PCIe Gen II

[XZezin]

What do you guys know about the next generation graphics slot? I saw in some AMD roadmap it is suposed to come in 2008. I would like to know what improvements are going to be done(specially since PCIe 16x is not nearly being used to its potential) and if it is going to be backwards compatible. Meaning if the new cards will work on old mobos.

 

[prozac26]

PCI-E is the norm now, and will be for a few year. I think when graphic cards demand more bandwith, then a new slot would come out.

G80, and R600 will be PCI-E 16x, so at earliest, I would expect a new slot late '08.

 

[JonathanDeane]

PCI-E is the norm now, and will be for a few year. I think when graphic cards demand more bandwith, then a new slot would come out.

G80, and R600 will be PCI-E 16x, so at earliest, I would expect a new slot late '08.

I agree but I might add that I think it will be even longer since even PCIe 8X is not even maxed out yet and you have PCIe 16X and if you count crossfire or SLI you have essentualy PCIe 32X ! So yeah earliest would be 08 but even that is too soon I think lol

 

[darkstar782]

Bandwidth is not the only concern, there is also latency, and protocol overhead.

The headers on PCI-E packets are quite large, which causes problems for applications where the data is small and bursty, like sound cards (hence why there isnt a PCI-E version of the X-Fi).

Its possible this is what the standard is ment to address, as this is something the HTX supporters use against them

It could (this is purely speculation on my part) also provide other enhancements such has hot switchable lanes, where for example, all cards have a physical x16 connector, and at least x1 lane, as soon as that lane becomes saturated another is allocated by the chipset.

Got a PCI-E 10Gbit LAN card, SLI/Xfire gfx and a high end PCI-E RAID controller? when playing games the gfx get x16/x16, when dragging files from the LAN the ethernet card and RAID controller get x16/x16, meaning you dont need to waste massive amounts of silicon on the northbridge throwing more and more lanes at a problem.

Thats just an example of an improvement to the spec I just thought up, just trying to say that bandwidth isnt everything

 

[prozac26]

PCI-E is the norm now, and will be for a few year. I think when graphic cards demand more bandwith, then a new slot would come out.

G80, and R600 will be PCI-E 16x, so at earliest, I would expect a new slot late '08.

I agree but I might add that I think it will be even longer since even PCIe 8X is not even maxed out yet and you have PCIe 16X and if you count crossfire or SLI you have essentualy PCIe 32X ! So yeah earliest would be 08 but even that is too soon I think lol
I'm thinking when single cards need more than 16x bandwith, because right now, they don't even use half of the available bandwith. Marketing fuels this BS.

 

[konfuzd]

AFAIK, the 2.0 PCIe spec operates at 5GHz, as opposed to 2.5GHz, and double's throughput to 1GB/s per lane. This gives you 16GB/s of bi-directional bandwidth for your 16x slot. Don't worry, it's backwards compatable with current 1.0 spec devices.

As for its necessity, I don't know. Unlike AGP, PCIe is a serial bus and as such it has certain latency penalties and can't come nearly as close to it's theoretical maximum bandwidth as a parallel bus. Doubling the speed of the bus would greatly improve the latency situation. It might even finally kill off AGP.

 

[JonathanDeane]

PCI-E is the norm now, and will be for a few year. I think when graphic cards demand more bandwith, then a new slot would come out.

G80, and R600 will be PCI-E 16x, so at earliest, I would expect a new slot late '08.

I agree but I might add that I think it will be even longer since even PCIe 8X is not even maxed out yet and you have PCIe 16X and if you count crossfire or SLI you have essentualy PCIe 32X ! So yeah earliest would be 08 but even that is too soon I think lol
I'm thinking when single cards need more than 16x bandwith, because right now, they don't even use half of the available bandwith. Marketing fuels this BS.

yes soooo true ! I guess AGP 8X is finaly being maxed out by Oblivion and some other games ? Anymore I just buy middle of the road video cards and live with non maxed out settings. I guess when you get older your eyes are not as sharp so 1024X768 looks pretty good in game lol