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Topic: LIGHTNINGASIC launching GPU miner. 8X GPU, 16XGPU, UP TO 32XGPU. - page 2. (Read 11552 times)

legendary
Activity: 1775
Merit: 1032
Value will be measured in sats
if we purchase now when is the delivery?

1-6 months?

Can we get more accurate delivery date??
newbie
Activity: 18
Merit: 0
our gpu  miner spec details publiced.
pls download it.
https://www.mediafire.com/?ni5o21948tyvbnn

Sorry but these actually aren't specs, asre just configurations and unverified performance figures, I (we) want: CPU ID, PCIe risers, SWITCH details.
legendary
Activity: 986
Merit: 1000
Crypto Currency , Mining, Exchange ATM, Wallet!
our gpu  miner spec details publiced.
pls download it.
https://www.mediafire.com/?ni5o21948tyvbnn
newbie
Activity: 18
Merit: 0
I'm very interested, need some details please:

Watching the Photos and reading your post, I guess your offer is the following:

A PCIe Switch-USB PCIe Riser combo board

and

a Custom Motherboard based on some low-end SOC with 8x PCIe x16 slots and maybe a integrated PCIe switch.

What are the specifications from the Custom Motherboard I need to know before consider your product:

CPU/SOC: ?

Memory (RAM) on board or slots ?

Boot method: USB, DOM, Integrated DOM ?

Supported OS, is a custom-kernel OS provided (to deal the 8 GPU restriction)?

About the Switch-PCIe riser, more details about the card (actual PCIe lines in use, Supported OSs, etc).

may you shown us a video on a working setups please?

I could order 150-300 from either solution (before qualification test - Barebones Boards Only, not interested on the "Case").
sr. member
Activity: 544
Merit: 250
Any news to that Thunder barebone motherboard? Ball park price range? ETA?

Guess i'll put a hold on to my project of re-doing my rigs with server PSU and pico's until this is available.
newbie
Activity: 41
Merit: 0
I have been very curious on these multiple-GPU systems. It is really interesting to understand the bottleneck. IMO, there is a protocol between CPU and PCI controller or switch on Mobo. Since end-user level mobos which we have shaved off some extra features. Like you said "tend to take shortcuts". I found some of your resources and they are very expensive. Then I found a server mobo that holds 2 CPU and 10 PCIe cards. I see that CPU is another factor to limit number of PCI. I assume that CPU, expensive PCI switch/controller, and lastly driver are all the bottleneck. BTW, server mobos are not cheap unfortunately.

Say you have 16 GPU system on a single mobo. You need :

16 x 100w per card = 1600watt minimum power supply for cards + 300watt for the mobo = 1900w-2000w power supply.

16 risers, long usb cables, long 6pin cables, a big frame to hold whole system. Plus, a long time to wait loading DAG file.

It looks to me a bulk system that will give an issue easily. A lot of parameters on a single system. Not trusty. It looks good sliced in pieces like 7-6 GPU systems.

Bottomline it is another technology to discover and taste. It is not cheap and easy to digest. Good luck and thanks for supporting community.
   
hero member
Activity: 588
Merit: 520
I can share you some of my observations, because I am working on a project to get 8+ GPUs into same machine.

Now, I have been confirmed by NVIDIA tech people, that this is possible and it is not limited by drivers or OS: https://devtalk.nvidia.com/default/topic/1004967/cuda-programming-and-performance/max-number-of-cuda-devices/

I have also contacted several manufacturers that are creating pcie expansion backplanes, such as:
- http://amfeltec.com/
- http://www.onestopsystems.com/
- http://cyclone.com/index.php

Out of curiosity, I also ordered that cheap 30 USD 1x to 3x PCIe expansion that is being sold everywhere around. Tested on several various motherboards from low end to high end, it does NOT work!

Then I ordered backplane from amfeltec which has a PLX chip on. It works, no issues at all. But of course, these toys are not for mining. A very simple backplane that has only 4 slots (1x to 4x) costs around 500 USD. And here comes the trick; all ports on backplane works fine, you can put 4 cards on it and it will work, but the total number of GPUs in system matter. And the motherboard I used for testing this backplane supports only 6 GPUs. No matter where I insert 7th card, the system would not boot. This indicate that the real issue is in BIOS and it is not a hardware problem.

An interesting expansion backplane is this: http://www.acalbfi.com/nl/Embedded-computing/PCI-PCIe/Bus-Expansion/p/PCIe-x16-Gen-2-Expansion/00000008SX It is the size of ATX motherboard. But keep in mind that this toy costs ~1500 USD.

I also sent query to the companies listed above asking about motherboard compatibility. I was specifically asking whether an Asus X99-E-10G WS (a 500 USD worth motherboard) would work. Their response was:
Quote
... I would recommend higher-end desktop motherboards or server-class machines.  Low end desktops tend to have BIOS packages that take shortcuts.  Your Asus mobo may be perfectly fine.  We have successfully used Intel, SuperMicro, Asus, Dell, HP, and Gigabyte with our 16 slot backplane. ...

