# Putting an AGP card in a PCI slot.

## Cuardin

OK, I am thinking about getting more than one graphics card in my comp. Now, getting a good PCI graphics card these days is easier said than done. 

And searching the web lead me to the lkml where it was stated that the earlier AGPs (1x/2x) are in fact just a superset of PCI. It was also said that if certain pins are simply not connected, then the card will be a de-facto PCI card. 

So I was wondering:

 :Arrow:  Does an AGP card physically fit in a PCI slot?

 :Arrow:  If not, are there adaptors?

 :Arrow:  If it does, will a card supporting AGP 1x/2x turn into a PCI card.

 :Arrow:  Has anyone had the balls to try this?

--Cuardin

aka Daniel Armyr

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## TheCoop

 :Arrow:  no

 :Arrow:  no

 :Arrow:  no

 :Arrow:  no

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## vonhelmet

JUST SAY NO!

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## Cuardin

FOr some reason I seriously doubt that the correct answer to question 4 is no. But I thank you for your answer, althought it was quite negative. Am I to understand this to alsom mean that the AGP is NOT backwards compatible with PCI?

http://www.uwsg.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0010.2/0859.html

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## NeddySeagoon

Cuardin,

AGP at its crudest is a 66MHz version of PCI but cut down  to be a point to point link.  It does not support the concept of an AGP bus.

Also, you may have noticed that the connectors are phyically different and spaced differently from the back edge of the motherboard. This is done to discourage those who would put a PCI cand in an AGP slot, or vice versa.

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## lbrtuk

An AGP card will actually go into a PCI slot if you push really really hard.

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## Cuardin

So it's either wait untill the dual AGPslot motherboards are affordable, or go find myself a manufacturer that still makes PCI versions of the cards?

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## Malakin

Just get a dual head agp card.

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## searcher

Or get yourself a Riva TNT2 card, these are cheap, and usually come in a PCI version.

~searcher

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## Chris W

 *Cuardin wrote:*   

> So it's either wait untill the dual AGPslot motherboards are affordable.

 

I don't believe that AGP can support the concept of multiple devices in a bus.  You can, I understand, have one AGP per PCI bus, so some large servers have the potential for multiple AGP sockets.  It's unlikely there will be dual AGP motherboards in the consumer market.  

PCI Express might address this limitation.

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## shakti

i just baught a fx5200 pci and it runs faster than the agp version due to faster memory speed.

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## hackerError

 *TheCoop wrote:*   

>  no
> 
>  no
> 
>  no
> ...

 

actually it's:

 :Arrow:  no

 :Arrow:  no

 :Arrow:  no

 :Arrow:  yes

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## Cuardin

Yeah, I allready hade a tripple-head card, but this time I don'ät simply want more screens. I want screesns that are good for different things. I want an nVidia with a CRT card for games and things that just need blazing polygon rendering speed, and a Matrox/3dlabs card for a digital flat-panel for things that require better color depth and dynamics. But it would still be nice to get a card with more than 32Mb or RAM for that flat-panel

--Daniel Armyr

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## NeddySeagoon

Cuardin,

Exactly what specificaions does your dream graphics card have?

hackerError,

When you witnessed this event, what happened ?

I'm sure we all want to know.

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## Malakin

 *Quote:*   

> But it would still be nice to get a card with more than 32Mb or RAM for that flat-panel

 Unless you're using 3d more then 32MB of ram won't make any difference. If you're using a nice LCD with a 1600x1200 resolution running in 24/32 bit color double buffered that's still only about 15MB.

You could always wait until pci express is available and then you should be able to use several decent video cards at once.

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## Cuardin

If I were buying today I would get whichever Gforce is the fastest, and a Matrox 550.

As for 3d, I tend to use it quite a bit, so it would be niec with som minimal support for it at least.

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## NeddySeagoon

Cuardin

What does the Matrox 550 give you that the nVidia 6800 doesn't?

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## Malakin

 *Quote:*   

> What does the Matrox 550 give you that the nVidia 6800 doesn't?

 Some people would argue that it has better 2d image quality at high resolutions. Whether this is still true or not I have my doubts.

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## Cuardin

Yes. It can be argued. I believe I see a difference. And even if there is no difference, I still want it.

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## pizen

 *lbrtuk wrote:*   

> An AGP card will actually go into a PCI slot if you push really really hard.

 

Hell, that technique works with any square peg and round hole.

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