# PCI-E slot faulty?



## Laurijan (Sep 21, 2012)

Hi!

I got issues with my ASRock Z77 Extreme4 and a ASUS GTX560Ti TOP.

When trying to start Windows Experience Index calculation it says:
"The Windows Experience Index for your system could not be computed. Could not meassure video playback performance"

When tring to run 3DMark 11 and Vantage I get an error message after I try to start the benchmarks.

I tried the other x8 PCI-E slot and had no problems.

Any idea how else I could test the PCI-E slot before I RMA?

Lauri


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## itsakjt (Sep 21, 2012)

Try updating to the latest drivers. Remove any unwanted software and check the system. It is very unlikely that the PCIE slot is faulty. But it may happen. Also check the BIOS and disable any overclocking. Run everything at factory settings and check results.


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## Sasqui (Sep 21, 2012)

itsakjt said:


> Try updating to the latest drivers. Remove any unwanted software and check the system. It is very unlikely that the PCIE slot is faulty. But it may happen. Also check the BIOS and disable any overclocking. Run everything at factory settings and check results.



Yes, and latest BIOS?  Perhaps something to do with the PCIe GEN3 being dependant on the "i" series CPU?


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## de.das.dude (Sep 21, 2012)

have you tried games? do they crash?

a quick google search shows Asrock seems to have trouble with PCIe Gen3 and GTS 560Tis.
https://www.google.co.in/search?cli...pw.r_cp.&fp=b2e72776c9587e7f&biw=1280&bih=901

Or maybe it is the problem of the 560's compatibility with the PCIe3

i suggest you check that you have the lates BIOS for both the GPU and the motherboard. dont forget latest drivers as well.
just for the sake of it, take a fine brush and clean the slot.


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## Laurijan (Sep 21, 2012)

de.das.dude said:


> have you tried games? do they crash?
> 
> a quick google search shows Asrock seems to have trouble with PCIe Gen3 and GTS 560Tis.
> https://www.google.co.in/search?cli...pw.r_cp.&fp=b2e72776c9587e7f&biw=1280&bih=901
> ...



Its PCI-E 3.0! I set the speed to PCI-E 1.1 and it works - there is no PCI-E 2 in the bios for some reason.

This is why I love this forum! I would have payed 20€ + shipping for an RMA of a functioning mobo.

Edit: 
Is the GPU speed very bottlenecked if i run PCI-E 1.1?


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## Sasqui (Sep 21, 2012)

Laurijan said:


> Edit:
> Is the GPU speed very bottlenecked if i run PCI-E 1.1?



I will likely make a difference.  The board *should * have PCIe 2 available.

This is from Wiki:



> AMD latest flagship graphic card, the Radeon 7970, launched on January 9, 2012, is the world's first PCIe 3.0 graphic card.[27] Initial reviews suggest that the new interface would not improve graphic performance compared to earlier PCIe 2.0, which, at the time of writing, is still under-utilized. However, the new interface would prove advantageous when used for general purpose computing with technologies like OpenCL, CUDA and C++ AMP.[28]



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_Express

Edit: BTW, your card is PCIe 2.0.  The PCIe 3.0 specification has backward compatibility to 2.0 in it (though who knows if/how they implemented that in the ASRock)


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## de.das.dude (Sep 21, 2012)

if you ask me i think AsRock botched up something somewhere. after all their boards are very cheap compared to other comepetitors!


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## Laurijan (Sep 21, 2012)

Sasqui said:


> Yes, and latest BIOS?  Perhaps something to do with the PCIe GEN3 being dependant on the "i" series CPU?



The latest Bios has PCI-E 2.0 setting available! I updated it. And 3DMark 11 works!

Thanks for the help now I am happy


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## Laurijan (Sep 21, 2012)

de.das.dude said:


> if you ask me i think AsRock botched up something somewhere. after all their boards are very cheap compared to other comepetitors!



After seeing that they have a bios update solving this problem my trust in ASRock returned 100%.


