WTB Single slot graphics card good enough to boot windows 11 without CSM

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Forums › Offers and Wanted › WTB Single slot graphics card good enough to boot windows 11 without CSM

richms

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#323699 3-Jan-2026 23:58

I made the mistake of getting a CPU without iGPU for my machine that I download on to upgrade it from the celeron that was too weak, and now I have my 1050 in it so I can use it but it covers the slot for the network card so I am back on the onboard gigabit. I would also like to get that back for another machine.

I tried some old AMD thing I had, but it kept forcing CSM back on, and there was no update for its bios.

So if you have anything that will take minimal power, take one slot up, and has proper UEFI bios on it that is cheap, let me know.

Richard rich.ms

fe31nz

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#3449507 4-Jan-2026 00:51

There are no video cards that take only 1 slot that I know of. Fortunately, the motherboard manufacturers now normally leave an empty slot beside the GPU (PCIe x16) slot. But if you are using an ancient motherboard that does not do this, the only option to keep using the slot that is shadowed by the video card is to use a low profile PCIe extender. I have one that I used to use to run my PCIe x1 DVB-T tuner card - I extended it out the back of the PC and ran the card there. This worked well for many years, but I have since upgraded to a newer motherboard that does have the extra empty slot and the tuner card is running internally now.

If your motherboard does actually have that extra empty slot, then you are looking for 1.5 or 2 slot video cards. In the Nvidia range, the cheapest that uses recent enough technology is the GT 1030 series, but even these are not cheap now. My preferred GT 1030 card is a silent one - no fans to cause the card to die when the fan does. Those are normally 2 slots wide. This is the only place I could find advertising available stock:

https://quietpc.co.nz/asus-gt1030-sl-2g-brk

I have 3 of those and an EVGA silent one as well. Since they do not have a fan to cause them to die early, they may be available second hand. Or maybe like me people keep them forever.

GT 1030 cards are good for HDMI 2.0 only and normally have one HTMI port and one DVI port. They are PCIe v3.0 and while most of them have a PCIe x16 connector, they actually only use PCIe x8 (half of the connector pins are unused). My EVGA one has a PCIe x8 connector, but I do not think they are available any more.

mentalinc

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#3449514 4-Jan-2026 07:53

Can you get a expansion pci ribbon to move the network card somewhere else?

CPU: AMD 5900x | RAM: GSKILL Trident Z Neo RGB F4-3600C16D-32GTZNC-32-GB | MB: Asus X570-E | GFX: EVGA FTW3 Ultra RTX 3080Ti| Monitor: LG 27GL850-B 2560x1440

Quic: https://account.quic.nz/refer/473833 R473833EQKIBX

shanes

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#3449517 4-Jan-2026 08:34

+1 for the extenders, I've successfully run a graphics card on a x1 slot in the same situation.

Have you considered using the 1050 to do the install, then run headless using RDP when necessary?

richms

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#3449518 4-Jan-2026 08:36

There were plenty of single slot cards around ages back, and I am hoping that someone may be offloading one of the older ones because they are upgrading to get AV1 support or something. A 1030 would be fine as all it gets looked at is when I cant RDP into it and its usually because its frozen partially or windows update is trying to trick me into using onedrive and for some reason that comes up before RDP starts working.

Moving the network card would be a last resort situation, Just hoping that I can exchange ~$50 for a solution to my problem from someone who has upgraded vs waiting on a PCIe riser turning up and having to hope that it will fit in the unused slot area since I was a genius and bought a microatx board when upgrading the machine to 8th gen.

Richard rich.ms

Mehrts

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#3449531 4-Jan-2026 09:33

Where are you based?

I've got an old Nvidia Quadro K4200 that's surplus to requirements which was originally from an HP Z440 workstation. It's single slot, single six pin power connector.
No idea what it's worth? $50 + courier?

I'm in Levin/Manawatu area.

tangerz

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#3449534 4-Jan-2026 10:08

Your best bet for single slot, low power, (no power connector), is gonna be a low end quadro card. I would think as far back as the Kepler "K" series cards should have UEFI compatible BIOS. Something like a K600 or K620.

The Pascal "P" series certainly do, (P400, P600), as evidenced by your 1050!

Theres a K620 on TM for $15 here

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eonsim

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#3449843 5-Jan-2026 09:48

The only easy to obtain single slot GPU I'm aware of if the NVIDIA GT 710, they can be picked up new at Pbtech. It's a pretty crapy GPU (budget model from 2014), but they are still making them, single slot, HDMI, VGA + DVI and does not require any power connectors. But if you need the cheapest, new single slot GPU just to act as video out for ~$110, it will do the job. Just don't buy the two slot GDDR version instead by accident.

Not sure with regards to CSM though...

https://www.pbtech.co.nz/product/VGAGBV00712/Gigabyte-NVIDIA-GeForce-GT-710-2GB-DDR3-Graphics-C

There is also the somewhat more expensive 1slot NIVIDA 1030:

https://www.pbtech.co.nz/product/VGAGBV11033/Gigabyte-NVIDIA-GeForce-GT-1030-2GB-DDR4-Graphics

Note there are two slot versions of each card so double check that you grab the correct one.