is pci-e x16 THAT much better than x4

[tombo12345]

I was looking at fry's today and saw a great bargain motherboard for 20$! The only thing is that it's pci-e slot is only x4. Now also consider that I'm plugging a very weak, very slow 7300 le graphics card into it, that probably doesn't need every pipeline going. Should I totally stear clear from it?

 

[ps2cho]

It won't affect something like a 7300LE. I believe anything higher than a 8600GT will "start" to add a bottleneck.

 

[nd4spdbh2]

It won't affect something like a 7300LE. I believe anything higher than a 8600GT will "start" to add a bottleneck. A 7300LE wouldnt even come close to maxing a 4x slot

ya that sounds bout right... my friends 8800GTS G80 320mb was only 10% bottlenecked by a 4x pcie slot, in 3dmark06

BTW OP what mobo were u lookin at?

 

[tombo12345]

ya that sounds bout right... my friends 8800GTS G80 320mb was only 10% bottlenecked by a 4x pcie slot, in 3dmark06

BTW OP what mobo were u lookin at?

I don't know the model number or brand. Hopefully it's still there tomorrow and I'll tell you then.

Thanks for the info!

 

[nd4spdbh2]

I don't know the model number or brand. Hopefully it's still there tomorrow and I'll tell you then.

Thanks for the info!

what socket was it?

do you remember the chipset... was it an intel 9X5 (945 most likely) or VIA, or Nvidia chipset?

 

[blazed]

Wouldn't effect a low end video card, but seemes weird a board would only have 1 PCIe 16x "4X" slot, maybe it had a 2nd PCIe16x slot that was 4x electricaly, alot of P35 boards have those.

 

[ps2cho]

Wouldn't effect a low end video card, but seemes weird a board would only have 1 PCIe 16x "4X" slot, maybe it had a 2nd PCIe16x slot that was 4x electricaly, alot of P35 boards have those.

When he says 4x PCI-E, he means 4x electrically. There are no 4x PCI-E slots in reality. 16x Only.

 

[resoluteK]

I'm learning something new here. Does that mean two 7600gt's in SLI won't be crippled by a board that runs SLI at less than 16x, 16x?

 

[nd4spdbh2]

I'm learning something new here. Does that mean two 7600gt's in SLI won't be crippled by a board that runs SLI at less than 16x, 16x?

nope... i would say you wouldnt have any probs running 7600gt's in SLI at 4x and 4x there probably wouldnt be any bottlenecking issues.

 

[resoluteK]

nope... i would say you wouldnt have any probs running 7600gt's in SLI at 4x and 4x there probably wouldnt be any bottlenecking issues.

thanks. also, in this instance, would there be any advantage to using hardware SLI (via SLI cable) vs. software?

 

[tombo12345]

what socket was it?

do you remember the chipset... was it an intel 9X5 (945 most likely) or VIA, or Nvidia chipset?

I don't remember the chipset, but I do remember some specs. 945 does sound familiar.

core 2 duo/p4/pd compat
ddr2 557mhz
pci-e x4
2 pci slots
onboard intel video
887mhz (or in that ballpark) fsb

 

[ratbuddy]

When he says 4x PCI-E, he means 4x electrically. There are no 4x PCI-E slots in reality. 16x Only.

Uhh, first off, it's x4 or x16.. Pronounced 'by 4' or 'by 16'.....

Sure there's x4 slots, there's x1, x4, x8, x16 PCIe slots. And the cards will work in electrically smaller slots, assuming they will physically fit. My mobo has a x4 slot that is open ended, you can throw a x8 or x16 card in there and it will work, though at reduced lanes..

 

[nd4spdbh2]

Uhh, first off, it's x4 or x16.. Pronounced 'by 4' or 'by 16'.....

Sure there's x4 slots, there's x1, x4, x8, x16 PCIe slots. And the cards will work in electrically smaller slots, assuming they will physically fit. My mobo has a x4 slot that is open ended, you can throw a x8 or x16 card in there and it will work, though at reduced lanes..

ratbuddy, i have NEVER seen pcie lanes or slots talked about in x# format... its always been #x format... ie 4x 16x 8x....


Hmm ull have to get the model number on this board for us... seems halfway decent for a lil build i have in mind.

 

[ratbuddy]

ratbuddy, i have NEVER seen pcie lanes or slots talked about in x# format... its always been #x format... ie 4x 16x 8x....

Take two of these and call me in the morning: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_Express

 

[nd4spdbh2]

Take two of these and call me in the morning: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_Express

*walks away and hides in shame of being royally pwned*

musta been the full throttle i just drank


in other words i stand corrected!

 

[3line]

Many of today's cards such as the 3870 and the 3850 still don't even max out the AGP 8x bus, so I don't see what the problem is. x16 only becomes a factor when running SLI and such. As someone said earlier, the bottlenecking on a pci-e x4 will be marginal. pci-e x4 is about equal to the old agp 4x, which is more or less good for most cards.

 

[blazed]

Actually bottlenecking can occur with AGP 3850/3870 cards when doing HD encode/decoding, same with using a 4X electrical PCIe slot. For games however, this is only the case for higher end cards. Also PCIe 2.0 chipsets are different, and PCIe1.a 4X PCIe2 4X and AGP4x are not comparible.

 

[Evilsizer]

pci 2.0 cards are backwards compatible wiht pci 1.0a/1.1... pcie 1.0a/1.1 4x = pcie 2.0 4x, both have the same bandwidth, difference is pcie 2.0 has faster signaling and can now use 32x slots due to increasing the lane width to the PCIE 2.0 buss.

 

[nd4spdbh2]

pci 2.0 cards are backwards compatible wiht pci 1.0a/1.1... pcie 1.0a/1.1 4x = pcie 2.0 4x, both have the same bandwidth, difference is pcie 2.0 has faster signaling and can now use 32x slots due to increasing the lane width to the PCIE 2.0 buss.

i thought pcie 2.0 slots had 2x the bandwidth for the same electrical interface?

 

[Neuromancer]

i thought pcie 2.0 slots had 2x the bandwidth for the same electrical interface?

yup

pci 2.0 cards are backwards compatible wiht pci 1.0a/1.1... pcie 1.0a/1.1 4x = pcie 2.0 4x, both have the same bandwidth, difference is pcie 2.0 has faster signaling and can now use 32x slots due to increasing the lane width to the PCIE 2.0 buss.

Nope there are x32 PCIE1 slots also

PCIE2.0 = double bandwidth. Yes it may have been achieved with faster signalling, but it has twice the bandwidth and the same number of lanes.

Many of today's cards such as the 3870 and the 3850 still don't even max out the AGP 8x bus, so I don't see what the problem is. x16 only becomes a factor when running SLI and such. As someone said earlier, the bottlenecking on a pci-e x4 will be marginal. pci-e x4 is about equal to the old agp 4x, which is more or less good for most cards.

AGP is actually faster then PCIE x8/ (Bus transfer of 254.3 MB/s per lane vice 250 for pciexpress. The differnce is PCIexpress is fully bidi. It can transfer and receive that amount of data each second (so often times is referred to having a 500MB/S transfer rate.) The main reason for the switch is PCIE x16 and multi gpu tech