8x pci-e slot - can I run blu-ray through it?

etheesdad

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Jan 8, 2008
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am rebuilding my htpc. Have got two mobos; one has an 8xpci-e - the other has 16x pci-e. Easiest option would be to use the 8x board in the htpc but cant seem to find much on google or forums about how well it works with blu-ray. I'll be using a card with hardware decoding, probably a 9400 nvidia or a 4 series ATI.

Just wondered if anyone out there has some experience of this? Will the 8x bandwidth be sufficient for decent picture quality? (the rest of the machine's hardware is up to the task, - RAM, CPU, etc - just worried about the slot)

Oh, BTW, it _is_ a physical 16x slot not a physical 8x slot (apparently there was a different interface on the 8x models originally - this is 16x but with 8x capacity)

mobo specs here
http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/Motherboard/Products_Spec.aspx?ClassValue=Motherboard&ProductID=2507&ProductName=GA-M61SME-S2
 

V3NOM

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hmmm... well im pretty sure the card would be bottlenecked by that...but whether it would still be a good quality picture, i'm fairly certain.

what's stopping you from using the x16 mobo exactly?
 

wimcle

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pcie 8x is 2000 Mb/s ... Im sure the 20Mb/s of HD video wont worry it :) It come down to whether your cpu of gpu can handle the decompression
 

etheesdad

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Well it looks unanimous then. Thanks all very much for the replies.

Its great to see such a solid response to a forum post. I appreciate the advice.

curnel_d , are/have you using/used the machine to play blu-ray?