Could a PCI-E 16x 2.0 card work in a 1.0 PCI-E slot? and would the performance decrease if it could?

[MraK]

I have parted ways with my old rig (see sig) to my sister and have decided to get her 2 9800GTX+s for SLI, since it will be released in a week or so and noticed that they are 2.0 slot cards and that the motherboard, the card will be used on, is a 680i board that has 1.0 slots.

Could a 2.0 card work on a 1.0 slot? and if so, would the performance decrease do to the limit of the 1.0 slot, since the cards are 2.0 required?

I know, it may sound like a noob question but I'm just not very familiar with this kind of thing and I dont want to waste my cash on something that may not work with this computer.

Thanks in Advance

 

[JPB]

Originally posted by: MrAK
I have parted ways with my old rig (see sig) to my sister and have decided to get her 2 9800GTX+s for SLI, since it will be released in a week or so and noticed that they are 2.0 slot cards and that the motherboard, the card will be used on, is a 680i board that has 1.0 slots.

Could a 2.0 card work on a 1.0 slot? and if so, would the performance decrease do to the limit of the 1.0 slot, since the cards are 2.0 required?

I know, it may sound like a noob question but I'm just not very familiar with this kind of thing and I dont want to waste my cash on something that may not work with this computer.

Thanks in Advance

Yup

 

[Keysplayr]

They should work fine.

 

[MraK]

k, so since they could work, would the card lose its %100 performance due to the slot being a 1.0 slot, since the card is 2.0?

 

[ViRGE]

No. There is a potential to lose performance, but it should not be severe and it will depend on the game.

 

[Hajpoj]

Considering no one has yet to maximize performance from PCI-E 1.0 yet...it just isn't possible at this point in time. All that 2.0 means is that they now have future headroom, or more "wiggle room" when developing tech to prevent hitting a wall. Hell they just maxed out AGP only recently!(if even) :roll:

Using this logic and following the trends, 1.0 shouldn't be a problem for future upgrades for a good while. <--If anyone has anything venerable to the contrary, please speak up!

 

[taltamir]

not true hajpoj.

there are many tests out there that show performance decrease. It would not be critical though.

 

[Hajpoj]

I mean it's not like it's going to be a deciding factor with the next gen of vid cards, And I would presume the performance hit would only be noticed if the rest of your specs were maxed that would allow a GPU bottleneck.

Hell; with 2 8800GT's SLI on a P5N-e SLI 1.0 board, I'm still CPU bound w/ an E8400@ 4.0ghz

Oblivion 1920x1200 with a boat load of mods.

 

[taltamir]

on a full 16x pcie v1 vs v2... then no it is not a deciding factor... but going down further (such as 8x or 4x CF operation and such) or using AGP for such a modern card does make the performance drop unacceptable.

You were just exaggerating too much.

And yea CPU bound is a serious problem, I recently did some serious testing showing that I am completely CPU bound (at low FPS) on Mass Effect with an E8400 @ 3.6ghz

 

[Hajpoj]

Mass Effect is HORRIBLY optimized for pc; since it's a port, you get "emulation-scaling" performance(basically your CPU is your daddy here).