Rant of the Day: Dell’s Proprietary PCIe Slot

// January 12th, 2005 // Ranting, Techie

I used to go through the trouble of building custom systems for employees at my job, but for the past year or so I’ve been buying Dells. Originally I didn’t go with Dell because one was usually forced into buying an OS and Office suite with theit desktop systems, which drove the price up considerably. Since most people I work with use some variation of Linux, getting MS Windows pre-installed was just silly. Then I discovered Dell’s desktop server line, which you can order barebones — no software installed.

These server systems were certainly cheaper, but for that you get a lackluster on-board video port and usually no AGP slot. For most people the on-board video was fine, but lately we’ve been getting people really nice 21″ LCD screens, which require a bit more horsepower behind them. With no AGP slot, I’d resort to PCI cards, which was fine for what we were doing. The latest systems, though, have a PCIe slot, which what you’ll start seeing taking over for AGP. Normally this is fantastic news for the Dell server systems, but not necessarily as in the case of the PowerEdge SC420, at least.

Dell PowerEdge SC420 Motherboard

See the “PCIe x8″ slot in the image above? Most PCIe cards, as I’ve just learned, have only one groove in the connector. That means the connector should look something like this. Notice there’s one divider in each example? Now look at Dell’s picture above. That’s right — there are two dividers. And some systems, as I’ve seen first-hand at work, have three dividers! The worse thing of all is, beyond the second divider, there aren’t any actual metal pins. That means the dividers are really only in place to make your life miserable. In fact, the stamp on the motherboard itself says the slot is a “PCIe x16″, yet there’s no way you’re getting one of them in that slot.

I wound up finding this thread on the subject. The solution, in short, is to take a dremel and carefully cut the dividers off. I can now confirm that this worked for me, but it still sucks that I had to do so, most certainly voiding the warranty on the system in the process.

Count yourself forewarned on purchasing these cheaper Dell server systems as a desktop system if you think a snazzy PCIe x16 will work in it without a hastle.

9 Responses to “Rant of the Day: Dell’s Proprietary PCIe Slot”

  1. Dell Sucks says:
    February 20, 2005 at 4:52 PM

    I wold think twice about performing this operation. I just hosed my PCIe slot while trying to cut down one of the dividers. The tiny blade of the dremel caught 3 of the pins closest to the divider and ripped them out of the plastic guides.

    Dell sucks.
    ch

  2. Gudlyf says:
    February 20, 2005 at 5:48 PM

    Yes it can be dangerous to try this, though I’ve done four sytems so far without trouble. I did what someone suggested and slipped some old RAM into the slot where the pins are to protect them from the dremmel. Worked like a champ.

  3. Adrian says:
    May 3, 2005 at 6:03 PM

    Gee, have you considered the fact that the SC420 only has an 8x slot? It’s not meant for your 16x video adapter.

    http://www.dell.com/downloads/global/products/pedge/en/sc420_specs.pdf

  4. Gudlyf says:
    May 3, 2005 at 7:38 PM

    Hey wise ass, did you read the post? The motherboard itself says it’s a 16x slot, so why the fuck is my 16x card not fitting in it past those idiotic barriers Dell put in?

    Also, when I called Dell about this, do you know what they told me? That since this was a server system, they wouldn’t outright support adding a video card anyway. What the FUCK?!

  5. Kredit says:
    May 28, 2005 at 4:02 PM

    Originally I didn’t go with Dell because one was usually forced into buying an OS and Office suite with theit desktop systems, which drove the price up considerably.

  6. Smackthis says:
    June 19, 2005 at 4:54 PM

    The Poweredge SC420 is Dell’s lower end server. It is designed for small business customers that need the ability of a server but not the cost. It was never designed to be a desktop computer. The PCI-E slot that is in the server is an 8X slot so there is no way a 16X card will fit in the slot even if you dremmel it. Dell has never supported 3rd party video cards in their servers by the way. Read this site and pay attention to the “NOTE” section.
    http://support.dell.com/support/topics/global.aspx/support/kb/en/document?dn=1091054&c=us&l=en&s=gen&cs=

  7. admin says:
    June 19, 2005 at 6:24 PM

    First of all, I note you work for Dell, so I can see there being some major bias there. Secondly, I’m sick and tired of Dell not letting customers use the systems they buy for whatever they want, be it a server or a desktop. Lastly, the motherboard itself has “PCIe 16x” printed on it! If you don’t believe me, I’ll take a picture and show you. I was able to dremmel the seperator in place and have had a video card successfully working in this slot for months now.

  8. carobnjak says:
    May 21, 2007 at 9:10 AM

    i have se7520bd2, is it posible to do the same thing as for dell.

  9. Dell Lover says:
    September 12, 2008 at 3:35 PM

    Dell sucks rotten eggs.
    If you are so cheap to buy a Dell, then you deserve these kinds of problems. Dell is hell, remember that.
    Oh..
    And stop being so fricking cheap.