Strix 3080 ti and Corsair RM850x (pcie cables/3 red lights)

[MarleysBeard]

I have a new to me 3080 ti and a brand new Corsair 850x to power it. As far as I can see the PSU only came with 1 individual pcie cable, the others are splitters/pigtails. I'm using the single pcie and one of the splitter cables to power the GPU. Today I turned on the PC and noticed the GPU had 3 red blinking lights. Could this be due to not running 3 individual pcie cables? If so can you recommend a budget friendly source of cables that will work with the 850x? The premium cables offered on Corsairs website are $99, a bit much for someone who doesn't care about colors or aesthetics.

[Agall]

18 minutes ago, MarleysBeard said:

I have a new to me 3080 ti and a brand new Corsair 850x to power it. As far as I can see the PSU only came with 1 individual pcie cable, the others are splitters/pigtails. I'm using the single pcie and one of the splitter cables to power the GPU. Today I turned on the PC and noticed the GPU had 3 red blinking lights. Could this be due to not running 3 individual pcie cables? If so can you recommend a budget friendly source of cables that will work with the 850x? The premium cables offered on Corsairs website are $99, a bit much for someone who doesn't care about colors or aesthetics.

An RTX 3080ti should run off two dedicated cables without issue. I think its more likely there's a fault somewhere than an issue with the cable configuration. The extra 8 pin really won't get much draw, and most modern PSUs can run fine off a daisy chained 2x8pin cable. 

 

Running 1 dedicated and 2 daisy chained for a 3x8pin card for a 350W TDP GPU with a 750W minimum recommended shouldn't be a problem with your described configuration.

 

Even an overclocked RTX 4090 at 550W can run off just two daisy chained 2x8pin cables. Its literally what the internally adapted cable will do as well, and I've run that configuration myself before getting a native 12VHPWR PSU.

 

TLDR: there's a likely a fault somewhere in the GPU or PSU.

[MarleysBeard]

1 hour ago, Agall said:

An RTX 3080ti should run off two dedicated cables without issue. I think its more likely there's a fault somewhere than an issue with the cable configuration. The extra 8 pin really won't get much draw, and most modern PSUs can run fine off a daisy chained 2x8pin cable. 

 

Running 1 dedicated and 2 daisy chained for a 3x8pin card for a 350W TDP GPU with a 750W minimum recommended shouldn't be a problem with your described configuration.

 

Even an overclocked RTX 4090 at 550W can run off just two daisy chained 2x8pin cables. Its literally what the internally adapted cable will do as well, and I've run that configuration myself before getting a native 12VHPWR PSU.

 

TLDR: there's a likely a fault somewhere in the GPU or PSU.

How would one go about diagnosing a fault in the GPU? I would lean towards it being in the GPU since it was bought used.

[Agall]

1 hour ago, MarleysBeard said:

How would one go about diagnosing a fault in the GPU? I would lean towards it being in the GPU since it was bought used.

Does it boot with those LEDs lit? I imagine you're talking about the LED indication for proper PCIe AUX cable plugged in. If so, then test it with them unplugged as well.

 

Just to be sure as well, make sure those cables are plugged into ports on the PSU marked as PCIE and that you're using the 6+2 end into the GPU on both cables. Make sure they're actually AUX cables and not an EPS 4+4 as well. That dedicated cable should be marked VGA or such as well.

[MarleysBeard]

3 minutes ago, Agall said:

Does it boot with those LEDs lit? I imagine you're talking about the LED indication for proper PCIe AUX cable plugged in. If so, then test it with them unplugged as well.

 

Just to be sure as well, make sure those cables are plugged into ports on the PSU marked as PCIE and that you're using the 6+2 end into the GPU on both cables. Make sure they're actually AUX cables and not an EPS 4+4 as well. That dedicated cable should be marked VGA or such as well.

No, in the past couple days I've ran some benchmarks, played a few games and never saw the lights. Today at some point after booting before I had even done anything I noticed them. I turned off the pc and turned off the switch at the PSU and then turned everything back on and the lights have gone off again. Ran another benchmark and played a game for a bit, still off. As far as I can tell I've used the correct cables in the correct spots. All of which are properly clipped in.

[Montana One-Six]

AFAIK the red lights indicate something being wrong with the power delivery.

 

I also have the strix 3080Ti but have a 1000W PSU and use 3 separate pcie power cables. In the 2 years of using the 3080Ti I had one of these red lights turn on during boot up one day for whatever reason. I don't know why that happened but I figured the cable were the red light was on probably wasn't providing power at boot or something along those lines which caused the red light to turn on. Shutting down and cutting all power reset the light and it never happened again since.

 

If it happens frequently I would probably use a third separate cable to see if that fixes it.