It's great that this thread keeps getting bumped. It allows other users to even more put more use to their pc if it is a daily use pc. I could see if you're mining farmer, then this thread has no point. Huge amount of effort? Really? Lol... Takes no effort at all. And no time at all as well, less than 5 minutes.
Putting this here so, blazin ain't being cock blocked...
Then boot into bios and set the mobo to IGPU and save and exit
Next pull the plug from the back of the video card and plug it into your mobo.
Then put a single dummy plug on the video card that is in the first (main) PCI-E x16 slot. Yes it works even if you are using 1x risers as that's all I use. No the other cards don't need dummy plugs. (though, some users have reported to need dummy plugs on all cards.)
Then reboot
Then control all settings from within cgminer as I've found MSI afterburner will lose voltage control etc.
Voltage control (if your card supports it), speed settings, fans, etc all work if used in cgminer, verified through GPU-Z.
This has worked for me on both Asus and MSI Z77 mobos using Ivy Bridge CPUs.
YMMV
As for the dummy plugs I am using 100ohm resisters. I read online anything between 75-150ohm is fine. Make sure you get ohms and not kohms.
Here is how you make dummy plugs for any inquiring minds. And of course you can always finish them off with some hot glue