Bottom line is this; forget about these cheap expansions methods. Even if they work, your motherboard probably will not support it. Cheap motherboards tend to take shortcuts, which would explain everything. If you really want a solution, you will first need pro expensive motherboard. After that, you will need even more expensive expansion backplane. The only pcie switching chips that actually work are PLX and these chips are EXPENSIVE. Ever wondered why motherboards that support 4way CF/SLI are so expensive? Because they pack one or two PLX chips that cost 100 USD a piece. And forget about cheap chinese shit (just look at that 1x to 3x PCIe expansion board, it has some cheap chinese chip on top of it, no wonder it doesn't work). It is also highly unlikely that some chinese company would come out with their own designed motherboard; we all know that all they do is just copy and copy from west world and are incapable of designing stuff on their own.
legendary
Activity: 4326
Merit: 8950
'The right to privacy matters'
i think most of us would be pretty happy to get the board only for 8 GPU. one can build wonderful rigs with such kind of a platform.
but to be honest, the website is a piece of junk. we need some1 to test this board and seller and confirm if they r eligliable.
i hope @philipma1957  will get his hands on this and test it. Wonder what the price will be for this board? guys, how much r u ready to pay for this?

I have been told by the op I would need to wait  more then a month  and less then  six months to get them.

I am 95% sure the eight slot mobo's will work fine.

I personally have 0 interest in the  16 or 24 or 32 card options.

But I would love to have the 8 slot mobo's.

My solar array will be reworked for the summertime and I could use the 8 slot mobos yesterday not 1 to 6 months from now.

I have no need for anything but the mobo's

As I could do 8 card  nvidia 1070 builds easy

or do 4 card nvidia 1080 ti builds easy with an eight slot board.

So do not look for these  as barebones any time soon.



full member
Activity: 186
Merit: 100
I'm interested in multiple MOBO's.

When is the ETA?
member
Activity: 438
Merit: 27
I dont believe this.
I will stay at 6x or 7x 1070 at 1 Motherboard.
full member
Activity: 192
Merit: 100
i think most of us would be pretty happy to get the board only for 8 GPU. one can build wonderful rigs with such kind of a platform.
but to be honest, the website is a piece of junk. we need some1 to test this board and seller and confirm if they r eligliable.
i hope @philipma1957  will get his hands on this and test it. Wonder what the price will be for this board? guys, how much r u ready to pay for this?
hero member
Activity: 649
Merit: 505
actually amd roc and fire pro support more than 8 gpus in nix system headless
legendary
Activity: 986
Merit: 1000
Crypto Currency , Mining, Exchange ATM, Wallet!
Can you put 8 GPUs in this board or you will need usb riser ? I cant see space with PCIE slots for 8 GPUs

this is not the board where you put the gpu this is just a expansion slot card that you connect your gpu to, this board will be put in the motherboard, but you need a otherboard that support 8 gpu or more, or this is useless
you didn't catch the key. and totally wrong.
sr. member
Activity: 406
Merit: 250
Can you put 8 GPUs in this board or you will need usb riser ? I cant see space with PCIE slots for 8 GPUs

this is not the board where you put the gpu this is just a expansion slot card that you connect your gpu to, this board will be put in the motherboard, but you need a otherboard that support 8 gpu or more, or this is useless
sr. member
Activity: 610
Merit: 265
Interested if the price is right.
legendary
Activity: 986
Merit: 1000
Crypto Currency , Mining, Exchange ATM, Wallet!
Hello, I see your results.

1. The card is a PCIE switch using the PEX8614 chip, which costs about $ 40.
2. And can only work in PCIE 2.0 4X to 8 PCIE 2.0 1X modes. Because the PEX8614 can only support up to 12 PCIE LANEs and 12 PCIE Ports (1 INPUT and 8 OUTPUT). And your design forgets to use GPIO to configure troubleshooting. So you can not work in PCIE 16X mode.
3. More than six new GPUs in a system (old GPU, such as 7870 it can work 12 because it only needs half the resources), you need to configure the BIOS MMIO, usually its BIOS option is Above 4G Decoding The
4. Most motherboards can support more than eight GPUs, but you need non-standard BIOS. Such as Panda's custom motherboards using the X79 BIOS, add Haswell CPU microcode support to get the Above 4G Decoding option.
5. The AMD driver does not support more than eight GPUs in an OS. If you want to make a 16 / 32GPU system. You must use Intel VT-D and SR-IOV technology, and through virtualization to achieve. Or you customize an AMD driver (but it is very difficult).
6. So on the lightning miners can make more than 8GPU system, I think this is not possible, because you do not understand how to achieve. You just made a PCIE switch card, it's very simple.

