Hi, thanks for choosing Dell. I'm guessing you meant

Nvidia Quadro Q400

 

 Please see this.

https://dell.to/3t7VGUh

it does support Q4000 however I believe this question should be directed to the graphic card company as to why it doesn't support 3 monitors.

Sorry I can't be of help this time.

Hi no I mean the Dell Invidia Quadro 4000 or Q4000 for short. I’m asking here because the video card does in fact only support 2 at a time and that’s fine, that’s why I bought 2. 

1 in CPU slot 1 and CPU Slot 2.  Aka 3 and 5 and both powered. I unaware how a two separate video cards would “block” each other. It appears to be a Dell thing not a Card thing.

who the heck would have paid Dell, to put in dual redundant systems with 1100 w psus back in the day and then spent thousands on 2 Q4000 (which were super expensive when I bought my T420) just to be told “yes you bought 2 cards with a total of 6 outputs but you can only use 1 on each card”  

so lol with complete respect I get you don’t have an answer and that’s ok but there has to be a tech person that can explain because even what you shared as a Link says nothing about limiting the cards to 1 output each if you want to physically plug monitors  

That’s what is happening only 1 output will work per card or just 2 on 1 card  

 

Hi, I'm wondering this could help.

https://dell.to/3w4nDhp

Thank you kindly for trying to help truly , unfortunately that doesn't help.

I actually contacted NVidia and they said that its a Dell Server issue. That, while each card can only use 2 ports at a time (DVI + 1 DP), each card should give me 2, meaning I should have 4 monitors (not including the disabled onboard VGA).

So :0( drats hehe.

I actually have literally 4 Dell T420 servers and its the same issue in them all, all are bios updated etc. All of them show Both NVIDIA cards in Device Manager of windows (on all versions), but somehow, something is blocking more than 2 total ports working at a time.

Weird

Hi @DellUserMichael,

 

When you said "But I can use 1 DVI and 1 DP on card 1, but if I plug into card 2, I still only see 2 display outputs", does it mean card 1 is able to display 2 monitors and card 2 doesn't show anything OR each card show a display on 2 monitors?

 

You mentioned "and both have power from the power distribution/backplanes." could you elaborate the ports? Pictures?

 

Do you have the DPN# of the cards?

 

Do you have iDRAC on the server? iDRAC Enterprise?

 

What Windows are you running?

Hi

I have 3 monitors

Scenario 1 (same card)

If I plug into DVI on card 1 to monitor 1 the pictures shows

if I plug DP1 on card 1 to monitor 2 the picture shows 

Then, if I plug DP2 of card 1 to on monitor 3, when the 3rd monitor shows a picture, monitor 1 will lose its picture. This is expected because each card can only show 2 of the 3 ports at the same time 

Scenario 2 (using both cards at once)

if I plug in DVI 1 on card 1 to monitor 1 and if I plug DVI 1 on card 2 to monitor 2 it both show a picture. 

so I am using 1 port per card 

With those 2 monitors on and both cards DVI port used, if I then try to use any DP port on either card and plug it into monitor 3, either monitor 1 or Monitor 2 will stop displaying a picture 

So I can use both cards, but only 1 port per

card, so a total of 2 out going ports at a time between cards 

Idrac, firm wares, etc are all updated. I actually have 2 other Nvidia cards (different models) and they have 3 outputs and all 3 outputs work. 

i will send the pictures tomorrow. And other answers. 

thanks!!

Hi @DellUserMichael,

 

Are you able to try 3 DP connections, instead of 2 DVI and 1 DP?

 

I previously almost similar issues with my personal laptop and docking. 

Unfortunately same result. I can use either 1 DP per card or 2 DP on 1 card but anything beyond that and usually the “first” one plugged in turns off when any 3rd one is attempted. 

 

Hello,

as said below, I think that this card doesn't support 3 monitors, but it is better to check with Nvidia support to have the official answer.

Thanks

Marco

Hi Joey,

I am running Windows 2012R2, 2016, 2019 and 2022, same issue in all the different machines

The DP/N for the card is 0731Y3

Here are a couple of photos. You can see that I have both cards in, both are powered by the 1100W redundant power supplies

You can see that I currently have 3 cables in.

