AGP cards vs. PCI express...

[VJ]

A first test of the ATi RV380 and the GeForce FX 5200, both with PCIexpress connection:

http://babelfish.altavista.com/babelfish/urltrurl?lp=zh_en&url=http://www.hkepc.com/hwdb/pciexpressvga-1.htm

But as I'm on the lookout for a new card: will there be new AGP cards by ATI, nVidia and Matrox ? Or could their current range be the last of the AGP cards by them ?

(if there will be no new AGP cards, I might jump for a topmodel-card, as there would be no possibility to upgrade further)


Jörg

[Gurm]

OH THE RECORD? Uhh... I can't really say other than that I'm PRETTY sure there will be more AGP cards from ATI. Very fast ones. Ones that make nVidia look silly.

'Course I can't really say. That's all personal speculation, not fueled by any direct knowledge.

- Gurm

[Taz]

Originally posted by Gurm
Ones that make nVidia look silly.

Don't they already

[Wombat]

PCI-Express does allow other protocols on top of it. It's entirely feasible that you'll see PCI-Express-to-AGP card adapters.

[VJ]

Gurm: ok, I just wanted some opinions on this subject... I have a feeling mainboard with PCI-Express could be here sooner than I expect them...

Wombat: Ha, this explains what nVidia has done (in the above link): they use a bridge-adapter, whereas the ATI card is natively PCI-Express.

edit: but those adapters won't allow you to use an AGP card in a PCI-Express slot, but rather the other way around... But if manufacturers stop making AGP cards (someday), this kind of conversion becomes obsolete as well...

Is it actually required for performance to switch to something else ? I thought the bandwidth of AGP 8x is never used...

Jörg

[TransformX]

I think because you can only have 1 AGP slot while you can have many PCI-Express slots.
Remember the old days when AGP didn't exist and all we had was PCI (on most boards there was still 1 ISA slot) ?
Well the good times are back !

[VJ]

Oh, so you mean the mainboards will still have an AGP slot for compatibility, some PCI-Express slots, some regular PCI slots...


Jörg

[Wombat]

Or they could have all PCI-Express, and you could plug in an AGP card via an adapter. Probably even multiple AGP cards in multiple adapters, if they write their code correctly.

PCI-Express offers not only bandwidth, but logic advantages. Also, it works over distances. You could have a PCI-Express link that travels over cable, like external SCSI does.

It might be kinda cool to have a display or something with a PCI-Express connector on it, with its own optimized video card, and then whatever "headless" computer you plug into it will work.

[VJ]

Originally posted by Wombat
Or they could have all PCI-Express, and you could plug in an AGP card via an adapter. Probably even multiple AGP cards in multiple adapters, if they write their code correctly.

Will this physically be possible ?
I mean, such an adapter would have to have a certain width, thus prohibiting the agp card to be fixed as it normally is ?


Jörg

[The PIT]

Originally posted by Wombat
PCI-Express offers not only bandwidth, but logic advantages. Also, it works over distances. You could have a PCI-Express link that travels over cable, like external SCSI does.

You mean we could have external graphic cards that we just plug in.

I can imagine it different cards for different games.

[Wombat]

We could have different cards for different games, but I guess latency might still be a problem. But I wouldn't be surprised if say Apple started going something like this. Some low-power, low-video-power portable palmtop computer with an external Express slot. You plug it into the apple 20" multimedia display w/ onboard ATI video card, and get great performance out of it.

Will this physically be possible ?
I mean, such an adapter would have to have a certain width, thus prohibiting the agp card to be fixed as it normally is ?

Yeah, but PCI-Express brings along with it an entirely different form factor as it is. You're going to be buying a new case anyway.

[Fluff]

Thoughts of a hifi kind of set up with pci express, Modules such as graphics and sound just stack on top of eachother.

Hot pluggale network cards seem like a cool idea, for keeping systems up and running..