Pci-e Audio Cards?

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Bluemouse

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Hey all,

I was wondering if there was such a thing as a pci-e audio card?

I am all out of pci slots on my mobo, but I have a bunch of 8x and 1x pcie slots free. Any ideas?

Also, what other things can run on pcie besides graphics? I think there are firewire cards, but what else is there?

Thanks :)

Edit:

The reason I don't have any pci slots free is because I am worried about the ventilation from my two graphics cards. If I place a pci card next to the second gpu, I don't think there is enough space for it to vent properly.

motherboard.jpg
 
PCI or pci-e

My Audigy 4 is a PCI card.
I don't know what a pci-e is.
For Audio Please explain.
8x refers to AGP Graphic cards.
The newest Graphic cards are PCI-E (Express),but need a new mbd.
But you don't need unused cards filling slots.
More cards less air circulation.Use the furthest away slots.
 
PCI-e is PCI express, which is what most graphics cards use nowadays (The newer ones).

Older than PCI-E is AGP, and older than AGP is PCI

There are different speeds of pci-e, and most graphics cards are 16x. However, there are also 1x PCI-e slots as well (the little white ones in between the blue/black pci-e 16x slots on the picture above).

The two PCI slots are the ones on the far left of the board, but as you can see one of the slots is right next to where the fan of my GPU goes, which is really bad for circulation. Hence, I would like to be able to put a sound card/firewire card/etc in one of my pci-e 1x slots as well. They definately sell PCI-E firewire cards, but they are like 50 bux.
 
You cannot compare AGP with PCI or PCI-Express. AGP is a specialised graphics port whereas PCI and PCI-E are universal busses that can take all kinds of devices.

As for PCI-E sound.. I'm pretty sure there are no decent ones available. Maybe some protoype-quality chinese gadgets.. Maybe you can replace some of your PCI devices with PCI-E versions? You most likely can't afford a PCI bus extender..
 
Nodsu said:
As for PCI-E sound.. I'm pretty sure there are no decent ones available. Maybe some protoype-quality chinese gadgets.. Maybe you can replace some of your PCI devices with PCI-E versions? You most likely can't afford a PCI bus extender..

Not sure if they are decent but for sure they are expensive and geared towards pro guys, this is serious studio equipment.
http://digidesign.com/index.cfm?navid=48&key=/news/details.cfm&itemid=3828&langid=1

EDIT:

Sound Blaster also has one in works, too:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/multimedia/display/20070111140528.html
 
Yea. Well I suppose I could move the wifi card over to USB or something (although I don't really want to spend the money on something I already have) and then put the audio in pci and firewire in pci-e. Thats going to cost a good 200 dollars though :S
 
audio Usb? You mean external audio? How much do they go for? Are they as good as pci audio?

I would only need a decent one which supports 5.1 speakers.


Ruben said:
Not sure if they are decent but for sure they are expensive and geared towards pro guys, this is serious studio equipment.
http://digidesign.com/index.cfm?navid=48&key=/news/details.cfm&itemid=3828&langid=1

EDIT:

Sound Blaster also has one in works, too:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/multimedia/display/20070111140528.html


Ouch, the PCI one's recommended price is $129....I don't even want to think what the pcie goes for.
 
Oh !

You probably would need a new PCI-e slot mbd and a PCI-e card.
Whats your point ?
I'm staying with ATI AGP, but a PCI-e isn't half that at ATI.

http://shopati.ca/searchresults.asp?search_id=8
But the topic was about Audio,There are none Bluemouse.
Is your ? answered yet ?

Edited by Moderator: Removed quote. There`s no need to quote the post directly above your own. ;)
 
Er, well I have 2 free pcie 1x slots, so I wouldn't need another mobo if I bought the card.

Does anyone think that with the picture above, it would be okay to fill that second pci slot? (the one closest to the pci-e 16x slot). I am not sure if it is a good idea, because my second gpu is right next to it...

Hm, seems this picture only appears sometimes...
 
Slots

Are you really sure its the new pci express video slot.
Not the pci type for audio and LAN cards ?
This can be confussing,but there would only be 1 pci e and probably no AGP .
What video card do you have now ? AGP or older video PCI ?
Name the brand and model.
You need a motherboard manual or pdf version to explain your slots.

Edited by Moderator: Removed quote. There`s no need to quote the post directly above your own. ;)
 
I know my motherboard slots :)

I have 2 PCI-E 16x slots because I have an SLI-Ready board. I also have 2 PCI-E 1x and two PCI slots. However, the two PCI slots are crammed into one corner, and a 16x PCI-E slot is right next to it, causing me to worry that there would not be enough airflow if I filled the second PCI slot.

My Gpu(s) are 2x Nvidia 7600 GT (PCI-Express).

I really don't know why that image won't show up... Here is the link if someone else is having a problem seeing it too.

motherboardcm3.jpg

http://img296.imageshack.us/img296/9057/motherboardcm3.th.jpg

The two long white ones on the left are the PCI slots, the black and blue are the pci-e x16 slots, and the small white ones in between are the pci-e x1 slots. I have filled the black slot, the blue slot, and the far left pci slot.
 
Wow, that's pretty crammed in, but good for an mATX case :grinthumb
 
As long as it's not physically touching anything, it should be okay.
 
wouldnt all the heat from being .5 cm away from the fan of the gpu be bad though? Not to mention the poor ventilation from the gpu:
 
It's possible yes, but computers components are made for enduring heat as well.
 
Is the PCI card low-profile? If yes, then it would cover only half of the vid card's heatsink.
 
Er, well it would be an audio card. I dont know, since I haven't bought it yet :)

Can I buy low profile audio cards?
 
Most PCI devices are low-profile nowadays..

You can easily tell: if the PCB is almost as tall as the backplate, then the thing is full-sized, if the PCB is only up to half the backplate, then it is low-profile.
 
Pci-e Audio Cards

I'm in agreement with Bluemouse. My new mobo has 2-Pci-e x16 slots, 2-Pci-e x1 slots, and 1-Pci-e x4 slot. Seams to me, since they are putting so many Pci-e slots in these new mobo's, why haven't they come up with more devices for such slots? (as per say, Audio cards) Why should we have to use the PCI slots, expecially if they may cause interference with other devices?
 
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