What is a PCIe Riser?
A cable that connects the motherboard PCIe slot to a graphics card is called PCIe Riser Cable, PCIe stands for peripheral component interconnect express, a motherboard contains several PCIe slots that are used for graphics cards, SSD cards, Wifi Cards or RAID Cards, it also depends upon the motherboard usability as well. Since the graphics card in GPU Mining are placed on top of the mining frame that’s why they are known as PCIe riser cables.
Instead of using Motherboard PCIe slots, a separate PCIe riser is to used to connect the Graphics card with a motherboard through a USB cable (Cable contains USB ports on both sides), this picture will help you to understand it better.
Buy PCIe Risers for GPU Mining.
Just below 50 dollars, buy these awesome 6 PCIe risers to connect Graphics Cards with the motherboard.
While choosing the riser for your graphic card, you should focus upon the capacitors and PCIe slots first, since these graphics cards are expensive so you should be smart enough to choose the best risers for GPU mining, more capacitors enables to keep stable power to your graphics card however the slot should be at least PCIe x16 to operate up to an optimal level.
Connect the USB cable:
This cable contains a USB on both sides, one is used in the riser while the other is used to connect with the motherboard, this image will help you to understand it better.
Power Supply:
You must be very conscious before going to buy the Power Supply for your motherboard, some miners use two power supplies – one for the motherboard and one for Graphics Cards but if you can afford you can buy a single Power supply depending upon the cards you are using, different graphics cards use. Each graphics card contains details when you buy that, you can easily figure out what is the watt usage of this particular graphics card.
3 Approaches to connect Riser with Power Supply:
Here comes a different scenario, you have three options to connect your power supply cable with a riser, each one is good but you have to be familiar with one thing “not to overload your cables” that’s why look at these options carefully.
In this Picture, the 4Pin option is used for Molex, 6 Pin is used for Splitter and 15pin is recommended for SATA cable since we are dealing with electric power so 4pin and 15pin options are an old school of thought, these were used when the Pentium series was launched, you can understand that each pin can not contain so much power demanded by a graphics card, absolutely, you are paying more on your graphics cards than your entire system so it is very important to keep this in mind, supplying less electricity may cause huge friction and cables can burn easily.
Always Use Splitters:
Please avoid using Molex or Sata, Splitter comes with 6 or 8 pins, most commonly they are 8 pins and if your Riser is expensive, yes, there are some quality risers designed for GPU Mining, that contain 8 pins for a splitter, but if you have 6 pins, don’t worry, it will work fine, just detach two pins by sliding in an upward direction, two pins with two wires will be detached.
LED Light for Precaution:
Always look at the LED light that must be green when you attach your graphics card and turn it on, this will indicate that everything is going normally.
Connect Riser with PCIe x16 Port:
Just follow the step-by-step process while connecting with the PCIe x16 port, don’t put the wrong side otherwise your riser may break/damage.
What is a PCIe Riser? FAQs
Do Risers Affect Graphics card’s Performance?
Recent experiments have shown that Risers do affect the performance of graphics cards up to 2% each as compared to the graphics card directly installed on the motherboard since there is no distance to cover so that graphics card performs fully.
This is negligible because you can not install all cards on a single motherboard, these graphics cards are bulky and cause much heat so risers are a good option for mining but if you are using them for scientific, study, or animation purposes you should go for the motherboard preinstalled graphics card.
Is Riserless Motherboard worth it?
Well, it depends upon the geographical location, if you are living in an area where the temperature is low it can be the best choice but if the weather condition is harsh, you should avoid buying this, since the heat is the major issue in GPU Mining so miners usually go for the GPU mining with risers, we have a Riserless motherboard today that comes with 6 PCIe ports to install Graphics cards on the same board, it looks pretty fascinating as you are saving 2% performance per card. These motherboards are really fast, reliable, and equipped with strong tech features.
The beauty of such mining motherboards is that they provide you with a single place to configure all of your settings since there is no distance or space through cables so the accuracy is much more realistic. Moreover, these motherboards come with a SODIMM slot, which means RAM is too small in size than the DIMM slot. If you like to purchase this check out the list of the top 10 best Resireless Mining Motherboards available online, you need to check out the aftereffects of such motherboards too.
Why to Choose PCIe Riser for GPU Mining?
Miners usually prefer Risers to connect Graphics Cards with the motherboard, instead of using Riserless motherboards due to several reasons, here are the factors one must avoid to using riserless motherboards.
1) Heat:
Riserless Motherboard causes a heat issue that can damage either graphics cards or the motherboard because these types of equipment are made of very sensitive material so the chances of being damaged may increase, so it is important to keep your expensive graphics cards safe.
2) Airflow:
Miners know the importance of an excellent airflow to keep the internal system cool so that the heat produced may not cause any issue, since the GPU installed on the mining rig have a decent space so the natural airflow helps the graphics cards to maintain the temperature even in hot weather.
3) Stress:
There will be great stress on the motherboard when several graphics cards are working on clocking and causing heat, clocking means consuming more watts that will also produce more heat, risers help to keep graphics cards away from the motherboard and supply so there is no circular airflow that will not damage any part of the system, whereas if you use riserless motherboard, you have to install all graphics cards on a single board so the chances of being heated become viable.
4) Bulky:
Motherboards are designed smartly so the circuits inside the motherboard can not bear weight more than their usual requirements since graphics cards are bulky so it will automatically add weight to the motherboard making it bulky, all in all, it is a bad idea for mining if you use riserless motherboard.
