ION System, Performance and PCIE Slot

[mason]

Sorry for might being a little offtopic here. But i have some general ION related questions. Right now im using XBMC on W7 on my main workstation via dualhead but i like to get a dedicated 'low-power' machine for my xbmc installation.

can some ion users post some comments on the performance and on the general satisfaction with their system regarding the performance and the responsiveness of the system? i have hughe movie and music librarys which are performing fine on my Intel Core2Duo ... but im suspecting that this could be a bit of an issue for the small ion platform.

Also is it possible to put a normal PCI card into the PCIE Express slot on the board? My idea was to use my DVBs card with the tvhead backend for use with XBMC also ... any comments on that?

appreciate your answers!

[seeker83]

PCI is not compatible with PCI-Express. You will need some kind of converter card for that. What board are you talking about btw, I thought most ION boards only had a single normal PCI slot.

[mason]

oh seems i got confused, the ZOTAC ION ITX A-E has only a PCIE Mini Slot.. this is the one i like to use (with the dualcore atom) looks like i mixed up with the Zotac GeForce 9300-ITX WiFi but for that one i would need an additional CPU and the 'low-power' factore would be gone.

[seeker83]

Yea it's got a pci-e slot instaid of a normal PCI port. And I'm guessing your DVB card isn't mini pci-e, so it won't fit I'm afraid. :(

http://pden.zotac.com/components/com_virtuemart/shop_image/product/IONITX-B-E_image2%20%5B84a3a24ad34749.jpg

It's a nice slot for wifi cards though, Intel's got a 3x3:3 MIMO 2.4/5ghz draft n card that would work nicely there! :)

[donabi]

perfect for a mini-pci ssd harddrive :cool:

[mason]

so anyone on the performance satisfaction with the dual atom? i guess my dvbs card goes into my linux server then ... no biggy

and as far as i know, that board comes with a wificard for the slot!

[Frozone]

perfect for a mini-pci ssd harddrive :cool:

Any experience with this?
I would like to do this. So i could use the 3.5 for a Big Harddrive in a mini-itx case.

[donabi]

well, i think a ssd on mini-pci would be to expensive.
possible, available ... but very expensive.

[mason]

damn threatjackers ;)