**POLL** That 6th PCI slot - Useful or Wasteful?

[RaiderJ]

I personally really like having that 6th PCI slot, mostly because I always block the 1st one with a watercooled video card. I wish more mobo makers would include that slot, or at least shove the other ones a notch away from the video card!

 

[bjc112]

Ya, what the hell... Never know if your going to need one..

Plus I have my HDD's down low, so the ATA 100 card goes in the lowest slot available.. Hides the cables below window view..

However i only use one of them.

 

[Corporate Thug]

i've never used more than 4 slots

 

[sandorski]

The most I've ever needed was 4(Voodoo2, soundcard, NIC, SCSI controller) and that was years ago. Now I only use 1(soundcard), though I've toyed with the idea of getting a PCI SATA controller. The "need" for 5 free PCI slots is likely much rarer than the market for 5/6 PCI slot mobos, I suspect.

 

[Ionizer86]

I've got 5 cards; one empty PCI. The one beside the vid card is empty. Here are the cards: (recently dead) SB128 digital, 1394 card, IOMagic PCPVR capture/tuning card, 10/100 lan card, 56k v.92 modem. Quite a lot. I don't think that many slots are necessary though because newer boards have integrated features, and you need to use a case spot for the brackets anyway.

Setup once 8rda+ arrives tomorrow: SPDIF header, PCPVR card, v.92 modem, USB2 header, 1394 header, gameport header. That'll be 6 slots taken by only 2 cards and 4 headers.

Cliffs notes: no, extra pci's won't help. You can place headers in case openings to get desired functionality, and the header prevents the pci slot from being used anyway.

 

[glugglug]

Nowadays with most things integrated on the motherboard you really don't need 6 slots, but it's nice to have just in case you want to throw in multiple nics for a PC-based router, and maybe give it SCSI RAID for a fileserver too or something.

My old K6 system did have 2 out of 3 EISA and 3 out of 4 PCI slots in use. That was back in the Voodoo days with separate video cards for 2D and 3D.

Theres also lots of hardware for specialized applications that can use up some of the slots. (A/D converters, high precision stepper motor control cards, special camera cards (not webcams), etc.), although a lot of that stuff is moving to USB nowadays.

 

[beatle]

I was glad I had 6 on my KT7a-raid. I had a scsi card, 2 nics, sound, tv tuner, and a modem. Now with so many things integrated well into motherboards, I don't really need 6. Heck, I'm only using one PCI slot now (tv tuner).

 

[Ionizer86]

RaiderJ, I guess pci slots really aren't about motherboard size, as the boards we use are mostly atx anyway. 5 and 6 PCI slot boards are like the same size unless the board is a lite board (ie the MSI K7T Turbo Lite: same length, less width).

 

[glugglug]

Originally posted by: Ionizer86
I've got 5 cards; one empty PCI. The one beside the vid card is empty. Here are the cards: (recently dead) SB128 digital, 1394 card, IOMagic PCPVR capture/tuning card, 10/100 lan card, 56k v.92 modem. Quite a lot. I don't think that many slots are necessary though because newer boards have integrated features, and you need to use a case spot for the brackets anyway.

Setup once 8rda+ arrives tomorrow: SPDIF header, PCPVR card, v.92 modem, USB2 header, 1394 header, gameport header. That'll be 6 slots taken by only 2 cards and 4 headers.

Cliffs notes: no, extra pci's won't help. You can place headers in case openings to get desired functionality, and the header prevents the pci slot from being used anyway.

A standard ATX case has 7 full size (5.25"?) slot openings, 2 "mini" slot openings about 2/3 size, 2 DB-25 size openings, and a DB-9 opening, and that doesn't include the ATX port panel.

A standard AT case has 8 full size openings in addition to other openings (5 DB-25 size, 3 DB-9 size on my old AT tower). You can always run some of the ports to drive bay panels too. Some of those ports you list should definately be coming out of the same case opening btw, for example, USB2 ports + 1394 ports + gameport should easily fit within one slot opening.

