Sound Card PCIe 1x on PCIe 4x , does it work?

[URBAN303]

Hi !

I have a problem ... i have Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3 Rev1.2 motherboard ...

Actually I have 2x R9-280X and 280X above the first I have an aquisition card video gaming. (PCIe 1x). I want to buy a Sonar or SoundBlaster but! I do not have PCIe 1x port available. If I insert an audio card pcie 1x on a port PCIe 4x is that it will work normally?

 

[RCoon]

Yes it will work, but it will steal lanes from your GPU's. If your Motherboard runs two GPU's in x8/x8 mode in crossfire, adding a sound card will steal 1 of the lanes from the GPU's, and the second will drop down to x4, cutting your GPU performance somewhat.

 

[URBAN303]

Yes it will work, but it will steal lanes from your GPU's. If your Motherboard runs two GPU's in x8/x8 mode in crossfire, adding a sound card will steal 1 of the lanes from the GPU's, and the second will drop down to x4, cutting your GPU performance somewhat.

Ah ... well then I must also replace my video aquisition card by finding a PCI (long) ... to use a PCIe 1x sound card for ... ok thank you for your reply and your valuable information

 

[URBAN303]

no! useless I found an ASUS Xonar D2/PM on a PCI bus

http://www.ldlc.com/fiche/PB00067287.html

Cool ^^

RCoon, with Audio Card on PCI it don't modify my crossfire ?

 

[RCoon]

Bare with me, I could be wrong. I've checked the specs of your board, and now I'm doubting what I said.

Can you please go into your BIOS and tell me what speed your two GPU lanes are running at. It will tell you what speed they are at, either x16 or x8. If it is x16/x16 or x16/x8, you can easily put a PCI sound card in there without an issue.

 

[URBAN303]

I have 2*16x + 2*4x PCIe Bus.

 

[RCoon]

I have 2*16x + 2*4x PCIe Bus.

Your BIOS should say specifically what speed the GPU's themselves are running at currently, not what the lanes are capable of.

 

[Ferrum Master]

Doesn't 1x lanes go through south bridge?

 

[URBAN303]

GPU-Z indicate PCIe 16x @ 16x (for the first and second card)

 

[RCoon]

GPU-Z indicate PCIe 16x @ 16x (for the first and second card)

You're good to go for a PCI-E Sound card then. Sorry for the confusion, i got too used to Intel boards and their limited lanes. I believe 990FXA has up to 40 lanes?

 

[URBAN303]

i don't know ... 990FXA have Southbridge SB950 :

an idea ?

 

[RCoon]

i don't know ... 990FXA have Southbridge SB950 :

an idea ?

It's fine, you have enough lanes for 2 GPU's and a sound card without losing performance. 32 in total, 16 for GPU1, 8 for GPU2 and 8 for sound card/other PCI_E devices.

 

[URBAN303]

Okay but i want to stay in 16/16 so i take an ASUS Xonar D2/PM in PCI mode (old) ^^ it's better ^^

 

[RCoon]

Okay but i want to stay in 16/16 so i take an ASUS Xonar D2/PM in PCI mode (old) ^^ it's better ^^

It doesn't matter if you take the older version, it still uses lanes running a GPU in x8 mode is fine anyway.

 

[URBAN303]

But .... i have already PCIe 1x card (aquisition video game card) ... don't take "lanes" ? it's that i don't understand in the fact ...

 

[zsolt_93]

The diagram mentions 2*16x+6*1x+4*1x lanes for the NB+SB. You are currently using 2*16x +1*1x for the hardware you have. You should not have problems with PCIE soundcards if you use the lowermost 16x slot, the one labeled with x4. That is connected to the Southbridge that delivers a maximum of x4. The rest are connected to the NB and share that bandwidth. Only if you add something in the second lower x16 will the graphics cards drop to x16/x8 to grant x8 to the third slot. Otherwise the third slot gets 0x and the two get 16x/16x. The capture card gets 1x from the 6 separate 1x lanes of the NB, along with integrated audio/network etc.

 

[URBAN303]

So if I understood everything ...

I am forced to use a Pcie 4x port; So if I put a sound card on one of them.
My second 16x PCIe 8x will automatically; is that it?

 

[Aquinus]

So if I understood everything ...

I am forced to use a Pcie 4x port; So if I put a sound card on one of them.
My second 16x PCIe 8x will automatically; is that it?

No, those two will stay at 16 lanes from what I've read so far. This was from the manual. You're not looking at the right block diagram.

 

[Mindweaver]

If you have all of the hardware why not test it out then check gpuz? Since you're not sure.

 

[URBAN303]

Indeed it is writing on the box of the motherboard PCIe x16 (Crossfire 2 channels) which means that in all cases the "two 16x" stay well "16x".

Okay and if i put Audio Card Pcie 1x into Pcie 4x ; it will be taken into account by Windows without any problems?

 

[URBAN303]

If you have all of the hardware why not test it out then check gpuz? Since you're not sure.

No ! I have not bought the sound card, I need it because obviously Battlefield 3 becomes erratic with the sound card of the motherboard ....

 

[KingPing]

Okay and if i put Audio Card Pcie 1x into Pcie 4x ; it will be taken into account by Windows without any problems?

Yes, i use my Titanium HD in a PCIe x4 slot, it works perfectly.

All PCIe devices are compatible with all PCIe slots whether they are x1, x4, x8 or x16. I have used a sound card in a x16 slot with zero issues.

 

[URBAN303]

I did not know it was possible; I thought about it and I thank you but others too

 

[Mindweaver]

No ! I have not bought the sound card, I need it because obviously Battlefield 3 becomes erratic with the sound card of the motherboard ....

Ahh ok, I was on my phone earlier and thought you had all the hardware. I didn't realize it was obvious that BF3 becomes erratic with on board sound? It works fine for me, but I would agree that a dedicated card would be better. As, most have already said you will be fine using a 1x card on a 4x slot.

 

[Aquinus]

Yeah, PCI-E will work on just about any port, even 16x cards can run in a 4x slot if there isn't an end to the slot itself. PCI-E 1x does assume it will draw less power than 4x or more unless it's running in "high-power" mode which is what all the other slots that are more than 1x run in.

For example, I have one of these running on my gateway in an x16 slot since it only has either 1x or 16x slots (two of the four are electrically 8x and if all are populated it runs at 8/8/8/8) so even if you put a card in that has more or less lanes than the slot, it will still work fine. It will use as many lanes as the device and the slot supports. If both have 16x, it runs at 16x, if one has 8x and the other has 4x, it will run at 4x. If the PCI-E device is PCI-E 3.0 and your board is 2.0, it will revert to 2.0 spec and speeds.

PCI-E is meant to be very flexible, you shouldn't run into any issues with different numbers of lanes or the spec it runs at.

The only time I've heard of issues is running PCI-E 1.1 devices on PCI-E 3.0 board when PCI-E handshaking will timeout when gen2 (2.0) or gen1 (v1.x) isn't forced.