Gigabyte Has a Crippled VGA Slot: MSI

[leonard_222003]

It's bad to not know the truth and believe any shit MSI and various news websites serves us as good.
The reason why gigabyte crippled that slot

http://vip.asus.com/forum/view.aspx?id=20080729234236140

from that forum

Hi all,

I am very keen to get this motherboard but was severely 'bitten' when I last bought a G35 ASUS board. I found that when I plugged my PCIe x4 RocketRaid controller into the x16 PCIe slot, it disabled the onboard graphics.

Can anyone tell me if the G45 board has the same 'interesting' feature - the Gigabyte board will do what I want but I much prefer to stay with ASUS.

Thanks in anticipation

and latter answers

Looks like you have a Gigabyte in your future. This is a limitation with all Intel integrated graphics chipsets.

The way that Gigabyte gets around it is by implementing a crippled PCI Express x16 slot that is actually limited to PCI Express x4 mode. Gigabyte takes 4x PCI Express lanes routed from the ICH10 Southbridge to create this slot. ASUS uses the full PCI Express x16 interface located in the G45 Northbridge. This also makes the Gigabyte solution PCI Express 1.x, whereas the ASUS solution fully supports PCI Express 2.0.

However, that isn't going to matter unless you intended to use a PCI-E 2.0 graphics card at some point. The Rocket Raid card specs exactly match the capability of the Gigabyte slot; PCI-E x4 (v1.x).

Soooo , anyone cares to add more to this ?

 

[newtekie1]

So the crippled the slot so people could use a second card in the PCI-E slot without disabling the onboard video?

That seems really stupid to me.

 

[Mussels]

and thats the evidence we needed: the 4x slot is *not* 2.0, so performance WILL be lower than the benchmarks posted earlier.

 

[leonard_222003]

So the crippled the slot so people could use a second card in the PCI-E slot without disabling the onboard video?

That seems really stupid to me.

They did it intentional to actually help some people , not to cut costs like everyone says.
It might come as a shock to some of you but some people don't need a computer to game or they just don't game on the PC and they need it maybe as a server for something , and this is how a raid controller comes into play.
The onboard raid controller of the G45 chipset is not very good for advance users who stackes several HDD's in raid , it's like de video card that is onboard , good for some poor graphics games but not for the latest , it's like that with the raid wich is basic for advance users , the raid from G45 if i'm not mistaken eats CPU resources for some configurations of raid and eats it bad.
Gigabyte should be blamed for carrying to much about helping some people wich don't see a computer just a gaming machine , next time they should stick to the usual and crowd the box with tons of stickers and "features" , seems to trick the consumer , some preety colors and a nice picture on the box.

 

[newtekie1]

There are just several stupid things about the "we did it so people could use RAID controllers" excuse:

1.) The number of people puting RAID controllers in these budget boards is nothing compared to the people puting graphics cards.
2.) They increase compatibility for a very small minority, and decreased compatibility and performance for a very large majority.
3.) There are very simple work arounds for the disabled onboard video. All these boards have another PCI-E x1 slot and two PCI slots, or just 3 PCI slots. Stick a cheap video card in one o those, and the cost for it will be relatively nothing compared to the cost of a RAID controller and drives.
4.) If they were truly concerned about people using RAID controllers, why not run the for PCI-E lanes from the southbridge over to a second PCI-E slot, replacing the PCI-E x1 slot with a PCI-E x4 slot? That would have let people use their RAID controllers with onboard video, and not given people a crippled PCI-E x16 slot.

 

[leonard_222003]

There are just several stupid things about the "we did it so people could use RAID controllers" excuse:

1.) The number of people puting RAID controllers in these budget boards is nothing compared to the people puting graphics cards.
2.) They increase compatibility for a very small minority, and decreased compatibility and performance for a very large majority.
3.) There are very simple work arounds for the disabled onboard video. All these boards have another PCI-E x1 slot and two PCI slots, or just 3 PCI slots. Stick a cheap video card in one o those, and the cost for it will be relatively nothing compared to the cost of a RAID controller and drives.
4.) If they were truly concerned about people using RAID controllers, why not run the for PCI-E lanes from the southbridge over to a second PCI-E slot, replacing the PCI-E x1 slot with a PCI-E x4 slot? That would have let people use their RAID controllers with onboard video, and not given people a crippled PCI-E x16 slot.

