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+--- Thread: Recommendation for single slot graphics card (/t-recommendation-for-single-slot-graphics-card)
Recommendation for single slot graphics card - dreunion61 - 2024-11-10
What I need is single slot GPU, there is absolutely no space for more in my case. I wanted to buy an nvidia T400 card but the guide says an Arc is much better and GTX1650 is actually not recommended which has the same NVENC engine as the T400. What is the reason? The alternative would be the newer nvidia A400 but the hardware guide seem to focus entirely on Intel GPUs.
Therefore according to the hardware guide the only option left is the "Sparkle Arc A310 ECO", which is the only single slot Intel Arc GPU I assume? But that seem to have firmware issues with its FAN curves, essentially it is switching only between 0% and 100%.
Or is there any other single slot GPU I'm overseeing.
What my planned system is:
jellyfin server on CentOS Stream inside a VM (with GPU passthrough), the host will be FreeBSD, the hypervisor bhyve.
RE: Recommendation for single slot graphics card - TheDreadPirate - 2024-11-10
(2024-11-10, 01:54 AM)dreunion61 Wrote: What I need is single slot GPU, there is absolutely no space for more in my case. I wanted to buy an nvidia T400 card but the guide says an Arc is much better and GTX1650 is actually not recommended which has the same NVENC engine as the T400. What is the reason? The alternative would be the newer nvidia A400 but the hardware guide seem to focus entirely on Intel GPUs.
Where do you see that the GTX1650 is not recommended? It is a perfectly good GPU for encoding. Having said that, if I were buying a GPU specifically for encoding, I'd get the Arc GPU. It is cheap, Intel Quick Sync is the gold standard for hardware accelerated encoding, and they support AV1 encoding.
(2024-11-10, 01:54 AM)dreunion61 Wrote: Therefore according to the hardware guide the only option left is the "Sparkle Arc A310 ECO", which is the only single slot Intel Arc GPU I assume? But that seem to have firmware issues with its FAN curves, essentially it is switching only between 0% and 100%.
Or is there any other single slot GPU I'm overseeing.
The fan curve might be an issue for gaming, but should be fine for encoding. Much much lower power draw. I can't speak from personal experience, but I haven't heard about issues with the Sparkle A310's fan curve.
(2024-11-10, 01:54 AM)dreunion61 Wrote: What my planned system is:
jellyfin server on CentOS Stream inside a VM (with GPU passthrough), the host will be FreeBSD, the hypervisor bhyve.
......No. Why this configuration? We don't support CentOS, or any Redhat based distro. Nor do we support FreeBSD. We don't have any guides for this configuration due to the lack of support.
This configuration is asking for a hard time.
RE: Recommendation for single slot graphics card - dreunion61 - 2024-11-10
(2024-11-10, 03:27 AM)TheDreadPirate Wrote: Where do you see that the GTX1650 is not recommended? It is a perfectly good GPU for encoding. Having said that, if I were buying a GPU specifically for encoding, I'd get the Arc GPU. It is cheap, Intel Quick Sync is the gold standard for hardware accelerated encoding, and they support AV1 encoding.
Here: https://jellyfin.org/docs/general/administration/hardware-selection/#server-with-dedicated-graphics
- Graphics: Intel Arc A series or newer, Nvidia GTX16/RTX20 series or newer (Excluding GTX1650), AMD is NOT recommended.
(2024-11-10, 03:27 AM)TheDreadPirate Wrote: The fan curve might be an issue for gaming, but should be fine for encoding. Much much lower power draw. I can't speak from personal experience, but I haven't heard about issues with the Sparkle A310's fan curve.
On the Intel and reddit forums buyers are all enraged at that card it seems. There is still no fix.
(2024-11-10, 03:27 AM)TheDreadPirate Wrote: ......No. Why this configuration? We don't support CentOS, or any Redhat based distro. Nor do we support FreeBSD. We don't have any guides for this configuration due to the lack of support.
This configuration is asking for a hard time.
