Problems with HIP on external graphics (request for BIOS update)

[ralperq]

I have a laptop with an external Radeon 500 Series GPU (RX 540X 2G) and I am having problems with GPU acceleration and HIP. In other words, I cannot render in Blender or run LLM on the external video card (only on the CPU). At the same time, I have no problems with games; the video card works perfectly in them.

I suspect that the problem is in the BIOS, because I get the same problems in Linux (i.e., kfd complains everywhere; when I run any program through the RX 540, I get endless loading, and the only way to fix it is to turn off GPU acceleration). I've gone through all the settings and updated the BIOS to the latest version, updated the AMD driver in Windows, and tried all the available packages in Linux. So coming here is my last hope.

I am interested in the following questions:
1. Can I somehow indicate that I need a specific BIOS update?
2. Is it worth the effort? I feel like I'm asking too much from a 2018 laptop. All I want is to run LLM up to 12B locally, which the CPU can handle, but using the CPU for this seems like a very bad idea.
3. Will I have the same problem if I connect an eGPU via Type-C, Thunderbolt 3? (I understand that it's cheaper to buy a new laptop, but I like this one.)

[Huffer · Accepted solution]

By external I believe you mean switchable. I do not think a BIOS update is going to help you. An eGPU is not going to work as your USB-C port is not Thunderbolt compatible. Advanced features of Blender and Large Language Model rendering were likely not thought of when the GPU was designed. That explains why your video card can do games but not the rendering you want to do. So we know it "works". This link has some suggestions you may or may not have tried.

https://www.google.com/search?q=rx+540+blender+rendering&rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS1022US1022&oq=RX+540+blende...

[ralperq]

The documentation says it's Thunderbolt 3 (I believe so because I see a lightning bolt icon next to the port). I didn't think the problem could be hardware rather than software. After googling, I found many other solutions (almost all of which advise staying away from the video card), thanks for that. Well, I think I'll spend some time checking them out.

I have stupid question. If I take my laptop to a service center and ask them to desolder this gpu and replace it with a compatible one (if such a thing even exists for my L15520-001 with PCIe 3.0 x8), will that solve the problem? Sorry, I don't really understand how laptops work at a low level.

[Huffer]

The lightning bolt can just mean HP Sleep and Charge which puts out a current for charging your cell, etc. while the laptop is asleep. I found the Service Manual and it does say the USB-C port is Tbolt.  So it will support an egpu although those are not very user friendly or inexpensive. Its an external dock with a video card slot like a dektop so you need a power supply, the dock, a video card and an external monitor. 

There is no way to desolder a video chip and replace it with a better one. Just not done as the motherboard is plumbed to accept only the video chip it has now and chip level motherboard modifications only rarely can be done on a laptop.