Does a DUAL Video card take 2 PCI slots?
So I'm going to buy an Nvidia 450 GTS For my desktop computer. I plan to use it in a PCI slot.
My question is since it is Dual Graphics Card, does that mean there are 2 seperate graphics cards that must be put into two PCI slots?
ALSO, My computer has 1 free PCI slot and 1 free PCI express slot. Can someone please tell me the difference? And if a dual GPU needs 2 PCI slots can i use a PCI express and PCI to satisfy it?
PLEASE give me some information on this matter.
Comments
There are cards that have dual GPU on them, but use only one PCI-Express slot. As an example, I had a 4870x2 video card. It's dual 4870's on one card, one slot....
I believe there is a ATI 5000 series card that is dual GPU on one card as well.... Not sure about Nvidia, but would not be surprised to see some there too...
Dual GPU video card is not the same as SLI or Crossfire - that requires two (or more) separate cards (and slots)
Cards now a days high end need extra cooling, so high end cards and some others need room, take up two PCIExpress x 16 slots, but only need one PCIExpress X 16 slot to work, additional power if needed will come from power supply and are called PCIE connectors 8 pin or 6 pin and combinations needed. Me I use Sapphire 6970, use one PCIExpress x 16 slot and one 6 pin PCIe connector and one 8 pin PCIE connector, the Sapphire 6970 takes up two PCIExpress slots ( room ). PCI was a great slot 10 years ago, AGP was always suppose to be great but wasn't, version 1.0 1x , 2x bad, version 2.0 2x,4x AGP bad, and then version 3.0 4x,8x AGP the best but still not great, that is why the PCIExpress X 16 slot rolled out, way better than any AGP slot ever was. Bottleneck = AGP slot. Sapphire makes a dual GPU card , the Sapphire 6970 TOXIC is one example of four 5970 dual gpu cards they make, how ever the TOXIC version is the fastest, needs 850 watt power supply, and has onboard memory of 4 GB, this one takes up two PCIExpress slots as well in room and requires only one PCIExpress x 16 slot and two 8 pin PCIE connectors for extra power.
Pci express is the standard in video cards. pci-e x16(which is the slot for graphics) is many times faster then normal pci. They havent made pci cards in a very long time.
And its better to get 1 higher end card, then 2 lesser cards.
how much do you want to spend? id look into either the ATI 5700 series(or higher) or maybe the nvidia GTX 400 series (or above)
First you will possibly be able to desire to earnings your motherboard specs and discover out which twin-card technologies it helps. If it fairly is SLI you're all sparkling to characteristic yet another 9800GT. If it fairly is Crossfire you could in basic terms use twin ATI enjoying cards. you need to use any single card you prefer on the two form of motherboard. For SLI, the enjoying cards might desire to be an identical kind, yet different manufacturers are ok. Even a 512mb 9800GT and 1gb 9800GT is high quality (the two would be dealt with as a results of fact the smaller ability) as long as they have an identical GPU.