PCI-e X1?

[Slowdog2]

I see alot of the motherboards list 1 or 2 even 3, PCI-e x1 slots what are they for?
sorry for asking {feel like a boner} but I dont have a clue?
thanks
Slo
I know! Slo fits :roll:

 

[bront]

PCI-E is supposed to eventualy replace PCI. However, since the extra bandwidth is not needed, and most motherboards have both slots, adopting the standard seems a bit slow.

You can find a few network cards, video capture cards, and even sound cards that use them, but they are generaly few and far between.

 

[DragonDoc]

The PCIe link is built around a bidirectional, serial (1-bit), point-to-point connection known as a "lane". This is in sharp contrast to the PCI connection, which is a bus-based system where all the devices share the same unidirectional, 32-bit, parallel bus.

At the electrical level, each lane utilizes two unidirectional low voltage differential signaling (LVDS) pairs at 2.5 gigabaud. Transmit and receive are separate differential-pairs, for a total of 4 data wires per lane.

A connection between any two PCIe devices is known as a "link", and is built up from a collection of 1 or more lanes. All devices must minimally support single-lane (x1) links. Devices may optionally support wider links composed of 2, 4, 8, 12, 16, or 32 lanes. This allows for very good compatibility in two ways. A PCIe card will physically fit (and work correctly) in any slot that is at least as large as it is (e.g. an x1 card will work in an x4 or x16 slot), and a slot of a large physical size (e.g. x16) can be wired electrically with fewer lanes (e.g. x1 or x8; however it must still provide the power and ground connections required by the larger physical slot size). In both cases, the PCIe link will negotiate the highest mutually supported number of lanes. It is not, however, possible for a device to operate in a slot that is physically smaller than it (eg. a x4 card cannot fit in a slot which is physically an x1 slot - though it could operate in a x4 slot wired with only 1 lane).

:?: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia...Read More

:arrow: Matrox Millennium G550 products for PCIe (PCI Express) are the world's first PCI Express x1 graphics cards. The unique x1 design allows these cards to be compatible with all compliant PCIe slots.

:?: These cards bring the reliability, image quality, and features .....Read More.......

 

[Slowdog2]

Thank you for the fast response.
And also for the info!!
thats what I thought they might be for but seemed like they were allways by the graphics card slot so I wondered if they might be some older or earlyer type of PCI-e graphic card that maybe I hadn't seen or read about?

 

[DragonDoc]

No problem. :lol:
I think we will be seeing more stuff on x1 in the future.

 

[Heyyou27]

My only PCI-E 1X card is a Powercolor tv tuner.

 

[DragonDoc]

My only PCI-E 1X card is a Powercolor tv tuner.

Cool, What do you think of your X2? Ive got a 4400+!

 

[Heyyou27]

It's fine, not great.