Question Will AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT work on ASUS M5A78L-M/USB3?

[MalcolmKK]

Hi All,
I hope you are well.
I have this old PC with:
an AMD processor (AMD FX-8350, the most powerful I could install on this MB)
MB is ASUS M5A78L-M/USB3
32GB of RAM
The PSU is brand new Corsair TX650M.

Will this rather newish GPU work on it?
I think this GPU needs PCIe Gen3 to work.
The MB only has these slots:
1 x PCIe 2.0 x16
1 x PCIe 2.0 x1
1 x PCI

2x separate PCI power cables are connected to it.
I can get to BIOS but then when I want to boot to OS it goes blank.
I tried to boot to RescueCD USB stick but same thing - blank screen.

I was able to launch AMD Radeon RX 590 8GB on this system but it's a card from 2018 not from 2019.
Please let me know.
Thank you

 

[Imperat0r]

Hello.
Your current setup will support it.
The video card is backward compatible with the PCIe slots.
So no worry about that.
The problem is when OS (in your case Windows) loads its drivers, the card does not display anything.
In order to eliminate a problem, please take the card and test it in another computer.
If it works there we will try step by step to make it work in your system.
If it doesn't work there either, then you have an answer.

 

[MalcolmKK]

Hello.
Your current setup will support it.
The video card is backward compatible with the PCIe slots.
So no worry about that.
The problem is when OS (in your case Windows) loads its drivers, the card does not display anything.
In order to eliminate a problem, please take the card and test it in another computer.
If it works there we will try step by step to make it work in your system.
If it doesn't work there either, then you have an answer.

Thanks Imperat0r.
On another system (much much newer system)
Asus ROG Strix X570-E WIFI II
Chipset X570
AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 16-Core Processor

I have swapped my AMD Radeon RX 590 8GB with this card and it did boot up to the OS, in this case not to Windows but to Linux. It does work.

On the old system it felt like some issue with the card because after BIOS screen even SystemRescueCD (Linux) went blank.

Does it matter to which HDMI/DP port the monitor is connected to (for troubleshooting)?
I don't think so.

I can see people complaining about blank screen with this card and that some recent firmwares didn't improve or made things more unstable.
I just wonder if this was one of those firmwares flashed to this GPU.

Someone reported (not sure what motherboard) that he had to enforce PCIe Gen3 in BIOS for the card to work. In my case I cannot do that.
As you said it should work as it supposed to be backward compatible with Gen2.
AMD Radeon RX 590 8GB did work on this old MB.
By the way I did reset all the BIOS settings to defaults on that old MB.

 

[Imperat0r]

So you say that in current configuration your system works as it should?
Well that is a great info.

 

[LuKaWin10]

Hi All,
I hope you are well.
I have this old PC with:
an AMD processor (AMD FX-8350, the most powerful I could install on this MB)
MB is ASUS M5A78L-M/USB3
32GB of RAM
The PSU is brand new Corsair TX650M.

Will this rather newish GPU work on it?
I think this GPU needs PCIe Gen3 to work.
The MB only has these slots:
1 x PCIe 2.0 x16
1 x PCIe 2.0 x1
1 x PCI

2x separate PCI power cables are connected to it.
I can get to BIOS but then when I want to boot to OS it goes blank.
I tried to boot to RescueCD USB stick but same thing - blank screen.

I was able to launch AMD Radeon RX 590 8GB on this system but it's a card from 2018 not from 2019.
Please let me know.
Thank you

It can work! Put it in the X16 slot as it will deliver the most!

 

[MalcolmKK]

What I stated in my previous post was done on my newer system so at least we ruled out any hardware issues with the GPU which I am grateful.

How do you think what else should I try on the old system to make it work?
Any specific BIOS settings on that over decade old motherboard?

 

[Zerk2012]

What I stated in my previous post was done on my newer system so at least we ruled out any hardware issues with the GPU which I am grateful.

How do you think what else should I try on the old system to make it work?
Any specific BIOS settings on that over decade old motherboard?

You need BIOS set to UEFI if your motherboard supports it for that card to work.

 

[LuKaWin10]

What I stated in my previous post was done on my newer system so at least we ruled out any hardware issues with the GPU which I am grateful.

How do you think what else should I try on the old system to make it work?
Any specific BIOS settings on that over decade old motherboard?

To make the GPU work set ur BIOS to UEFI mode so it supports it properly

 

[MalcolmKK]

To make the GPU work set ur BIOS to UEFI mode so it supports it properly

I have looked into the guide for this MB
https://dlcdnets.asus.com/pub/ASUS/...3/E8017_M5A78L-M-USB3.pdf?model=M5A78L-M/USB3

and unfortunately I cannot see anything about UEFI or Secure Boot.

