HARDWARE: Matrox *1-Lane* PCI Express Graphics

[.Nut]

• Millennium G550 for PCIe offers maximum flexibility
  
  Matrox Millennium G550 products for PCIe (PCI Express) are the world's first PCI Express x1 graphics cards. The unique x1 design allows these cards to be compatible with all compliant PCIe slots...

http://www.matrox.com/mga/workstation/3dws/news/features/g550_pcie.cfm

 

[blakerwry]

i find this more interesting than many of the higher end graphics cards, PCIe x16 is such a pain... if there were more 1x and 8x cards server boards (like those in the rediculously cheap dell low end models) suddenly become much more attractive...

 

[Mercutio]

Er... what goes in a 16x PCIe slot besides a graphics card? Don't get me wrong, I like the idea of a 1x card, but where's the other hardware that will take advantage of this tremendous amount of I/O?

OK... well, googling I find that Tekram has the ARC-1210, which is a 6-port card (actively cooled, even - shudder) for an 8x lane, that makes 3ware stuff look like a bargain.

 

[Buck]

Couldn't you produce a board without a x16 PCI-E and just use x1-whatever slots instead?

 

[Mercutio]

There isn't much of anything that goes in a 1x lane. A couple companies make NICs, Matrox has its thing, and that's about it. No modems, no sound cards (that I know of), no TV capture cards. What else goes in a PCIe slot?

 

[Buck]

I expect the whole idea is that adapter cards in general all switch over to PCI-E. Essentially, we should have a bank of PCI-E slots, preferrably all the same size, downward compatible to smaller devices, like x1, and all of our beautiful cards would plug in and work (e.g. modems, sound cards, video cards, NICs, SCSI controller cards, etc.)

 

[Tannin]

I expect the whole idea is that adapter cards in general all switch over to PCI-E. Essentially, we should have a bank of PCI-E slots, preferrably all the same size, downward compatible to smaller devices, like x1, and all of our beautiful cards would plug in and work

We already had a system where all our beautiful cards would just plug in and work.

Bring back ISA!

 

[Buck]

I expect the whole idea is that adapter cards in general all switch over to PCI-E. Essentially, we should have a bank of PCI-E slots, preferrably all the same size, downward compatible to smaller devices, like x1, and all of our beautiful cards would plug in and work

We already had a system where all our beautiful cards would just plug in and work.

Bring back ISA!

Welcome to the Century of the Anchovy Tannin, ISA is history, PCI-E is in. Tea, could you try to bring Tannin into this century?

 

[Tea]

Sorry Buck, he's gone totally retro.

I've tried leaving a note chiselled into the stone outside his bedroom door, but I can't do a thing with him these days. In fact I'm a bit surprised he still misses ISA. I'd have thought the Apple II slots or the old S-100 Bus would be more his thing. Maybe next week.

 

[Corvair]

...Essentially, we should have a bank of PCI-E slots, preferrably all the same size, downward compatible to smaller devices, like x1, ...

This would be quite inefficient from the mobo designer's standpoint, because, by rule, all PCI Express lanes must be able to provide full throughput at all times. This, of course, doesn't mean that every PCIe lane will actually be busy at all times. If you had a mobo with six 16x PCIe slots, it would have to be backed up by one hell of a processor to be able to deliver 96 PCIe lanes worth of full-duplex I/O performance (240 Gb/s, or 30 GB/s sustained throughput).

Designers will divvy up I/O performance of a given system's PCIe bus hub into the appropriate number and type of slots for the targeted consumer. For example, using a PCIe hub capable of delivering 20 lanes of I/O performance, one 16x PCIe slot and four 1x PCIe slots would be appropriate for a desktop mobo, then maybe four 4x PCIe slots and four 1x PCIe slots for a server mobo.

...and all of our beautiful cards would plug in and work (e.g. modems, sound cards, video cards, NICs, SCSI controller cards, etc.)

And don't forget, you shouldn't even need to turn the computer off to plug in a new PCIe card!

