Gamers demand better graphics in each new generation of games, and hardware manufacturers work to keep up. A group of manufacturers introduced the Peripheral Component Interconnect Express standard for video card slots in 2004. This video card slot had a significant speed advantage over the older Accelerated Graphics Port slot, and PCI Express quickly became more popular than AGP. The two slot types are not directly compatible, but a product allows some AGP cards to work in PCI Express slots.
Albatron ATOP
Taiwanese hardware company Albatron released a device called the ATOP in 2005. The ATOP allows the installation of AGP cards in PCI Express ports. The AGP card is installed in a slot on the ATOP. The ATOP is then inserted in the motherboard's PCI Express port. The ATOP is compatible only with a limited number of NVIDIA GeForce video cards and requires half-height cards due to the limitations of computer chassis design. In addition, the ATOP reduces the performance of the video card slightly due to the conversion performed to make the card compatible with the PCI Express slot. Albatron discontinued production of the ATOP in 2008.
PCI Express Advantages
A PCI Express video card slot is significantly faster than an AGP slot. AGP 8x -- the fastest AGP standard -- can transfer data at a maximum rate of 2.1 GB/second, while PCI Express 16x transfers data at a maximum rate of 8 GB/second. In addition, an AGP slot can only be used for video cards; PCI Express slots also work with other high-speed devices such as storage controllers, and many motherboards have the ability to run multiple video cards simultaneously for improved gaming performance.
Identifying a Video Card Slot
On a motherboard, the video card slot is generally the expansion slot closest to the processor. To identify the type of video card slot your motherboard has, look at it from above. You should notice that the slot has two sections separated by an off-center divider. In an AGP slot, the shorter section of the slot faces the inside of the computer chassis. The shorter section of a PCI Express slot faces the outside of the chassis.
Cost
Unless you have a half-height AGP card compatible with the Albatron ATOP and are able to find an ATOP inexpensively, purchase a PCI Express card. You can find PCI Express video cards for under $30 at the time of this publication, and an entry-level or mid-range PCI Express card is likely to offer far better performance than an AGP video card from the mid-2000s.
Tags: video card, card slot, video cards, video card slot, Albatron ATOP, card compatible