News Intel has PCIe 4.0 Optane SSDs Ready, But Nothing to Plug Them In To

[nofanneeded]

I get that. But there's the market challenge I mentioned in transitioning to narrower GPU slots, and then there are the physical realities of PCIe 5.0 requiring motherboards with more layers, signal retimers, and generally burning more power.

You're used to technology always getting faster, and basically for free. Because, that's how it's been, for probably your entire life. What you need to understand is that there are limits to the frequencies that can be pushed down a trace on a circuit board (and across a connector). As you near those limits, the technical challenges multiply. Smaller silicon manufacturing nodes won't improve this situation, either. PCIe 5 is just expensive to implement, period. And PCIe 6 won't be any better.


Those are not consumer-friendly, like existing Thunderbolt or USB cables.

If you don't believe me, just wait.

1- and I said again moving to 8x is the future , no one is missing the AGP today nor the Vesa local bus. we will have to move on , 16 lanes cards sarted in 2004 we are in 2020 !

2- Cancelling 16 lanes slots will save alot of space on the motherboards to put components on them , it will change the motherboard layout forever ... and with PCIe5 we have enough bandwidth to cancel the 16 lanes slots.

2- The cables are not consumer friendly because they are overpriced for the business ... once they make a mainstream version of it , ie TB5 it will be alot cheaper.

3- well if you want me to believe you show me solid proof , like a statement from AMD or intel that it is not coming to mainstream ..

 

[TJ Hooker]

Cancelling 16 lanes slots will save alot of space on the motherboards to put components on them , it will change the motherboard layout forever ... and with PCIe5 we have enough bandwidth to cancel the 16 lanes slots.

What sort of components do you envision them adding if the slot gets shorter? Keep in mind that just because the PCIe slot gets shorter doesn't mean the graphics card will get smaller, so it would still obstruct the same area of the board. Meaning you couldn't really use the board area you're saving with the smaller slot to add any connectors/slots.

 

[spongiemaster]

2- Cancelling 16 lanes slots will save alot of space on the motherboards to put components on them , it will change the motherboard layout forever ... and with PCIe5 we have enough bandwidth to cancel the 16 lanes slots.

This won't happen. I do see a benefit for removing 16 lane devices, which would allow more devices to be used with the same total lane limit, but the physical slot will not be changed. Video cards have gotten too heavy to use any physical slot size below 16x. Every new case would need to have some sort of brace to support video cards which would be a logistical nightmare to design considering all the variables.

I'm not sure eliminating the 16x slot would allow for any different layouts anyway. Standard motherboard dimensions aren't what they are because of the length of a 16x slot. How exactly would no 16x slots change motherboard layout assuming you stick with a universally compatible rectangle?

 

[bit_user]

1- and I said again moving to 8x is the future , no one is missing the AGP today nor the Vesa local bus. we will have to move on , 16 lanes cards sarted in 2004 we are in 2020 !

As long as PCIe maintains backwards compatibility, the market will penalize anyone doing this. In the two examples you gave (and you forgot "regular" PCI and ISA), there was no possibility for a card that maintained compatibility between standards.

2- Cancelling 16 lanes slots will save alot of space on the motherboards to put components on them , it will change the motherboard layout forever ... and with PCIe5 we have enough bandwidth to cancel the 16 lanes slots.

I really don't see why it would make a big difference. The cards would still be just as big, so you really can't do a lot with just shorter connectors. Furthermore, PCIe 5 will require more expensive boards and more components, such as signal retimers.

2- The cables are not consumer friendly because they are overpriced for the business ... once they make a mainstream version of it , ie TB5 it will be alot cheaper.

Not all problems can be solved by volume. A PCIe 3.0 x16 cable will never be as consumer-friendly as a USB-C cable.

3- well if you want me to believe you show me solid proof , like a statement from AMD or intel that it is not coming to mainstream ..

I already addressed this in the other thread, but you almost never find statements from companies saying what they won't build. It just attracts negative publicity, for no real benefit.