For the 4.) point , easy to talk , are you an engineer to know if this can be done ? i bet you are not , why didn't MSI and Asus did this ? or whatever company you defend ?
Do you made a survey of the whole world and know how many people change the onboard video card and how many needs it for a raid ? don't think so.
You talk very stupid things there , stick a cheap video card in a pci express x1 slot ? the problem for some people with this news is price and if we add a cheap video card to the price of the MB we get pretty far , who knows maybe we reach 150-160$ on newegg.
In the end it doesn't matter as long as they state it it will work at that speed and there is actually a reason for this crippled slot other than to cut costs and scam you little unknowing and poor angry consumers.
You people better welcome this because for some people comes usefull and for other don't but that's why you can choose MSI or Asus or whatever brand you want , don't you like diversity ?

 

[newtekie1]

As for point 4, if it is possible to run the 4 PCI-E lanes from the southbridge over to the PCI-E x16 slot, it is possible to run it over to a slot one down and run the 16 lanes down from the northbridge. It would complicate the PCB some, but it is possible. And yes, I don't have the experience and background to say this. Besides the fact that many motherboards have done very similar in the past.

Yes, the motherboard is cheap, but if you are using the system for RAID, it is no longer cheap. You are looking at a minimum of $120 for a RAID card worth using over the onboard. Then you are looking at at least another $100 for two decent moderately sized hard drives. So just to do the RAID setup is at the very minimum $220, throwing in a $40 PCI card isn't going to break the bank.

And as for the number of people wanting to put RAID cards in vs. the number putting video cards in. Just look at the number of people running dedicated video cards vs. dedicated RAID cards(and even then there are less running dedicated PCI-E RAID cards). Graphics card sales are a lot higher than RAID controller sales.

 

[leonard_222003]

Your numbers aren't backed up by anything than just assumptions , did you take into acount how many people actually buy a video card to replace the onboard ? there are a lot of people that never buy a discrete video card , they settle for what they have on the mb , did you know the actual market shares and how much intel has ? and by intel having some market share this includes the desktop MB's with onboard
http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/video/...ntel_Grabs_Highest_Market_Share_in_Years.html
those numbers mean only one thing , most people don't put another video card in that slot , you must feel very stupid now.
So , considering most of them never replace the onboard then sometimes it's good that slot could actually help some 1 % of people that want raid , and my personal opinion is that a diversity is good , to have more choices , if i want to put a 4870 on a g45 chipset than you rather buy an ASUS or MSI because they have a pci 2.0 x16 but if i won't ever consider changing graphics i could also consider buying a gigabyte motherboard.

 

[El Fiendo]

Leonard, I believe you were attacking Newtekie for spewing numbers without having done any research. Its odd that a couple posts later you would be doing the same. You haven't any more right say to 'people don't buy discrete video cards' then he had to say they do. The numbers you posted, if you had done any sort of research, are widely credited to the fact that most every motherboard has an IGP. Even the ones that get a discrete graphics card. Most prebuilt systems use both an IGP and a discrete solution. Most netbooks are a simple intel IGP, though less and less are now. This means Intel is not only getting their own market, the people who stay with IGP, but they are also getting counts for nVidia and ATI.

Also, please refrain from attacking him personally. He hasn't done any of that that I've seen and it doesn't count as a point in your favor in your discussion.

 

[newtekie1]

The graphics card market share means nothing to this discussion. Are you really assuming that every person that doesn't use a descrete graphics card is using a RAID card in the slot instead? Please...

