[geeks] pci express x8 video card?

[Francois Dion]

On 2/15/07, Charles Shannon Hendrix <shannon at widomaker.com> wrote:
> Francois Dion wrote:
> > On 2/14/07, Charles Shannon Hendrix <shannon at widomaker.com> wrote:
> >> Tue, 13 Feb 2007 @ 16:34 -0500, Francois Dion said:
> >>
> >>> Looking for an nvidia video card that is pci express x8, if there is
> >>> such a thing? All I see is x1 or x16. Anything x4 or x8?
> >> Yes, however, they are incredibly rare.
> >>
> >> They also cost more than x1 or x16 cards.
> >
> > Still, it might be worth it for me, do you have any links?
>
> Yes, but they won't do you any good.  They are all listed as "sold out" or "no
> longer available".
>
> Every once in awhile you'll see one show up, but you have to be vigilant, and
> they are getting more and more rare.
>
> >> If you don't think an x1 card is fast enough, then get a 16x card,
> >> and buy something called the "Orbit Micro Converter".
> >>
> >> http://store.orbitmicro.com/commerce/catalog/product.jsp?product_id=21199
> >
> > Yes, that's the product I mentionned earlier in the thread, but it
> > would not be usable in my case (1U server).
>
> That's too bad.
>
> I would still call them though, because they say on their page they have other
> options or something like that.

I'll definitely give them a call.

>  Maybe they could make one that is more of a
> side-by-side attachment.

There is also the external solution, but as you will see, it is about
as cost effective as buying a brand new Ferrari Maranello as a NYC
taxicab:

http://www.nvidia.com/page/quadroplex_comparison_chart.html

Mighty cool, but an order of magnitude too expensive. That would be a
pretty cool hack to do something like that. It connects to the pci
express bus of the server or workstation through a cable.

I cant take credit for finding that, somebody from Sun sent me a url.

Of course, I'm looking at putting a $200 video card in a <$1000 1u
rackmount server... If it was for home, this would have been resolved
immediately (buy a different server), but in the corporate world,
there are some hoops to jump through.

Francois