 

[sp80]

Im my experience, I dont even use my PCI slots, I use the onboard sound. It seems everything now a days is onboard, so I feel that 6 PCI slots is overkill

-Spencer

 

[compudog]

With my A7N8X, I have no need for more than 2 PCI slots. Back in my Socket 7 days I would have loved to have 6 PCI's though.

 

[Actaeon]

Nice to have, but not required.

 

[Swanny]

I've never used that many slots!

 

[sman789]

two nics, 1 PVR, 1 blocked by Zalman

i'm happy to have 5....may get a soundcard

6 would be really cool

 

[Ionizer86]

glugglug, maybe I'm using cheap cases, but I don't know of any openings other than the 7 slot openings for pci and agp (ie the mini slot, DB-25, and DB-9). Maybe you can post links to pics I do agree that some ports could fit on one slot, but that'd take a person willing to mod the brackets etc (ie not me).

sp80, I agree that on-board sound is getting better. I can't wait to hear my 8rda+ digital spdif sound thru my speakers

 

[glugglug]

On a ATX case, the extra openings are directly above the ATX port panel that has all the ports integrated onto the motherboard (to the right of it looking at the back of the case in a tower config). I've seen this location used for a fan on some minitowers, since there's no space for a fan above the power supply like there is in a full tower.

 

[brunswickite]

sound card
tv card
wireless nic
wired nic
pci switch for CC

using all 5 slots

 

[jose]

I'd say very useful, nowadays the video card takes up 2 slots..

agp/pci used by big as& video card
pci:
2 scsi
3 nic
4 sound
5 raid
6 free

Regard,
Jose

 

[magomago]

Right now all I'm using is my modem....


but back with my old socket 7 I wish I had 6 pci slots....

I had videocard, NIC, Modem, Sound Card...all on the PCI bus. I also had ANOTHER NIC on an ISA slot ....

 

[Noriaki]

I had all 5 PCI slots full at one point, I'm down to 3 now...and I could probably lose the NIC since I have one on board.

I doubt I'll ever use 6 PCI slots.

My 5 were:
NIC
Sound
TV-Tuner
Hollywood Plus
ATA controller

I hardly need a hollywood plus with a Radeon 7500 in here, and these days set top DVD players are pretty cheap anyways.

ATA controller is a possible again...or more likely a SCSI card.

I have my TV-Tuner, Sound and NIC in right now, I could lose the NIC probalby since I have it built in on my board, but the built in NIC isn't detected until after Windows is installed and I isntall the nForce drivers.

I can see a possible scenario where I might use 5 PCI slots again...but 4 is more likely, and 6 is very unlikely.

But all in all, I'm getting pretty close to 6, and I consider myself a moderate "expander" I think there should be a better selection of boards with 6 PCI slots.

 

[Acanthus]

i rarely use more than 2 on new PCs, unless its a workstation/server.

 

[BurnItDwn]

I like to have 6 PCI slots ... in the past I have used mobos with 6 and used them all, and I have also used mobos with 5 and wanted another PCI slot ....

Currently It doesn't matter for most of my boxes since most decent Video cards come with dual outputs nowadays which reduces the need for PCI vid cards, and Integrated ethernet reduces the need for Ethernet cards, but I still could fill 6 slots if I wanted to ... tripple display, SCSI, IDE Raid, dual nics, soundcard ... etc ... you can never have too much expandabillity.

 

[Auric]

I'd rather have a fully featured MicroATX board than a hoggish ATX. Alas they are invariably lesser featured (and not always due to space limitations). As said, with all the integrated schtuff, the average schmuck really doesn't need a full ATX, nevermind 6 PCI slots.

 

[Chaotic42]

I like it, because I have 2 64bit 66MHz slots. Having the available 32bit slots is nice for crap like USB cards.

 

[fredtam]

I don't really have a use for the extra slots but I do like to keep extra cards as far away from the video card as possible for cooling purposes. I have a modem in the bottom slot now.