PCIx16 & PCIx1

[dfigravity]

I am almost ashamed to ask this question...but here it goes...

What is the purpose of having one PCIex16 slot and one PCIex1 slot on a mobo? I am still using AGP (until the wife gives me more money to upgrade) and have never dealt with the wondrous world of PCI cards. Wouldn't you want two x16 slots? Why is one of them a tiny little slot? :think:

[FuzzyPlushroom]

PCI-Express x1 is the new (ACR, AMR, CNR). It technically has more bandwidth than PCI, but very few people actually, you know, care.

Tiny little slots always suck (yes, I know the ACR is a flipped PCI slot).

[mtekk]

PCI-Express x1 is the new (ACR, AMR, CNR). It technically has more bandwidth than PCI, but very few people actually, you know, care.

Tiny little slots always suck (yes, I know the ACR is a flipped PCI slot).

Yes and no, ACR, AMR, and CNR where "special purpose" slots that really never took off as their accessories always taxed the CPU (e.g. those "winmodems"). The pci-e 1x slot is an actual replacement for the old PCI slots. Some items are actually using this now such as some network and audio cards and those video tuners/recorders. Mechanically the 1x slot doesn't make much sense as it's interface is almost too small compared to the size of the cards connecting into them, making them easyish to break. Some SATA raid cards use the 1x slot also. However more use 2x or 4x connectors.

It does make more sense, unless faced with space constraints to place all mechanically x16 slots. This is because you can use any pci-e card in a 16x slot as they are all mechanically and electrically compatible by design (sometimes they are auto detect in other cases a BIOS setting allows configuring the electrical connectivity of a slot).

The 1x slots will probably get phased out in favor of 2x or 4x slots, and they will gain popularity as the old PCI become unsupported (just like IDE on intel chipsets). We'll see more and more pci-e expansion cards introduced in the same time manor as SATA optical drives (wasn't until last year that they were readily available and affordable).

[dfigravity]

cool...I always thought the x1 slots looked funny/useless

[Spawn-Inc]

the only use i have ever seen them being used for is asus with onboard sound.

http://xtreview.com/images/NVIDIA-nForce-680i-SLI/Extreme-Asus-Striker-sound.jpg

[mtekk]

the only use i have ever seen them being used for is asus with onboard sound.

http://xtreview.com/images/NVIDIA-nForce-680i-SLI/Extreme-Asus-Striker-sound.jpg

Newegg seems to have a ton of 1x stuff, see this search (http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&Description=pci%20express%20x1&srchInDesc=card&bop=And&Pagesize=100)

[Trace]

nothing came up :/

[mtekk]

nothing came up :/

I don't understand what you're getting at, the link works.:think: :?

[Airbozo]

Link works for me too.

PCIe x1 is used quite often in servers. One of our customers uses a pcie x1 powered firewire card (high speed camera's) and a pcie x1 CAN bus card (for communicating with a robotics controller).

Why do they include x1 instead of x4? Cost.

[dfigravity]

interesting...here I was thinking they we're silly little useless slots. They're almost cute....almost.:bunny:

[widefault]

I've been running an x1 TV Tuner card for a year or so and have a second one in my parts box. There's no real benefit other than letting me use the regular PCI slots for other cards.

Creative even makes an x1 X-Fi card (http://www.soundblaster.com/products/product.asp?category=1&subcategory=208&product=16770).