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## Sasqui (Sep 21, 2012)

Laurijan said:


> The latest Bios has PCI-E 2.0 setting available! I updated it. And 3DMark 11 works!
> 
> Thanks for the help now I am happy



Sweet!  It really is helpful to reach out here sometimes.  Maybe it's because your so pissed off that you can't focus, or you don't have time to research from a smart phone while your PC is broken.


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## de.das.dude (Sep 22, 2012)

Laurijan said:


> After seeing that they have a bios update solving this problem my trust in ASRock returned 100%.



see, i knew a BIOS update would fix it  anyhoo glad it all worked out.


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## redeye (Sep 22, 2012)

itsakjt said:


> Try updating to the latest drivers. Remove any unwanted software and check the system. It is very unlikely that the PCIE slot is faulty. But it may happen. Also check the BIOS and disable any overclocking. Run everything at factory settings and check results.



i have actually had a fault pcie slot, and it would only run at 8x... and ultimately it did not allow any cards to work it i it... (sabertooth 990fx) i RMA'd and all is well.

nothing much you can do to diagnose it except to compare performance across same pcie slots. 
and try different graphics cards and look in gpu-z to see the width of the pcie slot that is defective and what it should be.
Btw supposedly a pcie3 8x slot is the same as a pcie2 16x slot.


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## Laurijan (Sep 23, 2012)

Bad news the bios update did not fix the problem  
First it seemed so but no matter which version 1,2 or 3 i set the pci-e slot to be i get error in 3dmark 11 and windows experience index.
I will borrow a friends GPU to test with it.


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## Laurijan (Sep 23, 2012)

Ok i tested with another GPU a XFX 6950 and i have the same problem -  now i am sure its the mobo.


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## Aquinus (Sep 23, 2012)

Laurijan said:


> Ok i tested with another GPU a XFX 6950 and i have the same problem -  now i am sure its the mobo.



What makes you sure that it is the motherboard? The motherboard doesn't do much to the PCI-E. I would reseat your processor because that is where the PCI-E lanes go. It's also where DMI goes. It's also where DRAM goes. Did you fully uninstall your drivers after swapping the cards or did you let CCC figure it out on its own? If PCI-E was at fault, I don't think your video card would work at all.


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## Aquinus (Sep 23, 2012)

jimmyhelu said:


> While troubleshooting I cleared the cmos to make sure that wasn't the problem. I've been trying not to reinstall windows quite yet so that I could get some other opinions first since I really hate reinstalling all of my programs.
> 
> My drivers are up to date. The only other thing I could think of is updating my bios since I have the very first version of it at the moment. I'm somewhat afraid of doing that since I've never done so before.



You have nothing to worry about if your power is stable and you have the BIOS for the right board. It's pretty easy and straight forward.



Laurijan said:


> Ok i tested with another GPU a XFX 6950 and i have the same problem -  now i am sure its the mobo.



Edit: Also, what CCC driver are you using and are your chipset drivers up to date?


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## Laurijan (Sep 23, 2012)

Aquinus said:


> Edit: Also, what CCC driver are you using and are your chipset drivers up to date?



12-8_vista_win7_win8_64_dd_ccc is the name of the AMD driver and i used the latest Intel chipset install program


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## Aquinus (Sep 23, 2012)

Laurijan said:


> 12-8_vista_win7_win8_64_dd_ccc is the name of the AMD driver and i used the latest Intel chipset install program



Maybe it's that version of CCC, maybe try 12.6?


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## Laurijan (Sep 23, 2012)

Aquinus said:


> Maybe it's that version of CCC, maybe try 12.6?



I am sure its not the drivers - with the nvidia and ati card i got exactly the same error messages


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## Aquinus (Sep 23, 2012)

Laurijan said:


> I am sure its not the drivers - with the nvidia and ati card i got exactly the same error messages



What exactly do the error messages say, can you provide a screenshot? Does it only happen in 3D mode or when you fully stress the card? PCI-E is one of those things where it's very unlikely that it is only going to kind of work.

