PCIE slot secured
PCIE slot secured
I use an ASUS TUF B450M Plus gaming rig and have a GPU in the top PCIe slot (connected to the CPU and reinforced). Unlike TUF B550 boards, the PCIe 1x slot is positioned to accommodate two GPUs when needed, leaving only one accessible PCIe 16x slot—likely already wired for eight. I’m considering adding a wireless network card (a PCIe model with Bluetooth and Wi-Fi since I’m using a USB one and my router is upstairs). Is there a way to reclaim that PCIe 1x slot, perhaps via a riser cable (I’d like to find one on Amazon or eBuyer)? It seems like using a 16x slot for a 1x Wi-Fi card might be inefficient. I’m not sure if a Wi-Fi plus Bluetooth card would work well. Thanks.
Yes, it's a bit problematic. Particularly since it's an ASUS build and they produce GPUs. I'm probably going to use the riser. The issue gets worse because swapping it with the M.2 slot would work (except for the 3090s which have three slots but you'd need a Z570 chipset instead of a midrange TUF). They didn't provide the full length screw hole for the M.2, so fitting it next to the M.2 physically wouldn't be possible (though I'm not sure about the wiring).
Are you really requiring the 16x port? If not, proceed with that slot. Spending time tweaking a riser cable isn't worth it—it can cause issues and reduce reliability.
I understand your point. Just being polite would suffice. By then, I probably would have upgraded the motherboard already. It seems I was trying to act ahead of schedule.