M6800 Owners' Thread

Thank you for your response!

I have a 24" HP old, low-end FHD LCD screen right in front of me, and can't see anything like this. This is why it was strange to me. Seller swapped out the screen today for another one, but he says it's still the same. He says it's because of the pixel density (or lack of), which would be acceptable, if the 24" HP was doing it, but it isn't... I think I should try and check another M6800, and see how that is..

 

Thanks for your help.I had some time and tryed again.
I was able to boot into windows.
i am able to see the Tesla installed and through HWinfo,although I am unable to install an nvidia driver at all.
On windows 8.1 shows up as a Microsoft Basic Display Adapter.
Is there any way to install an nvidia driver ?
Thanks

 

When swapping out the GPU in these systems with an unsupported GPU, you will have to modify the NVIDIA driver INF file in order to get the driver to load. I'll give you the basic procedure but you can Google for more specifics.

First, modifying driver files will break the driver digital signature. You need to allow loading unsigned drivers for the install. (You don't have to do this at every boot, just when you are installing or upgrading the driver.) Hold "Shift" while you reboot your system from the Start Menu, and select "Advanced startup options" for the menu that appears, and then "7" (I think?) to disable driver signature checking.

Extract the NVIDIA drivers (I think this happens when you run the .exe file, pay attention to where it is dumping them, I always extract manually with WinRAR). Go to the "Display.Driver" folder in where they were extracted to. Since your Tesla M6 card is like a Quadro M5000M, we can start with trying to make it behave like the Quadro M5000M in Dell systems. In drivers downloaded from NVIDIA's site, this is defined in the file nvdmwi.inf.

Go to Device Manager and find the Hardware ID for your "basic" driverless GPU. It's on the "Details" tab, select "Hardware Ids" from the drop-down. You should find something that looks like this with different numbers.
PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_13F8&SUBSYS_053F1028

In nvdmwi.inf, find the line: NVIDIA_DEV.13F8.06DA.1028 = "NVIDIA Quadro M5000M"
Copy it to a new line, and change the ID numbers to match your hardware ID. In my case I change it to look like: NVIDIA_DEV.13F8.053F.1028 = "NVIDIA Quadro M5000M"
(You can change the card name in quotes to "NVIDIA Tesla M6" if you like, this has no actual function except for what the card's name will be in Device Manager.)

Now, go back to the top of the file, and search for one of these strings (without quotes).
"%NVIDIA_DEV.13F8.06DA.1028%" <-- If you have graphics switching turned ON
"%NVIDIA_DEV.13F8.16DA.1028%" <-- If you have graphics switching turned OFF

Each time you find a line with this inside, copy it, and change the hardware ID to match yours. Note that you need to change the ID at two places in each line, at the beginning and at the end. So in my case, I change this
%NVIDIA_DEV.13F8.16DA.1028% = Section246, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_13F8&SUBSYS_16DA1028
into this
%NVIDIA_DEV.13F8.053F.1028% = Section246, PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_13F8&SUBSYS_053F1028

Note that you will need to continue to search the file for this string and fix each of them as there will be multiple occurrences.

Now, save the file and you're done. Run the NVIDIA setup file (one level up in the directory structure from where the INF file is) and it should detect your card and install the driver. You will be prompted by Windows to allow the installation as the digital signature will be bad. After the driver is installed, you can reboot and it should hopefully work normally.


You have to repeat this process if you ever want to install upgraded drivers. It's a pain, but such is life with an unsupported laptop GPU...

 

Did it already!!!!!!!
Thanks a lot for your help.Finally I can claim a sucesss with the upgrade.
Thank you very much.The M6800 flies!!!!.

 

Awesome. So, Tesla can work in a laptop. Are you using graphics switching on or off (out of curiosity)?

 

Working on that right now

 

Temps at max load around 70c.Quite happy.
No info yet if optimus works or not.
Is there any tool that monitors both gpus?
Thanks

 

If you have graphics switching (Optimus) turned on in the BIOS, you will see both the Intel GPU and the NVIDIA GPU as separate devices in Device Manager. If you only see the NVIDIA GPU, graphics switching (Optimus) is not turned on. You can switch it from the BIOS. If you switch it, you will have to reinstall the GPU driver (the system recognizes the card as a different device, depending on the mode, and it will have a different hardware ID). Pay attention to which device to use when modifying the driver INF file as I described above.

If Optimus is on, you can monitor behavior with a system tray tool. Go to the NVIDIA control panel, and select "Desktop -> Display GPU Activity..." from the menu at the top. A square icon will appear in the tray. Gray means that the NVIDIA GPU is powered off. Colored means that the NVIDIA GPU is powered on. If you click on an icon, a box will pop up telling you which programs are using the NVIDIA GPU.

 

guys, need your help. i broke my motherboard and audio side board..! my display is a 1600x900. model : dell m6800. could you please guide me how to find out the item number of the said boards?

it will be great if you can provide me the same directly just in case you happen to know. pleeeeease help

 

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=m6800+motherboard
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=m6800+io+board

I'm not sure if all of the motherboards are the same. If there is a difference, it is LVDS vs eDP for the display output. (M4800 had different motherboards for each, with early units shipping with LVDS but later ones using eDP.) Look at what is printed on the motherboard where your display output connector is and make sure that the one that you buy matches it.