Lack of PCI slots on modern boards

[eehtpc]

One of the things that has held me back from deploying Sage in a larger scale environment (4+ tuners) is the lack of PCI slots on modern motherboards. You're lucky to get a board with three slots, let alone five or six like back in the day. Is the only solution to add usb tuners?

[BFisher]

If you look around, you can find some with PCI-e also... My giga mobo has something like 3 PCI and 3 PCI-e.

[bjkiller]

I purchased like half year ago industrial board IMBA-9454G

killer with 6 PCI slots!


recomended.

IMBA-9454G
ATX Intel Core 2 Duo/Pentium D LGA 775 Intel 945G Chipset CPU Card with VGA, 2xBroadcom BCM5787 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet 10/100/1000, 4xSATAII-300, Audio, 1xPCI Express x16, 6xPCI Expansion Slots

[Polypro]

P5W-DH can Fit 3 PVR-500's and 2 HVR-1800's.

P

[ybrew]

Got an intel board in june with 3 pci slots. I've got 10 tuners on that box.

3 internal hauppauge 500s (6 tuners), 2 external USB HD Tuners and 1 hd homerun dual HD Tuner.

Finding 3 pci slots is still not too difficult. Making best use of which tuners you get is up to you.

[autoboy]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128034

This one has 4 PCI slots and is cheap

[CollinR]

I too have bought some industrial boards that have more PCIs.

You can also look at backplanes, expensive but 10+ slots are possible.

[toricred]

Originally Posted by bjkiller

I purchased like half year ago industrial board IMBA-9454G

killer with 6 PCI slots!


recomended.

IMBA-9454G
ATX Intel Core 2 Duo/Pentium D LGA 775 Intel 945G Chipset CPU Card with VGA, 2xBroadcom BCM5787 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet 10/100/1000, 4xSATAII-300, Audio, 1xPCI Express x16, 6xPCI Expansion Slots

What intrigues me about this board is all the serial ports for serial control of DirecTV boxes. The big problem is the price though. Maybe someday for Christmas.

[GKusnick]

Personally I'd rather spend the money on USB tuners and USB-to-serial adapters than on monster boards that require monster cases to hold them.

[stevech]

Originally Posted by toricred

What intrigues me about this board is all the serial ports for serial control of DirecTV boxes. The big problem is the price though. Maybe someday for Christmas.

low cost serial port add-on is Inside-out networks Edgeport. Lots of them on eBay for a few bucks

[spike5884]

I use a PCI Expansion chassis. Works great. They come in different sizes . Normally 7 or 13 pci slots.
Search ebay for PCI expansion or PCI extender. Make sure it includes Host card and connection cable. Right now on ebay there seems to be a few 'broken' ones, but I did find a few good ones. There is also a wide range to the prices. If it truly includes everything, you are looking at $200+. Most common manufacturers are SBS Technologies, Avid SBS, & Digidesign.

Couple of examples of current auctions:
Avid SBS PCI Extender, cable, and card with warranty
Digidesign MAGMA 13-Slot, PCI Expansion System

[CollinR]

How many tuners are you running? HD or SD?

My backplanes use a PCIe-16x host interface I noticed those seem to be PCI to start with. I would be somewhat concerned about maxing out the PCI bus on the motherboard with that host controller.

It should also be said this stuff is basically Intel northbridge chipset only, this is right up the alley of the Via chipset problems.