can't seem to get R5 230 working with Lenovo M81

[GunsMadeAmericaFree]

I bought a Lenovo M81 Thinkcentre barebones desktop system recently from our local Goodwill Easter seals for $55. They remove the hard drives and destroy them. I was able to boot into the BIOS with no problem, and boot to a DOS image on a flash drive. The system is core i3, 4GB RAM, pretty basic. I have a 2 TB used hard drive I can pop in there. This is going to replace an old system for my wife's mom that died. She can't get on the internet or anything right now, and her $$ is limited in retirement, so she has just been going without for a while.

I have upgraded the BIOS on the system to the latest version, from June 2014.

I have purchased a brand new XFX R5 230 pci express video card to upgrade from the basic onboard graphics. I purchased this card because of the low profile brackets, and also because it was advertised as ultra low power - about 19 watts. It doesn't even need a fan, it just has a decent heatsink. I figure that this card should allow her to do some basic games if she wanted, and I think she needs the HDMI and DVI on the added card so that she can hook up her flat screen monitor. (motherboard has only vga out)

Unfortunately, I just can't seem to get the system to boot when I install the video card. The fans still spin up, but there is no post beep, and nothing shows up on the screen. I have tried going in to the BIOS and changing what it says to use for video before installing the card, but that still doesn't seem to make any difference. I can only boot to the BIOS when this card is not installed.

This is a PCI Express 3 card, and I'm pretty sure that the slot is pci express 2. However, from what I've read, it should be backwards compatible. I would also think that the system could handle adding just 19 watts. The power supply says 240 Watts. With just a core i3 in there using about 60 watts, and no hard drive even plugged in currently, I would really think that this should handle addition of a 20 watt video card without any problems.

I'm wondering if there is some sort of issue with this being a newer card on an older computer.... but wouldn't they make the cards backward compatible?

Any help would be appreciated, thanks!

 

[Elixer]

I would clear the CMOS (unplug machine first) and then try to boot.
See what happens then.
If you still have issues, remove card from slot (after unplugging machine), and make sure there is no crap in said slot. A can of air can help here.
If you still have issues, can you test the vid card in another system? Just trying to verify the card itself is OK.

And yeah, a PCIe 3 card can work fine in a PCIe 2 slot.

 

[GunsMadeAmericaFree]

System boots to BIOS just fine when I have my CRT monitor plugged directly to motherboard's VGA out, and no video card installed.

I tested both the r5 230 video card that I just purchased and an older MSI R5450 card in an AMD tower that I built - both cards worked fine and booted to desktop with Windows 10. I think this is a verification that both cards are in working condition.

I looked it up online, and the MSI 5450 is supposed to also draw 20 watts max - roughly the same as the r5 230. I decided to temporarily install the 5450 in the Lenovo M81, and it posted and booted to BIOS just fine, with video off of the card showing up on my CRT monitor.

Hmm. So it doesn't really seem to be an issue of wattage, since both of the cards are supposed to draw exactly the same max wattage. (technically, the r5 230 is 19 watts, the 5450 is 20 watts) For some reason that I can't figure out, the Lenovo M81 won't post or boot to BIOS with the r5 230 in there, but it will with the old 5450 test card I have.

Anyone have any ideas on what I should try next?

 

[Elixer]

Did you clear CMOS? I know it sounds dumb, but this has worked on a few mobos that had these kind of issues.

 

[Captante]

Check and make sure the on-board video is disabled in the BIOS manually. I've run into cards that for whatever reason were not detected properly and the automatic method did not work.

Unfortunately the other possibility is that the R5 is defective. Have you tested it in another PC?

 

[LTC8K6]

UEFI /secure boot problem?

 

[LTC8K6]

Come to think of it, where did you see 19 watts?

XFX recommends a 450 watt PS for their R5-230 cards.

Another problem is drivers. The card is not GCN and will be stuck with old drivers and DX11.

 

[GunsMadeAmericaFree]

I saw the 19 watt figure here:
http://www.game-debate.com/hardware/?gid=1887&graphics=Radeon R5 230

Most of the other places just said "ultra low power".

Yes, I have been able to boot the card on a different AMD based system, so there is nothing wrong with the card. The ThinkCentre Core i3 system will boot fine with the older video card installed, which supposedly has the same power draw.

I have disabled UEFI in the BIOS and set to Legacy, so I don't think that is a problem.

For now I am going to assume that either the power draw is too high or that there is some sort of incompatibility between the BIOS and the newer R5 230 card. I have installed the 5450 and will use it so that I can get my Mother in Law's system up and running without too much more of a delay.

I do have another one of these Lenovo M81 Smartcentre systems to set up in the coming weeks. Can anyone recommend an older PCI or PCI Express video card that would be better than the Core i3 intel graphics, would add HDMI & DVI inputs, but would be unlikely to trigger whatever was incompatible on the r5 230?

Thanks!

 

[Blue_Max]

I suspect the same thing as the Dell Vostro 460 from that same era... for some reason they're just super-finicky with video cards. SPECIFICALLY AMD cards. Same issue as yours, everything works fine without the card... put the card in - dead.

I was able to use a Radeon 4830 & 5450, but not the 7570 or R9-270 I had at the time. Other users reported the same, so it's a known issue (if not commonly so.)

Every nVidia card from high-to-low power has worked fine.

That's my suspicion anyway.

 

[Blue_Max]

Any luck, OP?

 

[IronTomDled]

I have the same problem

 

[nerp]

This is a Lenovo ThinkCentre, which is often sold to corporations in large bulk buys. Some of their stuff, like ThinkPads, often have hardware whitelists embedded in the BIOS to prevent only certain cards from working. This is for security purposes and makes sense in a corporate environment. You might want to poke around and find out if this is the case and see if there is a list of whitelisted cards out there.