Pci X and Express

[Gajdycz]

What is the differnece? will both be combaltible with normal PCI, and which will have the new vid cards on them?

 

[brink's]

Pci express will be only for a certain type of nextgen Graphics cards. You'll have to buy a new mobo to use them. x800xt will be both agp and pci express, but Im not sure about nvidia

 

[Maxi]

nvidia will go pciX too, and the format is not just for graphics cards, it's meant to replace PCI and AGP.

 

[[pioneer]]

http://www.infoworld.com/article/04/05/21/21NNpci_1.html

 

[psyno]

PCI-X and PCI-Express have nothing to do with each other. PCI-X is basically PCI. It's more popular in the server market, and there are a few version of it, some being 64 bits wide, some at double the frequency, but it's still the old PCI architecture! PCI-Express has three things in common with the old PCI standard: the letters 'P', 'C', and 'I'. It is a completely new serial interface with simultaneous upstram and downstream bandwidth. Each lane has it's own bandwidth, and multiple lanes can compose a slot to increase the bandwidth (this is what the PEG (PCI Express Graphics) slot does).

Naturally, no PCI card will be compatible with PCI-Express. I believe Creative will be offering a PCI-Express version of one of the Audigy series relatively soon.

Please, everyone, I beg you, stop calling PCI-Express PCI-X!!

 

[Varsity]

PCI-X will be the home user standard for the next five-six years, with PCI Express for industry, science and spammers. PCI-X is the graphics card and general purpose interface, and is backwards-compatible with PCI wheras PCI Express is only software copatible. So if you buy a PCI-X mobo your PCI cards will still work in it: just with a reduced speed boost. Not your AGP ones through.The chart shows the time it will take to introduce the whole PCI-X/PCI Express architecture. As you might have guessed, the whole shebang is a year late.

My sig came first, jfyi.

 

[psyno]

As far as I'm aware, no one is trying to make PCI-X (which has been around for years) catch on for home desktops, workstations, or notebooks. IMHO PCI should just die. Good riddance to AGP!

Largely, motherboard vendors will initially be offering hybrid boards with one PEG slot, one or two PCI-Express x1 slots, and 3 or so of the old PCI slots. This effectively solves any compatibility issues you might be worried about, along with the fact that more and more peripherals are being integrated into the motherboard. To be honest, the average user has no need to retain his old sound card, since the onboard sound will probably suffice for him, etc. Ditto for NICs.

Where you get that PCI-Express is for "industry, science, and spammers" I don't know, and how that makes sense is just beyond me...
:monkee:

 

[Varsity]

Look at the chart. PCI Express is way ahead of PCI-X. Of course, when I say PCI-X I mean PCI-X 2.0,2.1 and 2.2, which are all new technologies. PCI Express offers no advantages to home users because PCI-X provides all the speed and power they will need for years to come, at a cheaper price and with said backwards-compatibility. ISPS, research institutes and other high-data transfer areas will be using PCI Express, however.

 

[psyno]

PCI-Express is a serial architecture, meaning many less traces on the MB's PCB, meaning it's cheaper for vendors to produce, meaning they'll prefer it, especially for volume production. Beyond that, PCI-X requires an individual controller for each slot. How is that supposed to be cheaper than anything?

Finally, while PCI-X does retain backward compatibility with 3.3v PCI cards, that effectively breaks the speed advantage of the bus as a PCI-X bus will only run as fast as the slowest card on the bus is capable. It would be like saying, "Hey, look at this 1066 MHz DDR2 motherboard I've got here, and you can plug EDO RAM into it too!"

PCI-X is not new. It's PCI, but faster, and with a few extra features (like ECC). Very high bandwidth, plus features like ECC, plus high cost, plus a level of complexity beyond average users adds up to an interface that could not be intended for the home user market.

 

[Varsity]

Perhaps I should make it clear that I understand PCI-X to be an intermediate platform? When I said cheaper I was taking into account more than the basic price. It's very high-risk going from one tech to another new one, even if you do provide PCI and PCI Express ports. Thus manufacturers are going to stick with the new PCI-X for the next few years until it stabilises, then move on.

 

[psyno]

All right, well I see what you're saying but I don't agree with your timeline. I think PCI-X will continue to dominate in the (network) server market while everyone else (desktops and notebooks especially) will skip over PCI-X entirely.

I think we answered Gajdycz's question pretty thoroughly.
To sum up: PCI-X retains backwards compatibility, PCI-Express doesn't; PCI-Express is where all the hype about the new graphics interface (PEG) is, while PCI-X doesn't try to offer a replacement for AGP.
:cheers:

 

[Gajdycz]

so, PCI x is just faster pci slots, while pci express replaces the agp slot, right?

 

[psyno]

PCI-X is a modern standard based heavily on PCI, which is backwards compatible with PCI. PCI-X has no intention to dabble with graphics.

PCI-Express is a new serialized, packetized standard based loosely on PCI, which hopes to replace not only AGP with PEG, but also PCI in general.

 

[[Matt]]

Just so you know the common abbreviation for PCI express that most people are using is PCIe. Also since PCIe is replacing not only the AGP slot but also the regular PCI slots you can look forward to future systems running of not just one extremely fast PCIe graphics card but 2 or possibly more!!! Alienware have already demonstrated this can be done at E3 with 2 6800u cards in the machine and performance increases of over 50% were reported!