Mini-PCIe to M.2 adapter. Any change in performance?

Synomenon

Supreme [H]ardness
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Feb 10, 2007
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So I'm waiting for this board to arrive:
Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming-ITX/ac
ASRock > Fatal1ty Z170 Gaming-ITX/ac

the only problem I have with the board is that they put a mini-PCIe slot on it instead of M.2 for the wifi card.

The board has a M.2 slot for a SSD on the underside, a standard 16x slot for a GPU then the mini-PCIe slot.

The best wifi card I can find in mini-PCIe format is the Intel 7260. The Intel 8260 is available now (have one in my laptop), but is available only with the M.2 connector.

If I use one of these:
Mini-PCIe to M.2 adapter
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/81YICPdJkwL._SY679_.jpg

and then an Intel 8260 in it, will performance drop for the M.2 SSD and / or the GPU?
 
I'm thinking yes, since it's all PCIe anyway (just with different connectors), right?
 
I don't think you'd see any difference in performance. M.2 has 4 PCI-e lanes while mPCI-e only has 1 lane. On the other hand, you won't get the kind of throughput from any wifi card to fill up even one PCI-e 3.0 lane.
 
So using that Mini-PCIe to M.2 adapter (so I can plug that Intel M.2 card in the Mini-PCIe slot) won't reduce the performance of the video card (in the PCIe 3.0 16x slot) and the M.2 SSD (in the PCIe 3.0 4x M.2 slot)? Good to hear. Time to order that Intel 8260 then.
 
So using that Mini-PCIe to M.2 adapter (so I can plug that Intel M.2 card in the Mini-PCIe slot) won't reduce the performance of the video card (in the PCIe 3.0 16x slot) and the M.2 SSD (in the PCIe 3.0 4x M.2 slot)? Good to hear. Time to order that Intel 8260 then.

Nope, they should have their own PCI-e lanes, and even an 8-lane drop (or more) isn't going to have a meaningful effect on the video card's performance. My previous gaming system was a frankensteined together laptop with an external GPU. Even on an x1 2.0 bus, the GPU ran within 10% of what it runs on an x16 3.0 bus.
 
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