Using a PCIe x1 card in a PCIe x16 slot

You can also install a x16 card into a x1 slot. A lot of x1 slots have the back portion removed just for that. You see PCI-E negotiates the requirements on startup.

PCI Express - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A PCIe card fits into a slot of its physical size or larger (with ×16 as the largest used), but may not fit into a smaller PCIe slot; for example, a ×16 card may not fit into a ×4 or ×8 slot. Some slots use open-ended sockets to permit physically longer cards and negotiate the best available electrical and logical connection.

Of course that is not overly common as most just use the x16 slot for all.

Yes, in Youtube I have seen a video of a brave technician which dared to cut the rest of a graphics card with a cutting wheel in order to make it physically PCI-E 1x. And then he installed in a PCI-E 1x slot and it worked! Because of the smaller size and only 1x speed function it can be used for basic display (like the Microsoft Basic Display Adapter). It has very few, close to nothing, acceleration, but it can work and be used in a dual screen setup! But the normal is to use a small size card on a larger PCI-E slot when no PCI-E 1x slot is available. The opposite is very uncommon and really not recommended.

Antilope said:

Here is something I recently found out. I have tired this and it works.

You can use a PCIe x1 card, or a PCIe x4 card in a PCIe x16 slot. They work fine. So if you think you are short of PCI-e slots, you may not be. A shorter PCIe card works fine in a longer slot.

On PCIe X1, X4 and X16 slots, the first 18 pins are all wired the same, so as long as the PCI-Express card fits in the PCI-Express slot, it should work.

This is not the case for the legacy PCI (32-bit, non-express) slots, that are not PCI-Express. Those are not compatable with PCIe cards.

Attachment 36263
Picture of assorted PCIe and PCI slots.

The top four slots, in the picture above, are, from the top to bottom,
PCIe x4 slot , PCIe x16 slot, PCIe x1 slot and another PCIe x16 slot. A PCIe card that can physically fit in any of these slots will work, even if it doesn't fill the entire slot.

The bottom, 5th slot, is a PCI legacy (32-bit) slot. PCIe (express) cards will not work in this slot. It only accepts legacy PCI cards.

Here is the PCI-Express page on Wikipedia showing pinouts, etc.
PCI Express - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

YouTube Video showing PCIe X1 card in a PCIe X16 slot.
x1, x4 pci Cards Fit Into x16 pci-e Slot - YouTube

Here are links to discussions on this subject at Tom's Hardware.

"Can I install a PCI-e x1 Wireless network card in a PCI-e x16 slot?"

http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/...-x16-slot.html

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/205984-33-card-slot

http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/...-x16-slot.html

Thanks. I didn't know that.