Gigabyte Z87X-UD3H Motherboard

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The Gigabyte Z87X-UD3H comes with two PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots, one PCI Express 2.0 x16 slot (working at x4 speed), three PCI Express 2.0 x1 slots, and one PCI slot.

The two PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots are controlled by the CPU, with the first slot working at x16 when only one video card is installed, and with both working at x8 when two video cards are installed.

The third PCI Express x16 slot is 2.0 and works at x4. If you plan to install a dual-slot video card in this slot, you will have to buy a case with at least eight slots. (Computer cases usually have seven.) One important detail is that this slot shares PCI Express lanes with slots “PCIEX1_2” and “PCIEX1_3” slots, and they can’t be used at the same time.

When installing dual-slot video cards, you “kill” the slot immediately to the left of the slot being used (looking at the motherboard with its rear connectors facing up).

Since the Intel Z87 chipset doesn’t support standard PCI slots, the motherboard uses an ITE IT8892E bridge chip to connect the standard PCI slot to a PCI Express x1 lane.

The PCI Express 3.0 x16 slots support both SLI and CrossFireX technologies. It is important to note that, according to the motherboard’s manual, the PCI Express 2.0 x16 slot doesn’t support these technologies and can’t be used to install a third video card under SLI or CrossFireX modes. If more than one video card is installed, you must attach a SATA power connector from the power supply to the motherboard. This connector is located near the SATA ports and will be shown in Figure 4.

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