2 cables in Card (A) and 1 cable in Card (B). In this configuration what actually happens is Card 1 provides a picture to 1 monitor and Card (B) provides a picture to Monitor #2 and the 2nd cable in Card (A) is ignored. The order by which I plug things in, will change which card/cable/monitor actually displays anything

Doesn't matter what configuration of plugs each card will only drive a single monitor. Again my issue isn't that a single card only gives 2 monitors, its that 2 cards only give 2 monitors and NVIDIA swears its not them, its a Dell limitation. I'm not telling you that makes it true but how does a Video card specifically "block" another video card?

Thanks again appreciate your efforts sincerely

 

agreed but as I have explained and is in the title I have 2 cards. So therefore I should get 4 monitors not 2. Also as I mentioned Nvidia said it’s a Dell issue not Nvidia. You suggest it’s nvidia. That circle chain is useless. 

 

Hi @DellUserMichael,

 

Thanks for the pictures. 

 

With the cabling pictures, I can't make have a clear view of the power cables that are connected to the GPU.

 

Here's what I found after some searching. As much as I want it to work, if I do have the same configuration and I have already done many troubleshooting, it relatively might come to a cause of compatibility. From the part# 0731Y3, I couldn't find T420 listed. If I reverse find from T420 list, DPN# 6WTYT appeared. From both parts information, 731Y3 is Gen 2 card, whilst 6WTYT is a Gen 1 card. I'm unsure if T420 is compatible with Gen 2 card. 

 

Now as cabling in question, from the user guide, it says as below. Could you confirm that's the cabling that has been done. 

• For systems with two GPU cards, connect the first GPU card power cable to the GPU power connector CN11 on the power distribution board and the second GPU card power cable to the GPU_POWER connector on the power interposer board.

If cables are as according to user guide and it still doesn't work, I can't think of anything else other than a compatibility issue. Lastly, do you think could it be an OS cause? Maybe you can try a client Windows, eg: 10 or 11. (I'd doubt it can be installed, but least we tried)

Hi Joey

Yes the power cabling is correctly attached to the GPU ports matching the slot the card is in. 

At the moment I just removed one of the cards snd cut it back to 1 card and using a secondary card that is not a Quadro 4000 and it works perfectly and now I have 3 monitors  

cheers

 

I wanted to add something new to the situation that I found and or didn't share before

• I installed the Monitor Driver (it's the same monitor for all 3) and no difference
• In Device Manager: I can see all 3 monitors, with the Correct Driver
• In Device Manager: The monitors identify they are on (DVI) as thats the port im using
• In Device Manager: When you right click and select properties, on the General Tab, you can see that each monitor is correctly "identifying" that it is plugged into Card 1 or 2 and on a DP or DVI port
• I specifically can verify that there are no device, driver or startup errors. I reviewed all the event logs etc

I have also sent a message into the Windows Server team, to see if they can tell me why. 

I setup a Kernel debugger, so I can monitor both the hardware and software and no matter what, you can see the signals drop from whichever cable was plugged in 1st (if you plug in a 3rd cable).

So... /shrug no idea.

Hi Chris,

I'm not sure what you said is true. Maybe some doc says that somewhere I don't see but it doesn't work as you said.

If I just use a single Q4000 card, I can use one of the DPs and the DVI and I get 2 monitors no issues. Which if I read what you wrote above, shouldn't be the case correct?

If I use 2 cards, I can use 1 DP per card and I see 2 monitors (which again would go against what you said)

1. 1 DP and 1 DVI on card 1 (both monitors work)

2. 1 DVI being used on my Dell High Speed USB Docking Station, but as soon as I plug in either the DVI, or the HDMI on the docking station, one of the DP's, or if i use DVI on the Q4000 cards, I still only get 2 monitors, as one  of the DPs or one of the DVIs stop displaying.

or

1. 1 DVI on card 1

2. 1 DVI on card 2

3. 1 DVI on USB Dell Docking station and I still only get 2 monitors

depending on order I plug in, the first one plugged in always "stops" sending a signal.

I even tried

1. 1 DVI on card 1

2. DVI  + HDMI on the Docking station... still only 2 monitors and it depends on the order I plug them in