PCI-E Link Width only x8?

R

RyanEJ8

New Member
I just installed a BFG GeForce 8800GTS OC 320MB into my Acer Aspire desktop. When I check my PCI-E Link in CPU-Z I get the following:

Northbridge NVIDIA MCP61 rev. A1
Southbridge NVIDIA MCP61 rev. A2
Graphic Interface PCI-Express
PCI-E Link Width x8
PCI-E Max Link Width x16

Shouldn't the link width be set at x16 for a single card?

Thanks

Ryan
 
This board supposably has a x16 slot and CPU-Z says it has a max width link of x16. How do I set it to the max?
 
Be sure you're not in SLI mode or anything. I know many older boards(mine included) ran each 16x slot at only 8x...not that it makes that much of a difference.
 
[-0MEGA-];681076 said:
Have you looked around in the BIOS?
Click to expand...

Couldn't find anything anywhere in the Bios unless theres some control panel hidden. I can't find any adjustments for CPU and memory overclocking in there either. I've tried CTRL F1 and F2.


The_Other_One said:
Be sure you're not in SLI mode or anything. I know many older boards(mine included) ran each 16x slot at only 8x...not that it makes that much of a difference.
Click to expand...

I don't think my board could be in SLI mode because it only has one PCI-E x16 slot. Is there a switch I didn't see on the 8800GTS? :confused:

A test that Tom's hardware did shows that more recent cards like the 8800GTS are affected pretty significantly by running only in x8. They did an older test that it didn't prove to be much of a hinderance, but with newer cards it appears it is.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/03/27/pci_express_scaling_analysis/index.html
 
I double checked the bios again. There is nothing in there to change to the speed of the PCI-e slot to x16.

I wonder if I called Acer and complained that their "PCI-e x16 slot" isn't really x16 if I would get anywhere. Maybe they know a way to change it? :(
 
RyanEJ8 said:
I double checked the bios again. There is nothing in there to change to the speed of the PCI-e slot to x16.

I wonder if I called Acer and complained that their "PCI-e x16 slot" isn't really x16 if I would get anywhere. Maybe they know a way to change it? :(
Click to expand...
The chipset determines the speed of the PCI-E bus, so it's nothing you can change on your motherboard. Technically it's a PCI-E x16 slot, but it only runs at x8 speeds.
 
RyanEJ8 said:
Wouldn't that make it a PCI-E x8 slot then? lol
Click to expand...
No because a PCI-E x16 and PCI-E x8 slot look different. If you had a PCI-E x8 slot then you couldnt use an x16 card because the card would be bigger then the slot.

When someone says PCI-E x16, they are mainly referring to the slot type, because that slot can run at 8x, or even 4x speeds.
 
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