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Networking Hardware

PCIe 4.0 Specs Revealed: 16GTps Rate and Not Just For Graphics Cards Anymore (tomshardware.com) 62

Freshly Exhumed writes: PCI-SIG has released the specifications for version 4.0 of the PCIe (Peripheral Component Interconnect Express) bus, which, according to Chairman Al Yanes, promises data transfer rates of 16GTps, extended tags and credits for service devices, reduced system latency, lane margining, superior RAS capabilities, scalability for added lanes and bandwidth, improved I/O virtualization and platform integration. Tom's Hardware has posted a slide deck of the new version's specifications.
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PCIe 4.0 Specs Revealed: 16GTps Rate and Not Just For Graphics Cards Anymore

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  • by Anonymous Coward

    You can now buy motherboards with 19 PCIe slots [amazon.com] for crypto currency mining.

    • by mikael ( 484 )

      But you have to dangle your GPU's out in a rack rather than being in a single case.

    • by slew ( 2918 )

      You can now buy motherboards with 19 x1 PCIe slots for crypto currency mining.

      Need for slots w/o need for speed...

  • by viperidaenz ( 2515578 ) on Thursday October 26, 2017 @05:37PM (#55440719)

    It was never just for graphics cards. It's a replacement for the PCI bus. It just happened to also replace AGP, which was a dedicated graphics port.
    It's commonly used for network cards, audio cards, storage (NVMe is PCIe), etc.
    Thunderbolt is PCIe + DisplayPort

    • NVMe is not PCIe.

      NVMe is implemented over PCIe. It doesn't have to be. PCIe is a physical and electrical bus with logical controllers. NVMe is a logical interface that runs over PCIe. It could run on whatever.

      • I suppose so...

        NVM Express (NVMe) is an interface that allows host software to communicate with a non-volatile memory
        subsystem. This interface is optimized for Enterprise and Client solid state drives, typically attached as a
        register level interface to the PCI Express interface.

        • by viperidaenz ( 2515578 ) on Thursday October 26, 2017 @09:18PM (#55441737)

          After actually reading the NVMe spec, it's specifically designed to be used over PCI Express. Other transports look to be an afterthought. NVMe over Fabrics is a separate specification for using NVMe over non-PCI* interfaces.

          NVMe 1.2 was only intended to be used over PCI type interfaces, primarily PCI Express, but also PCI and PCI-X.

    • It was never just for graphics cards. It's a replacement for the PCI bus. It just happened to also replace AGP, which was a dedicated graphics port.
      It's commonly used for network cards, audio cards, storage (NVMe is PCIe), etc.
      Thunderbolt is PCIe + DisplayPort

      Amen to that viperidaenz... And that's on yer punny desktops and Laptops.

      Please do not get me started on what can be done with PCIe on my servers, including but not limited to 40G and 100G Eth cards, 32G Fibrechannel cards, 50Gbps infiniband cards, SAS RAID Cards for booting, and mezzanine cards Galore in Blade servers....

      • by jabuzz ( 182671 )

        Where did you get 50Gbps Infiniband cards? Valid Infiniband speeds are SDR at 10Gbps, DDR at 20Gbps, QDR at 40Gbps, FDR at 56Gbps, EDR at 100Gbps and HDR at 200Gbps.

        • It wasan FDR card, and I got the speed wrong. Since the error is close (but not exactly) 10%, is withing acceptable range ;-) :-P

    • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

      It was never just for graphics cards. It's a replacement for the PCI bus. It just happened to also replace AGP, which was a dedicated graphics port.
      It's commonly used for network cards, audio cards, storage (NVMe is PCIe), etc.
      Thunderbolt is PCIe + DisplayPort

      AGP is a modified form of PCI - the only real difference is it's optimized for data transfers from the computer to the card (since video cards are output devices, there's not as much need to have a truly bidirectional, link). The other difference is it

  • more lanes are needed as 3.0 hardware will not run at the same speed in a half as wide 4.0 slot then a 3.0 slot. Unless they add switchers to take 4.0 and split out 3.0 lanes.

    still need cpus to add 4.0 and that will take time.

  • by Joe_Dragon ( 2206452 ) on Thursday October 26, 2017 @08:58PM (#55441671)

    see how amd will not have an new socket till 2019-2020 any ways AMD is the king of PCI-e right now and they really don't need 4.0 or 5.0 right away.

    Now intel is low on lanes and if there idea of 4.0 is just the same number of lanes then it will not really do much.

  • Was it ever "just for graphics cards" though ?

    • by swb ( 14022 )

      No, but there's a whole universe of people involved with computers who got started on the gaming track and for whom the x86 platform is defined by the parts involved in gaming. Their reference point for PCIe slots is graphic cards because on most desktops in the last 10 years every other interface was integrated into the motherboard. For those people, the only apparent purpose of PCIe slots was graphics cards.

      They don't remember the old days of ISA/EISA based boards where there was literally nothing integ

    • I fail to see how it still isn't just for graphic cards.

      Technically you are right, it is used by just about everything, not just graphic cards. However only GPU really have any limitations on any existing bus systems in the modern past. Everything else that is attached to it is too slow to care, and is more influenced by timings and scheduling anyway. I mean I/O on even a high end SSD isn't going to really improve no matter how fast a bus you buckle it to... Although the summary does mention some other thin

  • There have always been PCIe RAID cards, storage cards, network cards, sound cards, etc...

In the future, you're going to get computers as prizes in breakfast cereals. You'll throw them out because your house will be littered with them.

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