Sorry for my english. Hope you can understand.

This is some interesting information.

If they stick to an 8GPU system and provide a barebones kit, I think they will get a lot of interest.


i believe in this.
newbie
Activity: 11
Merit: 0
Anyone used or ordered one of these?
newbie
Activity: 3
Merit: 0
If you can work for 8 GPUs, please check your BIOS, it must have Above 4G decoding option.

Hello, I see your results.

1. The card is a PCIE switch using the PEX8614 chip, which costs about $ 40.
2. And can only work in PCIE 2.0 4X to 8 PCIE 2.0 1X modes. Because the PEX8614 can only support up to 12 PCIE LANEs and 12 PCIE Ports (1 INPUT and 8 OUTPUT). And your design forgets to use GPIO to configure troubleshooting. So you can not work in PCIE 16X mode.
3. More than six new GPUs in a system (old GPU, such as 7870 it can work 12 because it only needs half the resources), you need to configure the BIOS MMIO, usually its BIOS option is Above 4G Decoding The
4. Most motherboards can support more than eight GPUs, but you need non-standard BIOS. Such as Panda's custom motherboards using the X79 BIOS, add Haswell CPU microcode support to get the Above 4G Decoding option.
5. The AMD driver does not support more than eight GPUs in an OS. If you want to make a 16 / 32GPU system. You must use Intel VT-D and SR-IOV technology, and through virtualization to achieve. Or you customize an AMD driver (but it is very difficult).
6. So on the lightning miners can make more than 8GPU system, I think this is not possible, because you do not understand how to achieve. You just made a PCIE switch card, it's very simple.

Sorry for my english. Hope you can understand.

This is some interesting information.

If they stick to an 8GPU system and provide a barebones kit, I think they will get a lot of interest.


I have a gpu in mind to use on the eight slot board. it is a thin 1070 from nvidia 1 slot wide.
legendary
Activity: 4326
Merit: 8950
'The right to privacy matters'
Hello, I see your results.

1. The card is a PCIE switch using the PEX8614 chip, which costs about $ 40.
2. And can only work in PCIE 2.0 4X to 8 PCIE 2.0 1X modes. Because the PEX8614 can only support up to 12 PCIE LANEs and 12 PCIE Ports (1 INPUT and 8 OUTPUT). And your design forgets to use GPIO to configure troubleshooting. So you can not work in PCIE 16X mode.
3. More than six new GPUs in a system (old GPU, such as 7870 it can work 12 because it only needs half the resources), you need to configure the BIOS MMIO, usually its BIOS option is Above 4G Decoding The
4. Most motherboards can support more than eight GPUs, but you need non-standard BIOS. Such as Panda's custom motherboards using the X79 BIOS, add Haswell CPU microcode support to get the Above 4G Decoding option.
5. The AMD driver does not support more than eight GPUs in an OS. If you want to make a 16 / 32GPU system. You must use Intel VT-D and SR-IOV technology, and through virtualization to achieve. Or you customize an AMD driver (but it is very difficult).
6. So on the lightning miners can make more than 8GPU system, I think this is not possible, because you do not understand how to achieve. You just made a PCIE switch card, it's very simple.

Sorry for my english. Hope you can understand.

This is some interesting information.

If they stick to an 8GPU system and provide a barebones kit, I think they will get a lot of interest.


I have a gpu in mind to use on the eight slot board. it is a thin 1070 from nvidia 1 slot wide.
hero member
Activity: 952
Merit: 508
Hello, I see your results.

1. The card is a PCIE switch using the PEX8614 chip, which costs about $ 40.
2. And can only work in PCIE 2.0 4X to 8 PCIE 2.0 1X modes. Because the PEX8614 can only support up to 12 PCIE LANEs and 12 PCIE Ports (1 INPUT and 8 OUTPUT). And your design forgets to use GPIO to configure troubleshooting. So you can not work in PCIE 16X mode.
3. More than six new GPUs in a system (old GPU, such as 7870 it can work 12 because it only needs half the resources), you need to configure the BIOS MMIO, usually its BIOS option is Above 4G Decoding The
4. Most motherboards can support more than eight GPUs, but you need non-standard BIOS. Such as Panda's custom motherboards using the X79 BIOS, add Haswell CPU microcode support to get the Above 4G Decoding option.
5. The AMD driver does not support more than eight GPUs in an OS. If you want to make a 16 / 32GPU system. You must use Intel VT-D and SR-IOV technology, and through virtualization to achieve. Or you customize an AMD driver (but it is very difficult).
6. So on the lightning miners can make more than 8GPU system, I think this is not possible, because you do not understand how to achieve. You just made a PCIE switch card, it's very simple.

Sorry for my english. Hope you can understand.

This is some interesting information.

If they stick to an 8GPU system and provide a barebones kit, I think they will get a lot of interest.

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