expansion card on mb. mini-PCI

[nene]

What is a mini-PCI for BMC card ? It comes with ASUS K8N-DRE mb.

 

[fishmahn]

Dont' know what BMC stands for, but Mini-PCI is a small version of a PCI slot usually used in laptops for expansion. WHy its on a server board I don't know but there has to be a use.

Mike.

 

[TunaSoda]

Are you refering to a PCI-X Slot?

 

[MShinn]

BMC stands for Baseboard Management Controller. It is a remote management and monitoring system that is harware based. I don't know who sells them in mini-PCI though.

 

[linux_0]

Yup that's right. In some cases you can use other mini-PCI devices as well, although most of the time you are better off using normal PCI or PCI-X devices.

Use PCI-X devices whenever possible for better performance!

Especially RAID / storage controllers.

 

[mpjesse]

Most server boards a low profile these days. Mini-PCI is used because most 1U/2U rack servers are extremely slim. Since rack servers don't typically need any expansion cards added (things like RAID are often attached via NAS and most blade servers just crunch numbers anyways), the larger PCI-x slots are not used. However, at times IT professionals need both slim servers and the flexibility of at least 1 PCI slot. This is particularly true with blade like servers.

So the reason for mini-PCI slots is simple, flexibility without sacrificing space.

-mpjesse

 

[fishmahn]

Makes sense. Thx mpjesse.

Mike.