Question Add USB C to my PC.

[Gregavi]

Hi, how do I determine if my PC will support a USB C card on the motherboard? It is a Dell Optiplex 3040 Intel i7-6700.
Thanks in advance.

 

[Roland Of Gilead]

Hi, how do I determine if my PC will support a USB C card on the motherboard? It is a Dell Optiplex 3040 Intel i7-6700.
Thanks in advance.

Hey there,

Can you run CPU-z and go to the mainboard page, and tell us the details of the mobo.

At first glance, it's hard to say. Your mobo (if it's this one: OptiPlex 3040 - Small Form Factor Owner's Manual | Dell Ireland ) has a PCIe 1.0 slot. PCIe slots are backward compatible, but run at the speeds of the slot version. So if you choose a PCie 4 USB C card, and run it on a 1x slot, you will serverly limit the transfer speeds, and possoble charging capacity too.

 

[Gregavi]

Couldn't get the "Add Image" function to work. Hope this works.
Thanks
It has PCIE 3.0 (8.0 GT/s).
Based on that, which USB C would you recommend?

https://photos.google.com/search/_tra_/photo/AF1QipMtSp7PS0tPKYQFVvSX0g_arO6WYbI1uYMx8nx7

 

[Karadjgne]

Usb is trixy. The USB3.0 you have has been renamed to USB 3.2 Gen 1. 3.1 was renamed 3.2 Gen 2, and 3.2 is now 3.2 Gen 2x2.
3.2 Gen 1 = 5Gb/s
3.2 Gen 2 = 10Gb/s
3.2 Gen 2x2 = 20Gb/s.

So what you can expect converting your 3.0 to type C is 5Gb/s at best, but prolly closer to 4.5-4.8Gb/s after conversion.

 

[Gregavi]

Thanks Karadigne.
So, if I will only get max 4.5-5 GB/s, is it worth my efforts to add USB C? If yes, I assume I should not bother getting one that is faster than 5 GB/s, like this one:
5 GB/s Card

 

[Karadjgne]

Looks about right.

 

[USAFRet]

Why the desire for USB C?

 

[BFG-9000]

I just wanted to point out that while the x16 slot attached to the Skylake CPU is PCIe 3.0, the x1 slots attached to the Intel H110 chipset are all only PCIe 2.0 and thus limited to 0.5GB/s per lane.

Therefore all 5 ports on that x1 5Gbit/s card will have to share the equivalent bandwidth of a single 5Gbit/s port. If you use only one port at a time, then you can get nearly the full 5Gbit speed out of it.

While 5Gbit/s is technically 625MB/s, with all the overhead of USB the nominal speed is considered 500MB/s or 0.5GB/s. That's the same as x1 PCIe 2.0

While USB C is nice because you can't plug it in upside down, I expect most people will want it for their USB C devices that may use its fast charging feature. Note that a x1 PCIe slot is limited to 10w but may negotiate up to 25w after initialization--still pretty far from the 100w that USB-C can deliver.

 

[Gregavi]

Why the desire for USB C?

Good question. It is why I asked the question, (I'm quoting myself) "So, if I will only get max 4.5-5 GB/s, is it worth my efforts to add USB C? "
I guess the answer is convenience and speed. Plus, I have a pretty nice USB hub that only connects with USB C while having several types of USB ports and a couple HDMI ports.

 

[Karadjgne]

If you kept scrolling down the Amazon search page, there's an adapter with single type C and single type A for half the price. Considering it's limited usefulness I'd think that'd be the better option than the 6 port.

@BFG-9000 makes a really good point about the chipset lanes being 2.0 with that motherboard, which doesn't translate well into speed and convenience, just convenience when used with that hub.

 

[Gregavi]

If you kept scrolling down the Amazon search page, there's an adapter with single type C and single type A for half the price. Considering it's limited usefulness I'd think that'd be the better option than the 6 port.

Good Point. This one?
5Gbps 2 Ports

 

[lvt]

Why the desire for USB C?

To make your computer look more hi-tech 😀

 

[Gregavi]

To make your computer look more hi-tech 😀

Even tho the C port would be in the back!🙄

 

[Gregavi]

I ordered this one: 5Gbps 2 Ports
It was cheap enough that if it doesn't perform very well it's no big loss.
Is it better to use SLOT 1 or SLOT 4, or does it matter? They're both open.

 

[lvt]

Even tho the C port would be in the back!🙄

No problem, it's already in the owner's mind 😉

 

[lvt]

BTW what Windows version do you have?

I have a couple of cards with the same Renesas chip and they don't work for me.

If the card works for you, please share your Windows version, TIA.