How about voltages? How stable is the rest of your rig? Are you overclocking the CPU at all? Also what are your CPU voltages, VTT, VCSSA, and +12v is mainly what I'm looking for. Keep in mind that the PCI-E controller in on the processor. Your board doesn't actually use the 4 lanes off the PCH.

If the second PCI-E slot works but the first doesn't, there could be a problem with one of the first 8 lanes off the CPU so I would recommend taping off all but 1 lane and work your way out in powers of two (except 2!) until you get the problem again (1x/4x/8x) but I'm not convinced that it's motherboard. Unless it's a bad contact, it would be the CPU. If there was a break in the line it wouldn't be working at all.


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## Laurijan (Sep 24, 2012)

I reseated the CPU and now it works! Thanks for the tip.


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## Sasqui (Sep 25, 2012)

Laurijan said:


> I reseated the CPU and now it works! Thanks for the tip.



No shit!  I had that thought and dismissed it.


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## Laurijan (Sep 25, 2012)

Some problems reappeared soon after i reseated the CPU. Now 3DMark works but windows experience index dont. I dont think i will RMA now. But will see after i test some games and see if the driver crashes like it did before reseating.


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## Laurijan (Sep 26, 2012)

Here a pic of the error with Windows Experience Index


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## Aquinus (Sep 26, 2012)

Laurijan said:


> Some problems reappeared soon after i reseated the CPU. Now 3DMark works but windows experience index dont. I dont think i will RMA now. But will see after i test some games and see if the driver crashes like it did before reseating.



Examine the socket, look for any bent pins. It sounds like some pins might not be making full contact. How tight are you tightening the cooler to the processor. I've heard that in some cases that tightening the cooler too tight has caused issues.


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## Laurijan (Oct 12, 2012)

After re-seating the CPU several times without success and checking the socket (no problem there) I decided to RMA the mobo since when I put my GFX into the lower 8x PCI-E slot Windows Experience Index works.

Could it be that the CPU is faulty since it controls the PCI-E lanes and not the mobo?


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## OneMoar (Oct 12, 2012)

WEI is completely meaningless if the gpu works in the top slot AND is in 16x mode ignore it
some large font text just to make sure you get the point:
WEI STANDS FOR:
WORTHLESS EXCUSE for INDICATOR


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## Aquinus (Oct 12, 2012)

Laurijan said:


> Could it be that the CPU is faulty since it controls the PCI-E lanes and not the mobo?



Maybe. I would re-seat the processor again and make sure to not over-tighten the cooler. It almost sounds like some contacts on the processor might not be making good contact in the socket. If this is the case, it would be the mobo most likely since that is where the pins are.


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## eidairaman1 (Oct 12, 2012)

OneMoar said:


> WEI is completely meaningless if the gpu works in the top slot AND is in 16x mode ignore it
> some large font text just to make sure you get the point:
> WEI STANDS FOR:
> WORTHLESS EXCUSE for INDICATOR



WEI is to only determine if Aero will work or not, that is it.

Probably last resort is to reset CMOS/ Update BIOS/UEFI, remove and reinsert the video card, Reinstall Windows with latest drivers, to include direct X. reinstall all games with latest patches


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## Aquinus (Oct 12, 2012)

eidairaman1 said:


> Probably last resort is to reset CMOS/ Update BIOS/UEFI, remove and reinsert the video card, Reinstall Windows with latest drivers, to include direct X.



That would be the first thing I would do.


