***Asus Rampage III Extreme Owners Thread***

[Samson]

First of all, a big Thank You to all of you who have replied to me on this issue trying to help.

Special thanks to donmarkoni who took the trouble of removing his card and place it in slot #2 to test.
And for also taking the PCI-E socket pictures.

I see that all of you are saying now that PCI-E slots #2 will only do 8x

on my board in slot #2 GPU-Z shows X8, in slot #1 GPU-Z shows X16. i know because i changed it over last night b/c of this problem. had to cut the tubes too, not flexible enough to bend and fit in slot #1.

However the situation is not so simple or so clear-cut.

With my two Sapphire Radeon HD5970 always in slots #2 and #4
I downloaded GPU-Z ver 0.4.4 (the latest version I could find), and as you can see in the image bellow
it says I am getting
PCI_E 2.0 x16 @ x16 2.0

Way at the bottom corner of the GPU-Z screen there is the drop down menu where I can select my GPU
ATI Radeon HD 5900 series

I can select all four of my 5970 GPU's and for all four I get the same result
PCI_E 2.0 x16 @ x16 2.0


So, I called up Sapphire U.S. Tech Support today (1-909-594-3128) and explained about my odd result of
Maximum Bus Setting PCI Express 2.0 x8 in the Catalyst 10.6 driver. Unfortunately the guy I spoke with
didn't know much about Video Cards it seems as he told me to try the newer Catalyst 10.7 driver
and if that didn't work to RMA both of my cards. I Thanked him very much and called up Asus U.S. Tech Support again.
1-(812)-282-2787

This time I spoke with "Bill" (a different person than yesterday). He told me the diagram on Page 2-28 is just
a general guideline. He also confirmed that all four PCI-E slots should do 16x for a SINGLE card provided
nothing else is plugged to the other PCI-E slots. (But this contradicts your results).

He also says that if GPU-Z is showing me 16x in slots #2 and #4 then it should be correct.

He also explained that the ATI driver is giving me that result because these are Dual-GPU cards.
Each of the GPU's on one card (so he says, remains to be confirmed) is like it is using 8 lanes for a
total of 8 + 8 = 16 PCI-E lanes.

It is true that in my Catalyst 10.6 driver the result
Maximum Bus Setting PCI Express 2.0 x8
is shown four times for each of the GPU's in my system (you must scroll down). I was aware of that.
I told him so myself.

This is why I am asking someone else with a Dual-GPU Radeon card in slot #1 to confirm.

From donmarkoni's pictures I have to agree that all the PCI-E sockets look fully wired.

To kpablo , the difference is that for you in your second screenshot of Everest for GPU it clearly shows
Buss Type PCI Express 2.0 x16 @ x8

Whereas for me, even in the most recent version 2232 (downloaded today) I get (Please see image bellow)
Buss Type PCI Express 2.0 x16 @ x16

but in the Chipset (North Bridge) section I still get
PCI-E 2.0 x4 port 5 In Use @ x8
PCI-E 2.0 x4 port 5 In Use @ x8

But since you people have tested slot #2 with a Single card and are getting only x8 then what is the truth here ????

Was today's Asus Tech Support guy "Bill" right about what he explained or mistaken ?!