Show me some numbers on descrete graphics cards vs. RAID controller cards and then we can talk. Simply showing that more people use integrated cards than descrete cards(duh) doesn't say anything about the number of descerte cards vs. RAID controllers. It is pretty common sense that more people have descrete graphics cards than descrete RAID controllers.

 

[Thermopylae_480]

Arguments work better when you don't insult the other person; so don't do it. I think you would prefer that I don't get involved.

 

[leonard_222003]

newtekie i'll just ask one question , is it bad to have more to choose from ? is it bad if gigabyte can help some people with their crippled solutions and unthinkable by many people who game on powerfull video cards ? if it's bad then we don't need 100 varietes of cheese or chocolate , we just need what most people want and forget the minority.
I'll refrain from offending people Thermopylae.

 

[newtekie1]

Yes, it is bad when Gigabyte makes the slot look like an x16 so people think they can put a good graphics card in it, only to find out the slot being crippled means their new graphics card is still going to perform like crap.

Gigabyte is only trying to cover their ass by making up the RAID controller excuse. If that was their true reasoning, we would have seen them making a big deal about it. It would be part of the advertising on the box. It would be listed as a feature on the product's webpage. None of that is true though.

And like I have already pointed out, if that was their true goal, they certainly could have gone about it in a much better way, and still given the use of a full PCI-E x16 slot.

 

[erocker]

Arguing in news posts isn't really acceptable either. State your case/opinion/whatever and move along.

 

[Mussels]

Video card users who are not techies see a full length slot and assume it works at full speeds.

this is a 4x 1.0 or 1.1 slot (unspecified) which is definately NOT good for gaming, or 3D rendering using a dedicated card.

The amount of users who add RAID cards is low to begin with, let alone people who do so on budget microATX boards.

Gigabyte also have a series of motherboards with a PCI-E 2.0 16x slot for video, and a 4x open ended slot for crossfire or RAID cards. why cant users with specialised needs buy specialised boards, instead of giga crippling them?


as Erocker has said, feel free to discuss (even heatedly) your cases, but under no circumstances are personal attacks going to be ignored.

 

[leonard_222003]

When your boss tell you to build a system with a raid config. in xxx$ and you can't spend more on a MB maybe a cheap gigabyte g45 is the solution.
For who doesn't read the forum posts , gigabyte didn't excused itself with this argument , it's just some guys talking on a forum and discovering a cheap MB with integrated grpahic card doesn't work with raid and only gigabyte let's them do that.
I don't know how much a specialised MB costs but it could be more than that gigabyte mb and not everyone wants to spend a lot of money if they want to get a game server up or a file server up.
To conclude this discution , what's the cheapest solution with integrated graphic card that allows people to add a raid controller in the pci express slot ? 16x, 8x or 4x ?
If there is a MB that is just as good in construction ( solid capacitors ) allows raid controllers without disabling the onboard graphic has a pci express 16x slot that will work at that speed and is cheaper or in the same price range as the gigabyte mb than i will shut up and mind my own bussines , if there is not then some people with a low budget in mind could be helped by this solution and the existance of this MB is not so unthinkable.

 

[Rebo&Zooty]

Video card users who are not techies see a full length slot and assume it works at full speeds.

this is a 4x 1.0 or 1.1 slot (unspecified) which is definately NOT good for gaming, or 3D rendering using a dedicated card.

The amount of users who add RAID cards is low to begin with, let alone people who do so on budget microATX boards.

Gigabyte also have a series of motherboards with a PCI-E 2.0 16x slot for video, and a 4x open ended slot for crossfire or RAID cards. why cant users with specialised needs buy specialised boards, instead of giga crippling them?


as Erocker has said, feel free to discuss (even heatedly) your cases, but under no circumstances are personal attacks going to be ignored.