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## eidairaman1 (Oct 12, 2012)

Aquinus said:


> That would be the first thing I would do.



pardon last resort is format windows to have a clean slate


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## OneMoar (Oct 12, 2012)

eidairaman1 said:


> pardon last resort is format windows to have a clean slate


but aero is working on his machine so .....
WEI is not accurate it broken as hell ignore it
install the gpu in slot one
fire up GPU-z Check that you are running in x16
ifexist=PCI_e_Lane==16;
return
   } 
 }
for you non-coders this means
IGNORE IT 
and quit fiddling with it before you really break something
now if its not running in 16x mode in the top slot THEN You can be worried


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## TC-man (Oct 12, 2012)

Hi,

Can you then test your processor on a friend's LGA 1155 motherboard vice versa? If your processor works correctly in an other motherboard with the videocard, then the problem may be your motherboard.
Perhaps just rma the motherboard, especially when such error should not be there, not in 3DMark 2011 and not in WEI; also, as you said, the issue is reappearing, even after rechecking the socket, pins, after reseating the cpu for more than once, using a different videocard, while the other PCI-E slot doesn't give you the issue you are having now.


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## Laurijan (Oct 12, 2012)

Ok I have re-seated the CPU once more and installed the stock cooler now - same problem WEI doesnt work with either the IGPU or GPU installed. 
Also I have had problems with 3DMark11 and Vantage random bluescreens about grapfics so I care about that WEI works since its an indicator that my machine work properly..
I am gonna install Win7 now and if it doesnt help I´ll RMA the mobo.
If the mobo comes back tested as working I have to assume the CPU causes the problems.


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## OneMoar (Oct 12, 2012)

what does GPU-Z report ?
I am just about convinced that you have two unrelated issues with your system 
could be something related to PCI-e ASPM or some signaling voltage issue need more info can you get us a full AIDA64 system report  with the GPU in slot A and then in slot B


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## Frag_Maniac (Oct 13, 2012)

This is why I always prefer to get a MB AFTER it's been properly BIOS updated and COMES with that version pre-installed. As complex as PC gaming hardware is getting, first batch MB problems are more and more prevalent. Furthermore, often there are problems for one reason or another, when an end user flashes a BIOS. It's a seemingly simple process, but at times you get problems with it, and sometimes it depends how well the flashing utility works if you use one. Many prefer to load the new BIOS to a flash drive and do it that way.


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## Aquinus (Oct 13, 2012)

If its the iGPU and the GPU, it sounds like something else. Have you tested your memory? Also how does the CPU do fully stressed?


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## eidairaman1 (Oct 13, 2012)

Frag Maniac said:


> This is why I always prefer to get a MB AFTER it's been properly BIOS updated and COMES with that version pre-installed. As complex as PC gaming hardware is getting, first batch MB problems are more and more prevalent. Furthermore, often there are problems for one reason or another, when an end user flashes a BIOS. It's a seemingly simple process, but at times you get problems with it, and sometimes it depends how well the flashing utility works if you use one. Many prefer to load the new BIOS to a flash drive and do it that way.



Being a Pioneer of Technology always makes you get arrows in the back


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## Frag_Maniac (Oct 13, 2012)

It's not always just drastically new tech they have problems with on first batches though. ASUS has run into first batch issues far more consistently just since increasing production in the past several years. Remember when they used to be THE trusted MB and no one blinked about buying a new model fresh off the factory floor? Now when you talk to ASUS, their own phone staff will warn you to wait a few months after a new MB model releases if you don't want to risk such issues.


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## eidairaman1 (Oct 13, 2012)

I had issues with them 10 years ago where msi n dfi didnt.



Frag Maniac said:


> It's not always just drastically new tech they have problems with on first batches though. ASUS has run into first batch issues far more consistently just since increasing production in the past several years. Remember when they used to be THE trusted MB and no one blinked about buying a new model fresh off the factory floor? Now when you talk to ASUS, their own phone staff will warn you to wait a few months after a new MB model releases if you don't want to risk such issues.


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## Laurijan (Oct 13, 2012)

I installed Win7 again and for now it seems the problems are gone - need to test further - use my machine and see if bluescreens happen.
Thx all for your help!


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## eidairaman1 (Oct 13, 2012)

ensure to disable automatic restarts so in event if it happens you will be able to get the code


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