Different types of PCI card

NotMe

Can someone tell me what the difference is between these two:

This is what I would think of as a normal pci card



And this one has three bits(can't think of a better word) on it



I bought a card like the second one a few years ago thinking it would be grand because I had a free pci slot and I had to return it because it didn't fit. Anyway are they different types of pci? Do they have different names?

7aken

i think its called mca. it was an architecture standard around for a while between isa and pci. i think it was developed by ibm, but they charged to much for the licenses to build peripherals that could use it so it kinda fizzled out. it was 16-bit hence the extra 'piece'. pci was made to be backward compatible with mca as far as i can remember

astrofool

I can't think of any configuration that the second wouldn't fit that the first one could o_O

The connector at the bottom of the second one simply has an extra notch, meaning it'll fit all pci slots, as different versions of the pci slot (1.0, 2.0, 2.2 etc.) had the notch at different places so that only compatable cards would fit. I know we have a blade in the office that the first type of card above would not fit, as its a 64bit slot, and the notch is in the wrong area.

Could it have been one of those amr slots or something? What motherboard was it? and was it that exact card, or just do you remember it looking like that?

7aken

astrofool wrote:

I can't think of any configuration that the second wouldn't fit that the first one could o_O

Could it have been one of those amr slots or something? What motherboard was it? and was it that exact card, or just do you remember it looking like that?

should fit into a pci slot as far as i can remember... amr is only two 'plates' and is a lot smaller. it clearly says on the top right corner that its pci. im guna guess it is what it says on the tin but with some sort of backward compatability and mca (micro channel architecture) is prob the best candidate (as opposed isa)

edit- actually im prob way off the mark as its firewire from what i can see. mca and isa would have been long dead before firewire was thought of as mainstream

Capt'n Midnight

If you look at the PCI cards above the end plate is on the Left hand side.

With ISA ,EISA and MCA it's on the right. - page with images of old cards http://members.iweb.net.au/~pstorr/pcbook/book2/busses.htm

IIRC pci uses the same edge connector but the location and pinout are completely different.

easy pci - http://www.swyx.com/support/ssdb.html?kbid=kb2471

Mac daddy

Top one if not mistaken is a 5 volt pci card - Older type 32 bit cards

Second is a 3volt card - look at how it is keyed - new type 64 bit cards

astrofool

Its not a 64bit card. I was put off a bit by 7aken's first reply, but people seem to be posting alot of incorrect info.

Anyway, it looks like the first one is a 5v card, and the second one is a universal card that fits into any pci slot, implying it will work at 3.3 or 5. As 7aken said, mca is far too old for any card like that.

If you couldn't physically fit it into a slot, it would mean that the card wasn't PCI. I'm also thinking that either NotMe is a troll, or that the pictures he's posted are not actually his card.

Anyway, capt'n Midnight's link: easy pci - http://www.swyx.com/support/ssdb.html?kbid=kb2471 explains that its a 32bit 3.3v or 5v card, meaining it'll fit all pci slots.

NotMe

No I'm not a troll. The pictures were just examples of the two different types I've come across, not the actual cards I have.

Basically what I really wanted to know is will this card(below) fit into a standard pci slot (that looks like this: )




It's appears that it will so thanks everyone for answering.