Ideas for empty MiniPCIe slot?
 

Hey LQ! I have a netbook (the super-small laptop with no optical drive) [Acer Aspire One D250], and I just successfully installed a new 320 GB Hard Drive and a 2 GB RAM card. When I was putting them in I noticed another, unrecognized slot on the bottom of it, and decided while I'm at it to see what was behind it...and there was Absolutely Nothing!! I went online and googled for like an hour and found it was a MiniPCIe slot. After googling some more, I found out I could put a SSD in there (don't need), or maybe a wireless 3G card (don't want more monthly bills), or possibly a wireless adapter (already have one).

So my question is: Other than an SSD, 3G card, or extra wireless adapter, what can I use that MiniPCIe slot for?

Thanks Everyone!

leopard

Nothing, really. You just named all the common uses for MiniPCIe. Though I can't imagine why you wouldn't put an SSD in there. Put the OS on the SSD and use the HDD for general storage. System performance will be better, and you can spin down the HDD when not in use to increase runtime.

There is really no downside to it.

I find this topic a bit interesting. My desktop machine has a mini PCI-E (a 1x slot) slot too, and I have pretty much forgotten about it due to its small size, which I guess I translated into "nothing useful will go in that".. It'd be cool to stick a SSD device of some sort into that-- but I wouldn't have thought that a SSD or Flash card or whatever would be directly pluggable into this slot.

So I looked around a little bit, and found among others, this thread on toms hardware: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/190694-28-pcie where folks are claiming that for 1x slots, there's a whole range of stuff, including video cards, sound cards, DSP cards, raid cards--- pretty much your usual selection of stuff ---but that these cards are a little harder to find, and might be pricier than a comparable PCI or PCIE x8 or x16 card.

It'd be kinda handy like MS3FGX wrote, to boot off of an SSD in that slot, and use the regular HDD(s) for storage and whatnot..

Thanks GrapefruiTgirl and MS3FGX!

Well, I do run a dual-boot system [Windows XP and Ubuntu](need adobe CS4).
The SSD seems to be the only thing that would be even useful to me, since SSD's last a lot longer and can handle thousands of formats. But due to size limitations, I'd probably only use it for testing Hacintosh OS'es and different Linux distros...I really wish there was a Graphics card I could put into that slot, but after googling, it seems this doesn't exist): That's one of the biggest problems with these netbooks, their integrated graphics card stink. Oh well...

Thanks, and if anybody else has a suggestion, or have a link to share, feel free!

PCIe 1x cards.
 

I haven't followed through on many of the search results, so my apology if you already have; but it would *seem* that such devices do exist...

http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&q=...G=Search&meta=

But, just as an example, I did download the pdf file here: http://www.matrox.com/graphics/media...ineup_intl.pdf

which I saw on a page linked from the nvidia NVnews forum, here: http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=53569

and it shows more than a few Matrox PCI-E 1x cards. So, I guess they are out there, but probably tricky to find, and certainly less common that the rest of the models (except maybe the 4x versions..)

Good luck with this :)

Sasha

If you like to play video on the netbook, how about the Broadcom Crystal HD Enhanced Video Accelerator. Not sure about the compatibility with your Acer Aspire One model but I know that HP has the Broadcom card as an optional upgrade to their Mini 110.
Found a post on adding one to a different Aspire One model: http://terracode.com/AcerAspireMod/A...reMods_P1.html

Not all manufactures makes it that easy. They probably have included a whitelist in the BIOS to only let a certain devices be connected. I suggest contact Acer for what it supports.

Hmm...! This look nice! And only about 50$ on eBay...
I will definitely look more into this. it seems perfect from my rather quick glance at it!
As for the BIOS, it seems Acer is putting that card into a new line of Acer's (if only I had waited (: ) So I don't think that will be a problem, hopefully (:
My only question now is how much of an improvement this card will do.

Thanks LQ, the undisputed best forum in the world!
Oh, and big thanks to GrapefruiTgirl helping me out, and asilsdorf, for the star suggestion! Let it be known a thumbs-up thanks to you both!

I also have this netbook, acer D250, did you try installing this broadcom card?
I know the BCM70015 is half the lenght of the original and uses less power, it should fit better.
I just want some feedback before trying this.

EDIT: Ho I see, I just opened the little slot below the netbook, there is a free miniPCIe slot; I thought this slot was the one that had the WIFI card. Genius of Acer, thanks. I guess it's just a matter of updating the bios to make it detect the slot and installing the broadcom card now.

Thanks.

You might be able to use it for more usb 2 and maybe 3 ports.

Might be a management board out there to remotely admin the system.

packet injection.... air crack... need i say more