Can't upgrade prebuilt?

[MVPernula]

Alright so my friend likes to play very simple games, say CSGO and League!

He has some sort of Acer Prebuilt PC and I totally forgot the model name but it has a 3350P and a GT 640, so pretty old.

 

The thing is, it runs CSGO and League just fine but his friend got in to Overwatch and he can't even start the damn game, so I told him he could borrow a GTX 460 I had laying about.

A GTX 460 is supposedly the minimum req for Overwatch, so hey free upgrades right?

 

Took out his old GT 640 and slapped my 460 in there, plugged cables into it AAAND,.. Nothing?

It beeps, fans spinning and everything. No image at all?

 

My first thought being.. Nah this can't be right, is it dead?

I tried 4 other GPU's nothing worked, ONLY the GT 640.

 

Preinstalled drivers for the 460 when the 640 was still in with no difference made.

 

Is the prebuilt set up to not work with other GPU's?

 

He has a 500w PSU so that's not the issue at all.

[Misinthe]

6 minutes ago, MVPernula said:

He has a 500w PSU so that's not the issue at all.

What brand and model? Pre-built systems usually use very low quality PSU, even if it's rated 500w it may not be powerfully enough to sustain the wattage requiered. 

 

Edit: what you could do is use your PSU to power his PC and see if it works like that. What I did once that I was having this issue was just use a second power supply for the GPU. Like Austin did in Scrapyard Wars Season 3.

[bgibbz]

Did you uninstall the old driver using DDU?

[UMxMarky94]

1 minute ago, Miguel552 said:

What brand and model? Pre-built systems usually use very low quality PSU, even if it's rated 500w it may not be powerfully enough to sustain the wattage requiered. 

damn beat me to it, but year he is right.

[Aleks NE]

17 minutes ago, MVPernula said:

Alright so my friend likes to play very simple games, say CSGO and League!

He has some sort of Acer Prebuilt PC and I totally forgot the model name but it has a 3350P and a GT 640, so pretty old.

 

The thing is, it runs CSGO and League just fine but his friend got in to Overwatch and he can't even start the damn game, so I told him he could borrow a GTX 460 I had laying about.

A GTX 460 is supposedly the minimum req for Overwatch, so hey free upgrades right?

 

Took out his old GT 640 and slapped my 460 in there, plugged cables into it AAAND,.. Nothing?

It beeps, fans spinning and everything. No image at all?

 

My first thought being.. Nah this can't be right, is it dead?

I tried 4 other GPU's nothing worked, ONLY the GT 640.

 

Preinstalled drivers for the 460 when the 640 was still in with no difference made.

 

Is the prebuilt set up to not work with other GPU's?

 

He has a 500w PSU so that's not the issue at all.

 

Try getting a spare hard drive and just install any operating system ubuntu takes like 10 min to download and install and see if it works, if it does you'll have to reinstall windowsi had the same problem when adding a GPU to a PC that run on a APU only for yeats

[MVPernula]

4 minutes ago, Miguel552 said:

What brand and model? Pre-built systems usually use very low quality PSU, even if it's rated 500w it may not be powerfully enough to sustain the wattage requiered. 

 

4 minutes ago, bgibbz said:

Did you uninstall the old driver using DDU?

 

3 minutes ago, UMxMarky94 said:

damn beat me to it, but year he is right.

It's the prebuilt PSU, we also tried another so we can rule it out.

We also tried with another GPU that didn't require the PSU cables at all.

 

I uninstalled an reinstalled all drivers 3 times to make sure.

[DnFx91]

12 minutes ago, Miguel552 said:

What brand and model? Pre-built systems usually use very low quality PSU, even if it's rated 500w it may not be powerfully enough to sustain the wattage requiered. 

 

Edit: what you could do is use your PSU to power his PC and see if it works like that. What I did once that I was having this issue was just use a second power supply for the GPU. Like Austin did in Scrapyard Wars Season 3.

i've never seen anything close to a 500W in an OEM machine, they always have suspiciously precise output wattages like 287W, this just says to me that they figured out that the machine in factory spec uses 285 watts and wanted to cost save as much as humanly possible

[Misinthe]

5 minutes ago, MVPernula said:

 

 

It's the prebuilt PSU, we also tried another so we can rule it out.

We also tried with another GPU that didn't require the PSU cables at all.

 

I uninstalled an reinstalled all drivers 3 times to make sure.

Did you mean "it isn't the pre-built PSU"? Even if you used a GPU that doesn't have its own power. It is still draining the power from the PSU through the PCIe.

