PCI-E x4 ?

B

bonanza

New Member
From what I see, most of expansion slot types (non-vga) are PCI and PCI-E x1 nowadays (That's excluding SLI/Crossfire-mobo, because the other PCI-E can be used for x1, x4, x8, or even x16 card).

Now it seems to me that the future expansion slot is PCI-E x1. So what is this PCI-E x4 slot used for (I see few mobo has it) ?
Is it crucial to have PCI-E x4 or x8 slot in the future ?
I mean will this x4/x8 be more popular than x1 for the card's availability in the future ?

Thanks.
 
I think you have AGP 4x/8x confused with PCI-Express 16x and 1x SLI/Crossfire expansion somehow. The early PCI-E type cards ran equivalent to the AGP 4x/8x speeds. Those days are gone. The PCI-E 1x slot is more of a suppliment for some early attempts at dual vpu and dual card setups. Eventually you may looking at PCI-E 32x cards in the coming years.
 
PC eye said:
I think you have AGP 4x/8x confused with PCI-Express 16x and 1x SLI/Crossfire expansion somehow.
Click to expand...

There are PCI-Express 1x, 2x, 4x, 8x, 16x, and 32x... You just currently don't see anything more than 1x and 16x with most mobos.

It's all like AGP and various past expansions. There are faster and slower versions of them for different peripherals. For the most part, I think as long as you have a 16x and a few 1x slots, you'll be fine. Most devices still work just fine in older PCI slots so I doubt you'll really need PCI-Express for much of anything besides graphics for the next few years.
 
Kornowski said:
Would it be a bad idea to put a new PCI-e card in a PCI-e x 4 slot?
Click to expand...

Do you mean a PCI-E x1 card in an x4 slot? Then no, because they are designed to work in any slot higher then their own (PCI-E x1 card can go in an x4, x8 or x16 slot).

But a PCI-E x16 card cant go in a PCI-E x4 slot.
 
As far as I know they only make PCI-Ex16 and PCI-E x1 video cards.

PCI-E x4 would be fine for video cards that arent high performance, such as the 8xxx series or some high-end workstation cards.
 
The 8800 GTX would be used in a PCI-E 16x slot at this point. That's one of the newest higher end card there. When PCI-Express was first introduced the older 4x/8x were soon to be replaced with 16x models as the norm. One good site that goes into lengthy detail on the various PCI-E types is seen at http://www.gen-x-pc.com/pci_basic.htm
 
Kornowski said:
What, You mean like the 8800 GTX?
So a x4 PCI-e slot is fine... Thanks
Click to expand...

I'm not sure what you mean.

You can use higher bandwidth ports then what a specific card uses, like you can use a PCI-E x1 SATA card in an x4, x16 slot, etc. But you cant use a PCI-E x16 card in an x4, x1 slot, etc.
 
When explaining how a 4x card could go into a 16x slot the misunderstanding there is on running an 8800 GTX in a 4x slot. But like diduknowthat has mentioned the slots for the different cards are also different in length. With AGP slots it would be backward compatibility only with an 4x/8x card being used in a 2x/4x slot or 2x/4x used in the older 1x/2x slot.
 
AFAIK a PCI x4 card will fit in a PCIX16 slot but will not have to x16 potential, it will only run x4.

ASUS P5VD1-x is an example PCIX16 only X4 speed, but it does have full 8X AGP but they will not work simutaneously.
 
PC eye said:
When explaining how a 4x card could go into a 16x slot the misunderstanding there is on running an 8800 GTX in a 4x slot. But like diduknowthat has mentioned the slots for the different cards are also different in length. With AGP slots it would be backward compatibility only with an 4x/8x card being used in a 2x/4x slot or 2x/4x used in the older 1x/2x slot.
Click to expand...

mnitetrain said:
AFAIK a PCI x4 card will fit in a PCIX16 slot but will not have to x16 potential, it will only run x4.

ASUS P5VD1-x is an example PCIX16 only X4 speed, but it does have full 8X AGP but they will not work simutaneously.
Click to expand...

Yes, the PCI-E x4 card will fit in a PCI-E x16 slot, but not the other way around.
 
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