Motherboard Specs say PCI-E 1.0

[rbarr110]

So a friend of mine has a Dell machine that he wants to upgrade to upgrade the video card to an ATI 5670 and depending on which he gets are PCI-E 2.0 or 2.1. The spec sheet says it is PCI-E 1.0 and the specs on the motherboard are here:

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/dime521/en/SM_EN/specs.htm#wp1052310

Anyone know if a 2.0 or 2.1 card will work in a 1.0 motherboard. Perhaps a BIOS update?

Thanks

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

You don't need a BIOS update, it should be backwards compatible anyway. In any case, I doubt a BIOS update would fix it if it weren't.

 

[E4g1e]

Yes, PCI-e 2.0 cards are backwards-compatible with PCI-e 1.0a slots. Keep in mind, however, that you're feeding the card half the maximum potential of the PCI-e 2.0 interface. In other words, the full x16 bandwidth of a PCI-e 1.0a bus is equivalent to the x8 mode of the PCI-e 2.0 bus. Most low-to-upper-mid-level GPUs should not be affected by the half-bandwidth bus. Only certain high-end graphics cards might be affected by the half-bandwidth connection.

And no, a BIOS update cannot change the PCI-e version at all.