 

[Corvair]

...I'd have thought the Apple II slots or the old S-100 Bus would be more his thing.

The S100 bus -- VME, GPIB/HPIB, and Multibus as well -- are all still alive and kicking in the industrial world. PCI is also used in industrial settings, especially CompactPCI.

By the way, PCI Express is also supplanting PCMCIA and CardBus (which are both derivatives of parallel PCI). On both portable and stationary computers, you will be able to hot-plug PCIe "credit card" form factor devices by sliding them into a PCMCIA-like slot meant for PCIe devices. These PCIe cards will be communicating native PCIe. The only difference between PCIe "credit card" form factor devices and the PCIe devices that you open your computer up to install is that only the form factor of the device will be different, as the PCIe connector on either device will be the same (1x).

In other words, when you plug a GPS card into your PCIe notebook computer or hand-held computer, you will be plugging your GPS card directly into PCIe slot.

 

[ddrueding]

I'm quite stoked about this, as it shows that we (mainstream early adopters) will have motherboard without PCI sooner rather than later. I'd imagine gimick-based manufacturers will be the first over, with creative and linksys offering their products in PCIe, before every else does. Then we can have a motherboard without PS/2, Parrallel, Serial, PCI, ISA, or PATA ... the golden age is upon us!

 

[Buck]

<strums harp>

 

[Corvair]

Well, I was once -- not too long ago -- hoping for a computer with an InfiniBand channel that I could connect anything to. Unfortunately, it looks like we'll have to wait a while for that to happen.

 

[Mercutio]

What the bloddy hell is wrong with serial and parallel again? Or PS/2, for that matter?

 

[ddrueding]

What the bloddy hell is wrong with serial and parallel again? Or PS/2, for that matter?

The fact that they are 4 different plugs, each with limited use and more complex that they need to be. That and they consume about 30% of the space on the backplane that could go to more usefull plugs such as Firewire, USB, Ethernet, Audio (1/8", SPDIF, TOSLink), external SATA, DVI, and maybe even CF?

 

[Mercutio]

The fact that they are 4 different plugs, each with limited use and more complex that they need to be. That and they consume about 30% of the space on the backplane that could go to more usefull plugs such as Firewire, USB, Ethernet, Audio (1/8", SPDIF, TOSLink), external SATA, DVI, and maybe even CF?

We already have standard placement for Ethernet, sound and USB. Firewire, eSATA and digital audio are all very much niche applications. You'd rather have those things than make millions of people buy new keyboards, mice and printers?

 

[ddrueding]

We already have standard placement for Ethernet, sound and USB. Firewire, eSATA and digital audio are all very much niche applications. You'd rather have those things than make millions of people buy new keyboards, mice and printers?

I'd argue that firewire and digital audio are becoming less and less niche apps. (The eSATA certainly is). I have a pretty hard time finding workstation printers that even support parallel, and an even harder time finding one that doesn't support USB. Ditto mice and keyboards - they almost all ship as USB with a PS/2 adapter on them.

Considering this would not be a retroactive conversion, only people buying new computers would need to have legacy-free peripherals. 90% of those people would get them as part of the package anyway. For the rest of us, we likely already have nice equipment that is USB anyway, or could drop an additional $20 to get some cheaply.

 

[MaxBurn]

I was recently forced to buy a USB keyboard as my new KVM doesn't suport the PS/2 thing. Not really happy, I liked my IBM cliky keyboard. Ultimately moving to these universal standards is a good thing though for flexability. I am thinking USB is going to be here for a long time, maybe longer than PS/2.

 

[blakerwry]

I couldn't find a good and cheap USb keybaord for a PC who had a flakey PS/2 port... solution was to buy an adapter that let my plug the ps/2 keyboard and mouse into a working USB port on the PC.

 

[Mercutio]

Seems silly to me to get rid of a perfectly functional keyboard just because there's something newer.

I haven't found PS/2 to USB converters to work reliably.