Folding Forum

I thought it would be a good idea to buy a $45 EGPU docking station, so I could breathe new life into my old laptops.
And spent the better part of the past 2 weeks working on getting it to work.

In short, those ExpressCard to PCIE 16x slot, with a transfer cable using HDMI, don't work for FAH.

They claim to improve the performance of the IGP, but in reality, the drivers are incompatible.
So not only do they provide ~1/2 PCIE 1x speed, but with incompatible graphics cards drivers, you can really only do 2D work (like 10x slower than the IGP).
A waste of money.

Linux, Debian, was able to recognize the card over ExpressCard slot, but the Nvidia drivers would freeze and crash when installing.
When interrupting the freeze, the drivers would be halfway installed, and the egpu would not be seen by FAH (though lspci did see it).

The egpu box works fine as a regular terminal, in case your IGP is broken.
But the GUI did not support the card, so 3D, mining, or folding is out of the question; and the laptop screen could not be enabled when starting the laptop with the card plugged in, meaning, unplugging the card, and you'd not be able to see anything anymore, even after replugging the card.
Linux allowed it to boot, but no gui.

Windows was more success. It found the graphics card, and the Nvidia drivers install (though take their time, nearly 10 minutes to install).
FAH finds the GPU even, and downloads a WU for it, but for some reason the card enters a 'ready' state.
When I set OpenCL Index to 0, the card appears to be starting a WU, but every few seconds errors until after a few errors it stops.

I wanted to look at those 'pass thru' drivers everyone is talking about (to pass Core I IGPs to an external video card), but the hardware requirements are very narrow.
I just don't own that hardware.

In other words, if you see these (relatively cheap) egpu connectors, they're mostly NOT compatible with Windows, nor Linux, for a full experience.
Sure, they can help you out in a pinch, but not for gaming.
The (Nvidia) drivers don't install correctly on these.
I thought it would be good for everyone to know.

No new life for my old laptop,
Our current only solution would be an overtly expensive thunderbolt connector box for folding on the go, or fold on desktops with graphics cards, or the $200+ expensive LattePanda Alpha with mini pcie port.

Sad. But the Windows experience sounds promising. Maybe you want to post the logfile and it is possible to tweak the settings?

I heard this expresscard is not working with nvidia gtx 10xx but with gtx 980ti?

There is also a mini PCIe version, so if your laptop offers that, this may be more compatible than expresscard slot version (because no drivers)
https://www.banggood.com/Mini-PCI-E-Ver ... ountry=DE&
Or the mini PCIe cheap riser version (needs power supply not sata but 6pin or molex).
https://www.ebay.com/itm/MINI-PCI-E-TO- ... 0010.m2109

Yeah,
I'm all for bang for the buck, and folding on the cheap, but laptops with a mini pcie port are scarce and expensive.
Most of them are based on an M2 port, and with an m2 port you're betting your luck..
As m2 ports can be tapped off the pcie or USB port, those off the USB connection won't work for graphics cards.
I guess most manufacturers tap off a USB hub, as laptops have plenty of pinouts for hubs, but few actual USB ports installed on the board.

Also, most people will likely use the m2 slot for harddrives, wifi, or other hardware than graphics cards, that has a higher chance on running fine off a USB hub, rather than pcie.

The cheapest solution I have found so far, is the Latte Panda Alpha. It has a genuine mini pcie slot, and with an adapter can actually power almost any graphics card.
It's an interesting device for folding on the go, as it can be placed back to back with a GTX 1050 and take up the space of a breadbox (plus 2 brick adapters), but only when the price would be halved would I consider buying it.