What is the life cycle of the PCI / AGP extenders ?
The extenders can be used either to prolong the life of the connector, on the motherboard or to prolong the gold finger of the I/O card. Therefore, either the connector or the gold finger of the extender, will wear out. For most of the straight extenders, built by Adex, the straddle mount connectors are custom made, heavy duty connectors. The life cycle of these connectors are about 1500 to 2000 insertion cycles. If the insertion and removal are aided by mechanical fixtures, the life cycle could be 3000 to 4000 cycles and higher. The gold finger on most of the Adex’s extenders are plated with 30 micro inches of hard gold, with minimum 150 micro inches of nickel underlayer. It is designed to withstand 1500 to 2000 insertion cycles or more.