[MVPernula]

12 minutes ago, Miguel552 said:

Did you mean "it isn't the pre-built PSU"? Even if you used a GPU that doesn't have its own power. It is still draining the power from the PSU through the PCIe.

I meant that we used the prebuilt's PSU, basically the one that came with the rig.

We also tried another PSU of higher quality, with all the GPU's. It's defiently not that.

 

And yeah of course the GPU still runs on electricity in PCIe  hahahah

[MVPernula]

14 minutes ago, DnFx91 said:

i've never seen anything close to a 500W in an OEM machine, they always have suspiciously precise output wattages like 287W, this just says to me that they figured out that the machine in factory spec uses 285 watts and wanted to cost save as much as humanly possible

I was also VERY surprised to see that, but I can guarantee that is was a 500W! Was even prepared to swap it out for another 650w, which I did.. But anyways.

[Misinthe]

And is the iGPU working? Also, you know which processor and Windows is being used?

[MVPernula]

1 minute ago, Miguel552 said:

And is the iGPU working? Also, you know which processor and Windows is being used?

That was also tried without success, iGPU did not start either.

 

It's an i5-3350P!

[Misinthe]

16 minutes ago, MVPernula said:

That was also tried without success, iGPU did not start either.

 

It's an i5-3350P!

Well, it didn't work because that model doesn't have integrated GPU.

[UMxMarky94]

how many PCI E slots does it have ? have you ruled out that a slot is possible not giving enough power out ?

[MVPernula]

20 hours ago, Miguel552 said:

Well, it didn't work because that model doesn't have integrated GPU.

Touché.

[MVPernula]

20 hours ago, UMxMarky94 said:

how many PCI E slots does it have ? have you ruled out that a slot is possible not giving enough power out ?

Just one sadly.

 

The other GPU I tested was a 7600 GT, highly doubt it draws significanlty more than a GT 640.

[Misinthe]

Did you double check those GPUs in your computer to be 100% sure they work?

[MVPernula]

5 minutes ago, Miguel552 said:

Did you double check those GPUs in your computer to be 100% sure they work?

Yes, they're guarateed to work. I tested them yesterday in my personal rig, they worked fine even without flipping drivers.

[Misinthe]

Have you tried putting the 640 back to see if it still works?

[MVPernula]

Just now, Miguel552 said:

Have you tried putting the 640 back to see if it still works?

Yeah I couldn't rip out his original card, try to upgrade it, fail and leave it like that hahaha! He has his 640 back and it works.

 

I did some research and it seems the model is a G3620, people have the same issues and it seems it's set up by Acer. You cannot upgrade it.

[Misinthe]

That's a laptop, I thought it was a PC.

 

Edit: Nevermind I Googled Acer 3620 instead of Acer G3620.

[MVPernula]

13 minutes ago, Miguel552 said:

That's a laptop, I thought it was a PC.

 

Edit: Nevermind I Googled Acer 3620 instead of Acer G3620.

Honest mistake hahah!

[Misinthe]

17 minutes ago, MVPernula said:

Honest mistake hahah!

So I found this, and I quote:

 

"Bios from standard acer pc's cant co-op with 3rd party gpus... A new non acer mono is required since acer tech support is a bunch og dicks for not fixing This... You Are NOT the first to have This problem m8"

 

It looks like the BIOS is locked so he will need a new MoBo.

[MVPernula]

3 minutes ago, Miguel552 said:

So I found this, and I quote:

 

"Bios from standard acer pc's cant co-op with 3rd party gpus... A new non acer mono is required since acer tech support is a bunch og dicks for not fixing This... You Are NOT the first to have This problem m8"

 

It looks like the BIOS is locked so he will need a new MoBo.

That really is a dick move.

 

Ohwell, that's that I suppose.

 

Worst part of it was that when I had to remove the PCIe brackets on the case to make room the were LITERALLY soldered on there. I hade to bend the shit out of them to actually make them loose and remove them. "Faking" upgradability.

The PSU even comes with two 6 pin VGA power adaptors. Useless.

[Misinthe]

26 minutes ago, MVPernula said:

That really is a dick move.

 

Ohwell, that's that I suppose.

 

Worst part of it was that when I had to remove the PCIe brackets on the case to make room the were LITERALLY soldered on there. I hade to bend the shit out of them to actually make them loose and remove them. "Faking" upgradability.

The PSU even comes with two 6 pin VGA power adaptors. Useless.

Yeah, it's so if you want to upgrade you have to send it to them and they make more money. Now for the brackets, in old cases they would all come soldered, you would have to bend and break them in order to put your cards in, I don't know how old that case is but that's why I hated using extra cards, if you removed them there would be holes on your case. Anyways, sorry for your friend, that's why you never buy prebuilt