*Attacks Mussels with bag of stale cheesy poofs*

 

[newtekie1]

When your boss tell you to build a system with a raid config. in xxx$ and you can't spend more on a MB maybe a cheap gigabyte g45 is the solution.
For who doesn't read the forum posts , gigabyte didn't excused itself with this argument , it's just some guys talking on a forum and discovering a cheap MB with integrated grpahic card doesn't work with raid and only gigabyte let's them do that.
I don't know how much a specialised MB costs but it could be more than that gigabyte mb and not everyone wants to spend a lot of money if they want to get a game server up or a file server up.
To conclude this discution , what's the cheapest solution with integrated graphic card that allows people to add a raid controller in the pci express slot ? 16x, 8x or 4x ?
If there is a MB that is just as good in construction ( solid capacitors ) allows raid controllers without disabling the onboard graphic has a pci express 16x slot that will work at that speed and is cheaper or in the same price range as the gigabyte mb than i will shut up and mind my own bussines , if there is not then some people with a low budget in mind could be helped by this solution and the existance of this MB is not so unthinkable.

Cheaper than the G41 Board:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813500018
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813186140
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130130
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188034
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188034
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813500006

Cheaper than the G45 Board:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813500019

Going to shut up now?

 

[leonard_222003]

If you read my post carefully i stated as a requirement for comparison to have the same built quality and to support a raid controller in the video card PCI express slot without disabling the onboard graphics , none of those motherboards have the build quality of gigabyte , some look like 5 years ago MB's with capacitors that begin to crash your system after 1 year and the question of it will work with a raid controller is not verrified on none of those motherboards.
Where is the proof it will work , from what i read G45 chipset motherboards don't support a raid controller in that slot with the onboard graphics still working unlles the integrator does some modifications like gigabyte did.
It was preety hard to find from the start newtekie because how are you going to prove this ? i need some prove so google it and find it , i can give you a lot of links with MB's cheaper than gigabyte too but will they work like that guy wanted on that forum ?

 

[btarunr]

I think you two are getting into loops with the argument. You could let go of it, but as long as you're keeping things civil, I've no complaints. If you're not, then put an end to it.

 

[newtekie1]

If you read my post carefully i stated as a requirement for comparison to have the same built quality and to support a raid controller in the video card PCI express slot without disabling the onboard graphics , none of those motherboards have the build quality of gigabyte , some look like 5 years ago MB's with capacitors that begin to crash your system after 1 year and the question of it will work with a raid controller is not verrified on none of those motherboards.
Where is the proof it will work , from what i read G45 chipset motherboards don't support a raid controller in that slot with the onboard graphics still working unlles the integrator does some modifications like gigabyte did.
It was preety hard to find from the start newtekie because how are you going to prove this ? i need some prove so google it and find it , i can give you a lot of links with MB's cheaper than gigabyte too but will they work like that guy wanted on that forum ?

If you look carefully, they all have solid caps(with the exception of the Foxconn). And since none of them use an Intel chipset, they all avoid the problem of disabling the onboard graphics when a card is plugged into the PCI-E slot(that was a problem solely with the G4x chipset). Solid caps don't indicate quality.

As for build quality, that is really a subjective thing. There are definitely some better quality boards in the list I have. The Zotac board crushes the Gigabyte in build quality IMO, and it is ~$15 cheaper. As do some of the very cheap(sub-$50) boards.

Solid caps is not the definitive mark for quality either, especially cheap solid caps, a board with normal caps can last just as long as a solid cap board, in fact I have several high end boards from the previous generation that are all normal caps.

 

[leonard_222003]

I must be blind but i don't see all solid caps on none of the MB's , anyways , even the moderators are getting tired of this disscution , i could keep arguing with you but i'm bussy with other things and this is going nowhere anyways so what's the point of keep going.
Bye and have a good life.

 

[newtekie1]

I don't see all solid caps on Gigabyte boards either. Only solid caps on the power circuits, which some of the other boards have also.

 

[erocker]

Newtekie and Leonard walk away. There is no point in continuing your conversation on this topic.

 

[TOTO1218]

wow, so GIGABYTE actaully says that on their site ?

why are they doing that ?

I GUESS..... for HDMI

And AS I know, EG41MF-S2H... is x16...