So this GPU needs it but with AMD Radeon RX 590 8GB I can get away without it.

 

[LuKaWin10]

I have looked into the guide for this MB
https://dlcdnets.asus.com/pub/ASUS/...3/E8017_M5A78L-M-USB3.pdf?model=M5A78L-M/USB3

and unfortunately I cannot see anything about UEFI or Secure Boot.

So this GPU needs it but with AMD Radeon RX 590 8GB I can get away without it.

Oh, well, I will see later what you can do

 

[MalcolmKK]

Oh, well, I will see later what you can do

From what I now know Secure Boot is not the same as UEFI, SB is something that can be enabled on top of UEFI.
But do I need such thing in the BIOS or do I just need an OS that has UEFI GPT partition?
The OS on this box is Windows 7 installed in old BIOS/legacy mode.
I think I have to install at least Windows 10 that I reckon comes with UEFI by default, no?

But I do remember in the past switching between UEFI and CMS mode in BIOS on one of the systems I worked on but it must be a different system (most likely one of the laptops).

 

[LuKaWin10]

From what I now know Secure Boot is not the same as UEFI, SB is something that can be enabled on top of UEFI.
But do I need such thing in the BIOS or do I just need an OS that has UEFI GPT partition?
The OS on this box is Windows 7 installed in old BIOS/legacy mode.
I think I have to install at least Windows 10 that I reckon comes with UEFI by default, no?

But I do remember in the past switching between UEFI and CMS mode in BIOS on one of the systems I worked on but it must be a different system (most likely one of the laptops).

Try doing that.

 

[Zerk2012]

From what I now know Secure Boot is not the same as UEFI, SB is something that can be enabled on top of UEFI.
But do I need such thing in the BIOS or do I just need an OS that has UEFI GPT partition?
The OS on this box is Windows 7 installed in old BIOS/legacy mode.
I think I have to install at least Windows 10 that I reckon comes with UEFI by default, no?

But I do remember in the past switching between UEFI and CMS mode in BIOS on one of the systems I worked on but it must be a different system (most likely one of the laptops).

SB has nothing to do with it.
The 5700XT has UEFI BIOS so the motherboard must also have it.
The older cards had the old BIOS and UEFI so they work with either.
It's possible a BIOS update to your board will add UEFI but not sure.

 

[MalcolmKK]

SB has nothing to do with it.
The 5700XT has UEFI BIOS so the motherboard must also have it.
The older cards had the old BIOS and UEFI so they work with either.
It's possible a BIOS update to your board will add UEFI but not sure.

I am going to check if there are any BIOS updates for this MB but I already upgraded it I think last year.

 

[MalcolmKK]

I checked and the last BIOS update was released on 2015/08/05 so 9 years ago and it's definitely that one that is flashed onto the motherboard.

I think since I cannot use this GPU on this system (no UEFI mode) I am going to swap this 5700XT GPU with AMD Radeon RX 590 that has comparable performance but works in BIOS/legacy mode.

 

[Imperat0r]

Hello.
Comparable in what way ?
Not even close.
I own both type of those cards and they are not comparable at all.
https://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/AMD-RX-590-vs-AMD-RX-5700-XT/4033vs4045

 

[logainofhades]

Yea the 5700xt and 590 are in totally different leagues. Not sure why you think they have comparable performance. They might when paired with an FX 8350, as those cpu's are quite weak. Had a couple FX 8320's overclocked to match an FX 8350. They were quite bad. Putting that 5700xt into your AM4 rig will give it quite an upgrade.

https://www.techpowerup.com/review/amd-radeon-rx-5700-xt/28.html

 

[MalcolmKK]

Apologies I bough them relatively cheap for the same amount of money but indeed it was 2 years apart.
I assumed that considering my "gaming rig" is PCIe Gen2 then I would never see the benefits of RX 5700XT in relation to RX 590. I think GPU is no longer a bottleneck in this setup (since I upgraded GPU from my Riva TNT2, just joking)
I can see that unlike RX 590 RX 5700XT needs 2x PCIe power cables connected what would explain higher power consumption and higher performance.

Unfortunately my old "gaming rig" won't have the 5700XT unless I upgrade the whole thing. I have to check this UEFI firmware thing next time when buying parts. 5700XT will go into my workstation instead, YouTube videos will render at higher frame rates I presume.

 

[logainofhades]

Your workstation will be quite the capable gaming rig, with that 5700xt in it. Yes, you would need to replace the whole thing, if you want a separate gaming rig, from your workstation rig. To be honest, a lowly i3 12100 would run circles around your FX. Even a gen 1 Ryzen would be a massive improvement. If money is an issue, maybe scour facebook marketplace for a complete rig that someone is selling. Preferably something compatible with Win 11, as Win 10 support is only about a year from ending.