Motherboard manual PCIE nonsense.

I would prefer to plug my PCI 1x soundcard into the PCIEX16_3 slot but I cannot make sense of whether a 1x card will disable SATA ports as the manual mentions but doesn't seem to describe very well. Can anyone make sense of this?



Edit: I want to use SATA 1-4 ports.

Kol12 said:

I would prefer to plug my PCI 1x soundcard into the PCIEX16_3 slot but I cannot make sense of whether a 1x card will disable SATA ports as the manual mentions but doesn't seem to describe very well. Can anyone make sense of this?



Edit: I want to use SATA 1-4 ports.

That matrix and note below is somewhat confusing - can you post a link to the manual?

Taken literally, I would assume "populated" means used or occupied.

And therefore that SATA6G 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 would all be disabled if ANYTHING is in the PCIEX16_3 slot.

I assume V means void.

The above applies to a random native English speaker.

However.........tech manuals out of Asia are often hopeless. The words likely mean whatever some unknown person intended them to mean, your dictionary and grammar rules be damned. No more and no less.


The 3 "rules" circled in red are unfortunately conflicting if taken literally. The first one says 4 ports are disabled outright. The next 2 rules contradict that.

If the first rule is true, the third rule is redundant and unnecessary.

Rule 2 would appear to be in contradiction to rule 1 or incomplete.

I'd expect to be surprised and prepared to reconfigure in any case.

Admittedly, I have no idea what the writer of the rules and manual means by the terms "run", "disabled", or "populated"

@Kol12

Assuming the PCIex1 sound card has an edge connector approx. 1 inch long... then probably none of those things in the manual are accurate.

ALL of those manual statements concerning the PCIex16 slot being "populated", are most probably referring to a card with a full length PCIex16 edge connector.

In other words... you would need to consider the pinout of the entire PCIex16 slot, to KNOW if sticking a PCIex1 card in there, would disable certain SATA ports.

Maybe the "disabling SATA ports" only occurs if the middle or the right end of the PCIex16 slot is populated.

Without knowing the PCIex16 pinout, you can't answer that question.



Here are the pinouts for all the PCIe slots... I don't know how much this will help though...
Who you really need to ask is an ASUS motherboard engineer.

PCI Express 1x, 4x, 8x, 16x bus pinout diagram @ pinouts.ru

ignatzatsonic said:

However.........tech manuals out of Asia are often hopeless. The words likely mean whatever some unknown person intended them to mean, your dictionary and grammar rules be damned. No more and no less.

I won't say that about all manuals coming out of Asia, cause I find Gigabyte's motherboard manuals far more detailed and cohesive than those of Asus's manuals. I can't tell you how many times I had to decipher their manuals in providing help to users here.

Anyway, that's helping Kol, nor am I dishing on Asus. Strictly speaking on their owner's manuals.

That said, I read that chart and note to mean that if you run a "PCIex16" device (assume GPU) in the third PCI slot, you lose 4 SATA ports (1, 2, 3, and 4) - Note 1. If the device runs at x2 mode (example soundcard), you will only lose 2 SATA ports (3 & 4) - Note 2.

The PCIe x1 slot has 18 pins and only 1 Lane involved.
The PCIe x16 slot has 82 pins and 15 Lanes.

So, I would guess that putting a PCIe x1 in a PCIe x16 would only affect one Lane. Namely, Lane 0.

Now, as to whether that particular Lane is one of the Lanes that shares SATA ports... who knows.


But I also, suggest you use the PCIe x1 slot if at all possible.

Ghot said:

But I also, suggest you use the PCIe x1 slot if at all possible.

Use PCIe x1 for what.... a soundcard And put the GPU in the last lane.... causing the OP to lose 4 SATA ports

Anyway, I posted my "understanding" of what I read of those red circled notes above.

Peace