I asked tech support at PNY about conflicting information on a product I saw at Newegg. It's a NVS 295 PCIeX1 dual monitor GPU. Here's the dialogue: Question: In consideration of your product number VCQ295NVS-X1-PB which is a NVS295x1 gpu, I am seeing conflicting information on your product page. By looking at the card I can see it fits (physically) into an x1 PCI slot, but the System Requirements and other descriptions on the product page say that a minimum of x16 is required. My question is "What is the minimum system requirement (in PIC slot) required to run this card?" and "How many in aggregate can I install in a WinXP or Win7 box?" Answer: Hello, Thank you for contacting PNY Technical Support. In reviewing your message, Thank you for bring this to our attention, this is a misprint, the minimum requirement is an x1 pci-e slot but is forward compatible with x4/x8 and x16 slots. For your second question, there are many factors, however provided there is enough power and motherboard resources and available slots, the maximum that can be used is five cards for a total of ten monitors(per machine), generally most industry standard motherboards have two X1 slots or one x1 slot and one x16 which limits the amount you can install per machine to two cards(generally speaking of course) If there is any other information that you require please let me know and I will assist you, I will also forward your contact information to our field sales engineer so that he can also assist you and possibly help you with inventory and roadmaps. Best Regards, Hector PNY Technologies Support 800-230-0130 M-F 9 AM - 8 PM EST The GPU I was inquiring about is $139 at Newegg http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814133277&cm_re=nvs_295-_-14-133-277-_-Product
Tech support gave you a clear answer. I think you are confusing PCI and PCIe. The card you are referring to is an x1 PCIe and won't fit in a PCI slot because they are completely different standards. It will fit in any PCIe (pci express) slot. I currently run two PNY Quadro NVS 290 cards (very similar) and they are excellent.
The confusion was on the manufacturer's product specifications page. It said x16 minimum slot required when it clearly is an x1 card. That's the only confusion that existed. And some people had said that although it's an x1 card, it won't run in an x1 slot, so I asked the manuf to clarify it. People on this site are building boxes all the time and looking to expand with multiple monitors. This seems like a cheap(er) way out. PNY says if you can fit five of them in your box you can run 10 monitors. It would be interesting to see ten monitors all running on x1 cards.
Interesting. However, I can't (1) run my 290/295x1 cards in my x1 slot, nor (2) run them in an x16 slot. Don't know if that is a general condition and PNY is not aware, or just an issue with my hardware.
a good faq on pci vs pcie x1, x4, x16 etc can be found at http://www.emcworkstations.com/faqs.asp#PCIx although they (the manufactures) say they are backwards compatible, I have found same problems as Scataphagos. It is really dependent on the chipset of the motherboard and video card. x1 cards in my opinion are a tech support nightmare. If you get them to work, do not change a thing!! I have found that it is best to stay with the x16 cards wherever possible.
I have found the x1s to work in x4 and x8 slots. So.. a premium choice for a trader who wants to run 8-10 monitors might be a Precision T3500... x58 mobo with 2, x16 slots and 2, x8. If one wants to run 10 monitors, might have to run at least 1 quad.