Hardware Mini PCIE to PCIE and USB Converter?

[gudenau]

There is a device that is being worked on that requires a mini PCIE slot. I was wondering if there was a device that converted mini PCIE to PCIE and USB, the plan is to have the device use the USB for firmware updates.

Anyone know of a device for this?

 

[FAST6191]

Why would you need a dedicated device to speak PCIe? Surely you would just buy a USB host controller chip and write some part of the firmware to pull a file or something from the FAT on a USB drive. It is kind of long winded and a bit more complex as there are better, or a least cheaper and simpler, ways to pull small files from SD cards and the like but it is still cheap enough for a small run I guess ( http://www.hobbytronics.co.uk/usb-host-dip http://www2.mouser.com/Semiconductors/Interface-ICs/USB-Interface-IC/_/N-45lw3/ ).

 

[gudenau]

Why would you need a dedicated device to speak PCIe? Surely you would just buy a USB host controller chip and write some part of the firmware to pull a file or something from the FAT on a USB drive. It is kind of long winded and a bit more complex as there are better, or a least cheaper and simpler, ways to pull small files from SD cards and the like but it is still cheap enough for a small run I guess ( http://www.hobbytronics.co.uk/usb-host-dip http://www2.mouser.com/Semiconductors/Interface-ICs/USB-Interface-IC/_/N-45lw3/ ).

The device needs the bandwidth of PCIE, but it'll use the USB port for updates.

 

[FAST6191]

Sorry, the way you phrased it made it sound like you wanted the PCIe to speak directly to the USB, however only for the purposes of updates, which was odd to my ear. The above linked stuff will see you find things you can have a normal chip speak to to pull firmware updates and whatever from the USB, assuming you do still want USB and are not going for simpler and cheaper SD card stuff.

Also of passing interest

 

[gudenau]

Sorry, the way you phrased it made it sound like you wanted the PCIe to speak directly to the USB, however only for the purposes of updates, which was odd to my ear. The above linked stuff will see you find things you can have a normal chip speak to to pull firmware updates and whatever from the USB, assuming you do still want USB and are not going for simpler and cheaper SD card stuff.

Also of passing interest

It was odd to me as well, but they decided to go with a microcontroller serial bridge to use the FPGA serial programmer thing. :-/

 

[Futurdreamz]

that sounds confusing. The only mPCIe to PCIe adapters I'm aware of are ones to add wifi cards to desktops (I'm using one in my system right now), but i don't know how sensitive they are to the nature of the device, and may not work with your super secret mysterious device. But if that works, then it should be dead simple to also get a (I'm assuming the device uses) microUSB to USB header cord on eBay to plug it into a spare USB header port on your motherboard.

 

[gudenau]

that sounds confusing. The only mPCIe to PCIe adapters I'm aware of are ones to add wifi cards to desktops (I'm using one in my system right now), but i don't know how sensitive they are to the nature of the device, and may not work with your super secret mysterious device. But if that works, then it should be dead simple to also get a (I'm assuming the device uses) microUSB to USB header cord on eBay to plug it into a spare USB header port on your motherboard.

It uses the USB bus on the mini PCIE connector and has two HDMI ports. :-/