Amigabill Projects

I didn't realize that the mini PCI-Express card format has USB2 data signals as well. Or that some cards to fit these sockets are purely USB2. (WLAN is PCIe, WWAN is USB2 from the sounds of it) Interesting. I do not at this time find anything about USB3 SuperSpeed support in any standard use of this connection/form factor.

I also did not realize that SATA drives also come in this PCB form factor, termed mSATA. It seems that the SATA signals are muxed with the PCI-Express signals (or replace them completely for an mSATA specific slot without PCIe) similar to how ExpressCard2 muxes USB3 SuperSpeed signals with PCI_Express.

The Mini PCI-Express connector defines pins for a SIM card for cellular based wireless data such as 3G. The SIM card is not on the module itself, perhaps on the motherboard or possibly on an adapter card if the motherboard lacks this and you need it.

It seems the Mini PCI-Express module is useful for more than just WiFI+Bluetooth, which is all I was aware of previously. Such as a hardware video decoder.