Agp, pci, pci-e
- Thread starter quintin3
- Start date
Aastii
VIP Member
that isn't strictly true.
You can get PCI graphics cards, you can use a normal graphics card on any PCI slot so long as it can fit in, obviously it will be slower, but it will work
They are all 3 expansion slots, meaning you can put extra, non-essential components in, by which I mean they aren't needed to run the system, like graphics cards, NIC's, sound cards, RAID controllers, modems etc. They just use different layouts and support different things.
Linkin was right in that AGP is for older components, it is just about redundant now. PCI is generally for the expansion cards now, like your sound cards, wireless cards etc, and PCI-e is for graphics cards, but you can use a PCI-e card in a PCI slot and vice versa
Drenlin
Active Member
PCI came first, and you can still get some graphics cards for it, though they're rather weak.
AGP came next, and was a video interface...it's gone now.
PCI express, or PCI-e for short, is the new standard. The number after it, like x16, x4, or x1, refers to how many lanes of data the slot has. You'll notice that this corresponds directly to how long the slot it.
An interesting thing about PCI-e is that none of the connections behind the little tab on the front are dedicated to anything. What this means is that you can plug a PCI-e card into any PCI-e slot that it will fit in, no matter the size. Some motherboard manufacturers even leave the back of the slot open, so that you can plug cards made for bigger slots into the smaller ones. It's strange, but it works. Sometimes video cards even work there.
An exception to that is video cards and the PCIe x16 2.0 slots. Often, these are for use only with video cards, though it's not unheard of for them to be available for other cards to use.
Here's some pictures to help:
Here you can see the open-backed x4 and x1 slots that allow cards meant for larger slots to work:
AGP came next, and was a video interface...it's gone now.
PCI express, or PCI-e for short, is the new standard. The number after it, like x16, x4, or x1, refers to how many lanes of data the slot has. You'll notice that this corresponds directly to how long the slot it.
An interesting thing about PCI-e is that none of the connections behind the little tab on the front are dedicated to anything. What this means is that you can plug a PCI-e card into any PCI-e slot that it will fit in, no matter the size. Some motherboard manufacturers even leave the back of the slot open, so that you can plug cards made for bigger slots into the smaller ones. It's strange, but it works. Sometimes video cards even work there.
An exception to that is video cards and the PCIe x16 2.0 slots. Often, these are for use only with video cards, though it's not unheard of for them to be available for other cards to use.
Here's some pictures to help:
Here you can see the open-backed x4 and x1 slots that allow cards meant for larger slots to work:
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Well, PCI and PCIe are two different ways of communicating. They are not compatible.
MacBook
banned
Basically just repeated what I said with more info^^ Show off.
lol
