nVidia K1200 on R720?

Question

I'd like to add an nVidia K1200 to an R720 that's being re-purposed to support communications activities.

The K1200's interface is PCI-e 2x16; maximum power consumption is 45 watts and does not require (or have) a connector for additional power.

The system has two E5-2630, 95 watt cpus installed. I have Riser Board One, Slot 1, 2, 3, G3_X8; Riser Board Two, Slot 4, G3_X16, Slot 5, G3_X8; and, Riser Board Three, Slot 6, G3_X8 and Slot 7, G3_X8 installed. The system has two 450 watt power supplies. The system boots off of a pair of Samsung Evo 500GB ssd's and has two 900GB sas drives installed.

With the K1200 installed and the on-board video disabled in BIOS, the system proceeds through the POST phase repeatedly but never completes the boot phase. During the second attempt it produces a "system fatal error during previous boot, core mid level error" message.

I realize this is a non-standard, non-supported use/graphics card but would like to get it working if possible. It seems others have managed to get Quadros to work in R720s. If necessary, I'm willing to install a different model graphics card if anyone knows of one that will work. I do not need a high power, high end graphics card.

I understand there's an optional Riser Board Three with a single 2.0 x 16 slot on it. Would that be worth looking into?

I would think with the light hard drive load that large power supplies would not be needed; are the 450 watt power supplies not up to the task?

Any advice or suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks.

Everett

Daniel My · Answer

Hello

The system may not be able to provide adequate power without the 1100w PSUs. All of the slots on risers 2 and 3 are listed as 75w, but there are stipulations listed for GPUs. You meet most of the requirements, aside from the PSU wattage and having the GPGPU kit installed. Those slots may be capped at a lower wattage if 1100w PSUs are not installed.

Thanks

KE5MMT · Answer

Daniel; thank you for your reply.

I replaced the two 450 watt power supplies with 1100 watt models but the result is the same. I get video during the initial POST phase but right about the time you'd expect the OS to load it instead reboots with the same error message.

I've seen where other models in the Quadro line work but this one doesn't seem to. I'm out of ideas except to try a different video card which is too bad as I thought the K1200's low power draw and lack of an external power connector might make it more "system friendly".

Regards.

Everett

Daniel My · Answer

I don't have detailed information available on exactly how the slots work. All my documentation states is that 1100w PSUs and the GPGPU enablement kit is required for the validated GPGPUs to function. The BIOS may be programmed to throttle the power on the PCIe slots if both conditions are not met, but that is just a guess. There could be another reason the card is not working.

Thanks

KE5MMT · Answer

Daniel:

Thanks for your reply. So far I haven't had any luck with this or an NVS 510 card (max. power consumption of 35 watts which is 10 watts less than the K1200) even with two 1100 watt power supplies installed. One question, does it matter how the two power supplies are configured?

I also have access to an R820. It looks to me from Dell's Technical Guidelines like it would probably be easier to do this using it and a Quadro 2000 instead of the R720. Is that correct?

Thanks.

Everett

PowerEdge Hardware General

nVidia K1200 on R720?

Was this post helpful?