CentOS is no problem, I'm already running one server on Fedora including NVENC fully working. Everything needed is provided in the rpmfusion repo.
RE: Recommendation for single slot graphics card - TheDreadPirate - 2024-11-10
Ok. I got clarification regarding the GTX1650. Nvidia has multiple variants of the GTX1650 with the same model number but some variants have different NVENC encoder/decoder generations. In addition to some models having GDDR5 vs GDDR6 with no way to differentiate for either what kind of GDDR or what NVENC generation a GTX1650 will have. So it isn't that they are unsupported or something. It has to do with the uncertainty of what you will actually get.
Do the reddit and Intel forum threads mention whether they upgraded their A310's firmware? I vaguely recall a firmware update modified fan curves.
The A380 also has a half height model. But I am not sure if it is a single slot or not.
Regarding the rest of your setup, the only thing I can recommend is to make sure that the version of FreeBSD you are running has drm-62-kmod and newer. My understanding is that FreeBSD ports Linux kernel drivers and Intel Arc requires Linux kernel 6.2 and newer for kernel driver support.
RE: Recommendation for single slot graphics card - dreunion61 - 2024-11-10
Thanks for the clarification, does that mean NVENC 6th gen and older is not recommended? The T400 is also 6th gen.
Regarding FreeBSD I will probably not run jellyfin bare metal on FreeBSD but in a Fedora Server virtual machine (CentOS doesn't seem to have uptodate jellyfin packages). On FreeBSD the latest available drm drivers seems to be kernel 6.1 based (drm-61-kmod).
RE: Recommendation for single slot graphics card - TheDreadPirate - 2024-11-11
I have not used VMs with GPU pass-through. I'm am not certain if the host needs to be have the proper GPU drivers to be able to pass through to the VM. Keep that in mind if you have issues.
The difference between 6th and 7th gen NVENC is minor (no HEVC b-frames when encoding). I think the non-recommendation for GTX1650's has to do with not enabling this anti-consumer behavior.
RE: Recommendation for single slot graphics card - dreunion61 - 2024-11-14
The A380 has 6GB of VRAM, is it beneficial to encoding? Is A380s encoding speed faster than the A310?
This post claim the A310 is faster than the A750: https://www.reddit.com/r/IntelArc/comments/1cly7oo/comment/l2x9s7m/
Here it is claimed the A380 is slower than A750 and A770: https://www.reddit.com/r/IntelArc/comments/zwsjgo/encode_speed_a380_vs_a770/
Are those claims correct and is the fastest Encoder the A310 by that logic? And if yes, should I go for 2GB more VRAM (A380) for a little less encoding performance? (Card is only used for encoding)
RE: Recommendation for single slot graphics card - TheDreadPirate - 2024-11-14
The entire Arc lineup has the same media engine. And even the same number of media engines. Any difference in encoding performance MIGHT be due to differences in firmware. Some users here straight up couldn't encode on Arc until they updated their firmware. They had some super old pre-release firmware. But I have no way to verify that hypothesis. Regardless, theoretically each card in the Arc should be within margin of error with each other, all other factors being equal. Including firmware versions.
Where each model does differ is VRAM, which is important for HDR to SDR tone mapping. More VRAM = more HDR to SDR tone mapped streams.
RE: Recommendation for single slot graphics card - dreunion61 - 2024-11-15
Thanks for the info, I have found a China (or Asia?) exclusive single slot A380 card with 6GB VRAM at taobao and ordered already via superbuy.
The cards model is the "Sparkle Arc A380 Pioneer".
The seller I bought from: https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=795843468467
But this seller only has 4 units left.
Another seller with same price is: https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=802579882774
It seems to be the only single slot A380 available and also only in China as far as my research goes. That exclusive "Pioneer" variant seems to have a better/bigger FAN and is also even a shorter card than the Sparkle Arc A310 ECO.
RE: Recommendation for single slot graphics card - dreunion61 - 2024-11-17
For anyone interested regarding the Sparkle Arc A380 Pioneer, here are photos of my box. (Still in China at the Superbuy warehouse.)