Hello, newcomer here. Although I have made quite some researches on many topics, I still got to learn.
My plan is to build a 8 x 1080Ti rig.
About motherboards, I am hesitating between :
ASUS PRIME H270-PLUS (6x PCI-E + 2x M.2 slots)
Asus Z270-A mobo (7x PCI-E + 1x M.2)
BTC250-BTC+ PRO (8x PCI-E)
First I was going for the H270-PLUS in order to save bucks.
Next thing I am told is that M.2 to PCI-E adapters can be tricky : there needs to find a sweet spot when pushed in, otherwise the “contact” can be very sensitive. Can a M.2 adapter displace itself on it’s own and lead to an off card some mornings ? I would not want to lose connectivity each time the rig is moved or parts randomly touched by mistake for instance.
I can also read some reports online that the hashrate may be sometimes lower from a M.2, than a PCI-E, unsure why exactly.
Last, I am warned about “lanes” which I might lack enough since I am using 1080Ti. Lanes is a concept I have no knowledge about… could you please tell if M.2 adapters are to be avoided at all cost to run a 1080 Ti ? Therefore, is the Biostar the only mobo recommended for my 8x 1080Ti setup ? All PCI-E as mandatory ?
As far as could be, my goal is to build a “plug and play” rig that won’t make me lose time on random issues, so I can grow some will to run more than one at a later stage. Hence, me going into details
A lot of moving parts in an 8x-Ti build and a lot of single points of failure. If you have virtually no experience building computers (or operating miners), I would consider starting out with a less ambitious build (buy 2-4 cards staring out) and expanding from there. That’s a lot of money to just toss into a project you’ve never executed before.
I can only speak to the Z270A, but I have nothing but good things to say to this point in time. I’ve had 2x 4-1080Ti rigs running on that board for ~2 months on Windows 10. Setup was pretty easy, although I did encounter different challenges (minor for the most part) getting each board to boot with 4 cards that were much easier to address due to prior build experience. Again, all of the help you need is on the Internet, but unless you know how to search for it, it may be difficult to find.
All of these boards you mentioned have precisely 8 PCIE lanes, meaning you’ll be using all of them. It’s not that uncommon for 1 or 2 of them to not work; on the other hand, they certainly all might, but I hope you’ve considered these scenarios already. Furthermore, if you’re planning on using a SATA SSD, you may need to be careful which port you use as M2 slot use will sometimes disable certain SATA ports.
The ‘lanes’ discussion refers to the number of PCIE data lanes that run between your GPUs and CPUs in this case. With 8 cards, you’ll be operating all in 1x . Kaby lake processors have 16 lanes , IIRC, so this wouldn’t be a problem for you. There are videos online that will help you with the BIOS setup where you’ll ensure this is the mode they operate in.
I had plans to try out SimpleMining instead of ethOS which is said to operate as “quite a breeze” also and be more stable than Windows, but also hashing slightly less and harder to overclock than Windows (still my preferred choice at this time). Guess I’ll have to toy with both
@belgarion84 I have already built computers twice, just not put dedication into understanding the behing the scenes yet. Never handled the software part of mining neither overclocking, that’s true
Wise words here : when I said I was going for 8, I really inted to start with 2 then 4 cards in the first place and will power each 2 x 1080Ti with 750W PSU (either eVGA P2 or Corsair HXi, they come with enough 6+2 cables to plug the two 8+8 pins of the GPUs) so I can easily add more over time, then only eventually move on to 8 with quad PSU
Thanks already for the info. Okay so basically, the lanes dilemna is never dependant from the use of M.2 or PCIe ? That’s not what I was told yesterday. Lots of info on the internet, but sometimes conflicting ^^