraded to SLI I had to do the following things:

Install second card

Install the bridge cable (this actually attaches to the bottom of the card)

Flash new BIOS

Flash new vBIOS

Reinstall video drivers

I believe the cards will work without the bridge cable, but not very well.

Hope this helps.

 

i did not see a bridge cable on mine and it was factory installed with sli. you said it is on the bottom of the cards? that means i would have to take out the cards in order to see it, right?

 

actually i may never have even noticed the cable. is this it, wobble?

 

Yes you need a bridge cable to fully utilize SLI. It works without the cable, the information goes via the pci bus but this will give you a lower 3dmark score for example.

For ARGH -- The bridge cable is under the two cards when installed and it's hard to see without lifting up the cards. But it's there if your computer come factory installed with SLI EDIT: Yes thats the one in your picture..

Your problem is that you don't have the BIOS and VBIOS I think. The bridge cable isn't part of the problem. You'll need this for performance..

I know that people have uploaded the SLI bios version here , but i don't know where.. sorry.. I have it too but i'm not able to upload it at the moment. I'll try to get it to you later if you still didn't recive any.. Good Luck

 

he can simply call sager to get the bios emailed to him in a few minutes. this would solve one problem, but he will still need the bridge cable to utilize sli.

i scored 12,900 3dmark06 points so i am fairly certain my system does have the bridge cable in place.

 

I'm a little picky now but he doesn't need a bridge cable to utilize SLI. He needs it to f u l l y utilize SLI.

I've run SLI with and without cable and i get higher 3dmark score without the cable compared to one card..

 

and the mystery grows deeper....lol

 

sounds like i may be placing a call to sager to buy just the bridge cable. i had 3 pms about the bios and a guide. Thanks to all, so far. I love this place. I am about to format the mem stick, and do some flashes. report back in a bit.

My single card 3dmark06 score, as of right now is 10236. cpu fsb oc'd to 1333, so q6600 @3ghz using pinmod

 

hey sabregen, can you tell me what your idle and load temps are with your cpu pin-mod using normal fans?

it is very tempting to do the pin-mod but i am worried if this pushes the wattage of the cpu from 95w to 130w.

 

Update: flashes are completed...and now I have a failing hard drive. my second drive almost caused both my work and my personal partitions to corrupt. I am rebuilding my raid-5 right now, hopefully all is well, because the raid-5 is okay, because that's my work partition.

ARGH - I wish that I could tell you, but i can't seem to find a monitoring program that works in Vista Ultimate x64, unless you know of one.

The nvidia driver update did show that I am now SLI capable, but I will wait until the array is normal before I attempt to enable SLI. ANyone know if maybe the SLI cable is already in the laptop? I seem to recall (earlier today) seeing the cable in question already in the chassis...maybe I will have to double check when the rebuild is done.

 

you do not have the cable. there is no way because it would have been dangeling(sp) in the chasis and i am sure sager would not do that.

 

Even if it is there, if you didn't attach it to the bottom of the card, then, well, it won't be attached...might be worth checking tho i doubt it'd be there in a non sli system

 

you're very likely right. i am hoping i am a lucky bastard though (which never works for me, by the way). any comment on the previous ideas of SLI working without the sli bridge cable? anyone confirm that it will work?

 

you are the perfect test subject on this. try it out and see how it performs. 99.9% you do not have the bridge cable so give it a shot.

 

That's it... the orange flat cable you can see between the cards.

Yep. In Crysis I got 19fps with one card, 25fps with SLI but no bridge cable, and 32fps with the bridge cable connected.

 

just curious, what versions are the vista x64 users using?

 

well, the array errors are still happening, and so I am still trying to fix them. I have confirmed that I do not have the SLi cable, but I have also confirmed that SLi is functioning. Until I get the arrays straightened out, I won't be running any benchmarks. More updates as I am able to do so.

 

sabregen did you get your laptop with TWO Cards or with One only and second card you get latter ?? because if you get it with one card your second card comes with sli cable and disk or usb with bios

 

hey did you also flash the bios?? if so did you make sure that everything was re-enabled like achi?? i know a couple of times when i flashed it disabled this and of course it could not find the os or the drivers. also make sure raid in set to enabled and the bus is set right in the bios as well ...

 

bought two 9262 as single 8800m gtx configs. one is having major issues, and went back for rma today. yanked the card from rma laptop to put into my laptop and test sli. I did not buy the upgrade kit from Sager, so no cable.

BIOS has been flashed, and is confirmed working. The disk errors are still reapairing. Man, RAID-5 calcs take forever on a desktop chipset. I am used to an array rebuild on like an IBM DS4800, w/15k FC disks...this is really a long time to me. Currently at 29% rebuilding.

Since the array is still rebuilding, I will not be doing any benches. This is a work laptop, but I am allowed to use it for personal use as well (gaming, etc). There's two arrays, a RAID-5 for work, and a RAID-0 for personal. The weird thing is, the fault tolerant RAID-5 is the one that won't boot. I am currently running on my personal partition, which is RAID-0, and recovering the RAID-5 array.

 

what major problems is your other 9262 experiencing? just curious.