7000 Series

[erenas4]

I know its all speculation that this point but I keep hearing that the next generation of cards will have PCI 3.0. If thats the case, will they work in PCI 2.0 boards? The reason I ask is because Im about to build a new system and am wondering if I should wait for a good PCI 3.0 board to come out or if Ill be good with a current gen 2.0 motherboard.

Thanks!

 

[Djentleman]

I'm not sure, but i know we haven't used the full potential of pci 2.0.

 

[mactronix]

While I cant say 100% because I have not bothered to look into it or ask I would 100% expect them to be compatible. It would be plain stupid to make a card that most people could not upgrade to without a complete Motherboard upgrade.

Mactronix

 

[erenas4]

Ok. Another question. Does anyone know how close we are to using the full bandwidth of 2.0? Is it likely that the next gen cards will max it out?

 

[sayantan]

PCie slots are both forward and backward compatible.So there won't be any compatibility issue.FYI most powerful dual GPU cards(590,6990) are PCIe 2.1 compatible.So even if HD7970 has a performance comparable to 6990 it won't be bottlenecked by PCIe 2.1/2.0 slots.Only dual GPU 7990 will need to use the potential of 3.0.

 

[erenas4]

Just so I understand correctly. We're not even close to maxing out the 2.0 bandwidth with single cards? And dual cards are getting there?

 

[renz496]

While I cant say 100% because I have not bothered to look into it or ask I would 100% expect them to be compatible. It would be plain stupid to make a card that most people could not upgrade to without a complete Motherboard upgrade.

Mactronix

+1. This.

 

[sayantan]

Yes, single gpu cards won't be able to saturate 2.0/2.1 bandwidth anytime soon.Only the next gen Dual GPU cards might need the extra bandwidth of 3.0.

 

[mactronix]

Ok. Another question. Does anyone know how close we are to using the full bandwidth of 2.0? Is it likely that the next gen cards will max it out?

I have never seen this question adequately answered, with supporting links etc.
However from what I know I don't think we are in any serious danger of a single card, even a dual card maxing out a 2.0 slot.
When the cards come out Techpowerup usually do a scaling test where they restrict the PCIE lanes. Like this. http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/NVIDIA/GTX_480_PCI-Express_Scaling/

Actually checking they have not done so for a while. maybe because the results here show its not going to be an issue for a good while.

Mactronix

 

[erenas4]

Best answer selected by erenas4.

 

[Mousemonkey]

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey