#45, I believe the 'Secure Networking Processor' is just another fancy name for the TCPA, which has nothing to do with protecting owner of the machine. See http://www.notcpa.org/faq.html for details.
"... and an obscure device called the Secure Networking Processor. NVIDIA claims the "processor" enhances networking security, reduces CPU overhead and contains specialized features that defend against hacker attacks. Although we will have to see it to believe it, this journalist suspects it is probably nothing more than a tweaked ruleset for QoS and *maybe* some denial of service protection (hopefully outbound as well as inbound)."
IF this version of NForce incorporates the EtherMax technology from IReady which they acquired in April, then it could do all that and more. (That's what I would wish for!)
But I would speculate that it's too soon for this version of NForce to have incorporated technoogy from IReady, unless NVidia had already begun this process before the acquisition occurred.
also gtech, whats up with 'raid using morons'? Is having faster performance that bad of a thing? Or is having increased drive security bad? I personally use raid, and I have enjoyed every moment of it.
Reflex, it would be a pretty dumb idea to remove PCI altogether. No one would want to have to buy all new stuff just because PCI wouldn't be supported anymore. I wouldn't want to go out and buy a new TV tuner card, and a new Creative Audigy 2 sound card. Yea I think there needs to be less PCI slots, but not elimination altogether.
#39 Why? Please elaborate. An additional FireWire PCI-card would of course be possible.
Does an add-on FireWire chip also use PCI-bandwith? If not, well great, if so then I still would not want a 1394-PCI card sit in a slot that I'd like to use otherwise. If in fact USB 2.0 would do the trick for me, I'd be OK, but it doesn't. I've been told however that USB is heavier on the CPU than 1394a/b. So if this is true, 1394a/b is still a good feature to add-(on). With or without it, the CK8-04 looks like a smash.
In the end it all depends on your priorities. I wouldn't choose PCI-E over 1394b though I would gladly accept PCI-E if it came with 1394b on a new 754/939 mobo. Let's just bring it on nVidia!
I wanted to upgrade my system last October, but decided to wait when I read early reports of socket 775 and pci-e. Unfortunately when these boards finally arrived their performance didn't compare to amd 64 boards. So, I decided to wait for socket 939 boards, only to be disappointed in the lack of pci-e. I can't justify buying an AGP card today, knowing that there won't be a slot for it if I update my mobo later. The exciting thoughts of SLI make pci-e all the more attractive to me.
Nforce 4 is finally what I've been waiting almost a year for and more (I didn't even dream of SLI), but here I am a year later, still waiting.... My computer isn't going to be able to run Doom3 or HL2. I don't know how much longer I can wait to upgrade after HL2 is released (assuming it really will happen)!!
If the Nforce4 boards are really out by the end of Q3, I would be happy. But, a recent post in the ABIT forums by their marketing team isn't as optimistic:
"NF4 Fatal1ty board will be available late this year or early next year depends on when the chipset is available. And yes it will have PCI-E, SATA 300 and other ABIT innovative features that I can not talk about right now."
Kris, is the Q3 info reliable enough to convince me to wait another month?? Or, should I just give up and go with the msi neo2 now and be stuck with an AGP card?
#36 Marlin1975: So no point in adding something most will not use.
So most DV-camera's, TC FireWorks, RME Fireface and outboard FireWire HDD will be obsolete? Are you unaware of 1394b? IEEE1394b = 800Mb vs USB 2.0 = 480Mb. Then why the hell would they even invent that? Maybe average househould PC's do not rely on FireWire. For audio/video people it's a different story.
Oh well, this is just the chipset, right? 1394b will probably come on a Texas Instruments add-on chip then.
Seems less and less companies are making items for firewire and most people buy items with USB2.0 now. So no point in adding something most will not use.
BUT GOOD sound, Sata, ethernet, etc... are things everybody can use.
32 - You don't need to install the IDE drivers as part of the nForce package if you don't want to. Non-MS IDE drivers have been problematic for everyone, regardless of the chipset. Even Intel gave up on the regular IAA last year.
First off using the default MS IDE drivers can only be done if skipping the Nforce drivers, seems to me that would be kind of a bandaid since you'd be sacrificing performance to fix a basic problem.
Not having heard of Iwill? Well in the server world they are rather large.
If you click on the link for the Google search you'll find that some of the links refer to this commentary going on in AT forums. I'm not sure how much more major or close to home the issue has to get. Maybe a search on said forums would be a good idea.
Can AT reproduce the problem? Has it been tried? Is AT using the MS IDE drivers to avoid problems?
Curious - thought there would be more mental curiousity on this one rather than a "no that couldn't possible be true" responses. But I'll take your thoughts in since maybe you are correct.
First off, I've never even heard of that review site (Burning Issues). Second, they're reviewing an IWill board, not exactly a large and well known mobo manufacturer.
I haven't heard of any nF3 issues based on reviews of boards by Asus, Abit, MSI, etc. on well-known review sites.
#28 - That review is incorrect. nForce3 supports parallel emulation of SATA drives, so as long as you're not a RAID-using moron you can use the default MS IDE drivers. It works the same as on an Intel platform.
Plenty of hints exist that both the GPU's and the chipsets will become available around the same time. And by GPU's I mean ones worthy of the reason you'd be buying a A64 and the CK08 in the first place. Via too, is planning to be in on this Pci-e chipset stuff too I think.
Big thing from a go forward standpoint is will the CK08 have the same 'issue' with PATA and SATA and optical drives and so forth that the NF3 does...
The best cards available in PCIe are the ATI X600 and the NVidia 5900. Both of those cards are from the last generation. The X600 is basically a 9600 in PCIe.
When I made that comment I was wondering if NVidia 6800's in PCIe would be available when the CK8-04 is released. ATI's X800 is also nowhere to be found in PCIe at the moment.
This is good news, one of those nForce4 Ult, oops sorry I meant CK8-04 Ultra will be just what I was after (I've no use for SLI as theres no way I'd waste money on two gfx-cards of the same generation). I just hope AMD manage to get the 90nm process churning out nicely overclockable A64s before the year is out (or very early '05).
Buy a new cpu? If you don't already own a 939, then changing over to it, should be an expense you expected anyway, imo. The decision on when to do that switch is up to budget of course.
I was referring to a large amount of people who currently own 939 A64's and have wanted pci-e for a while (yes the videocards will match the release of the boards from looking at news on both), or those who have been waiting to dive into 939 until they could get pci-e. That is a large amount of folks, honest.
Waiting 2 months? You still need bios revisions and the like, but the days of having to wait for hardware changes to get refined over time for Nvidia chipsets are 'mostly' behind us. In fact, if you think about it, this is really building on the NF3, which is a well working chipset, as you know. If you want to wait till January, super, then I won't be competing with you to get my board :)
Budgets are what they are, and I am not saying that it'll be an easy thing to go out and buy tons of stuff to start using the CK08's, but I do think a great many folks have been avidly awaiting this board or a similar NV board with pci-e and 939, and I think those folks are going to be buying a lot of these boards.
If boards with the CK8-04 will be out by the end of Q3, does that mean NVidia's video cards will be available in PCIe at the same time? The boards sure aren't going to sell very well if PCIe video cards aren't available.
I don't think these boards will be selling like crazy, because with a board like this, you'll have to change the CPU and GPU at the same time. That's a huge expense, considering that you will most likely be buying a high performance CPU and graphics.
Personally I'm still figuring out how the hell I'm gonna pull it of, because god knows I want to, but I just don't know how.
And I wouldn't suggest you buy right away, since new MOBOs are well known for having all sorts of problems. Wait a month or even better two. I know I'll definately wait untill early next year for my A64/GF6800GT/CK8-04 combo :'(
I think Nvidia will be floored by how many of these boards fly off the shelves. Tons of folks at least that I've been reading, have been holding for pci-e on A64's, and to offer them that plus SLI, will be quite amazing to watch the sales.
Even just upgrading the mobo, lots of folks will be doing. These things are going to sell like crazy.
Boards on shelves by the end of Q3? If that's true, you just made my day. I've been waiting for this for so long, and it looks like it's right around the corner. WOOHOO! :)
OK, now that we're being picky about all of this, I don't think Half-Duplex is quite the right way to describe AGP.
Half-Duplex usually describes a link that can be used full speed in either direction, but only one way at a time, such as Ethernet when used with a hub rather than a switch.
AGP doesn't work this way. The 2.1GBps is downstream (from the host bus to the 8xAGP interface on the graphics card). Upstream, which isn't used for much at all, is standard 66Mhz PCI signalling, or only 266MBps. So it's assymetrical. I guess it is still half-duplex from the point of view that the link can still only be used one way at a time.
Of course, as in many things (everything according to my wife), I could be wrong here...
Mino: Your grammar is pretty good. You're far easier to read than half of the supposedly educated Americans that post online.
Regards,
Dave
p.s. No, that isn't America(n) bashing. I am one, and proud of it. I'm bashing the general lack of grammar used in online posting, which becomes particularly evident when a foreign speaker shows better English skills than most of the 'natives'.
Put a CK8 ultra on the shelf from a major board maker, and I'll be buying it. I've waited a long time for these to arrive and was losing faith that they were ever going to arrive.
The use of a chip to interpret 1 slot 2 slot SLI capable systems is extremely helpful, since I won't initially commit to SLI, but a second 6800 ultra would make a nice self present down the road a bit.
If these chips were sitting in boards right now, I'd own one.
I have no idea how could chipset support defined amount off A64's since the hypertansport interface DOES NOT make difference betwen CPU, NB, SB or any other HT device. therefore it should not depend on desing of NB wheter it supports multi-CPU systems. As I see it only way it may be incompatible with multi-CPU systems may be driver issue even which is highly unlikely.
I suspect they just are not targeting CK4-08 to these markets.
Actually k(ilo), M(ega),G(iga), T(era) should ALWAYS be written the way a did in this sentence, since they are from SI-units convention about metric measurements.
B(Byte) should be as far as I know ALWAYS in capital to avoid misinterpretation with b(bit).
However in recent years I frequently see "b" meaning bytes and in the same article "b" meaning bits. It is usually caused by people who are lacking even basic education about computer science. Also they are in many cases wery skilfull in hardware topic, they lack some theoretical background.
Please excuse my grammar since I'm Slovak and I hated English classes during my high school;)
yeah, I was thinking when I read that "no way does a SINGLE PCIe lane have as much bandwidth as 8x AGP". I didn't have the exact numbers in my head, but I was thinking that 8x PCIe and 8x AGP have about the same bandwidth, and you've shown that to be correct.
At one time, I think the convention was that when abreviating computer capacities and speeds, a small leading letter (i.e. kbps, mbps, gbps) meant bits, while a capital leading letter (i.e. Kbps, Mbps, Gbps) meant bytes. Now I often see the 'B' itself small or capital to denote bits and bytes, which is more intuitive I admit, but I don't think that's correct. That said, to be on the safe side I often use all letters small for bits (i.e. gbps) and the first two capital for bytes (i.e. GBps).
BTW, I knew it was a typo, but I thought 'bunbers' was actually kind of appropriate. New definition:
Therefore your conclusion that SLI PCI-E cards will not be limitted by PEGx8 in bandwidth are correct, but Your numbers presented are COMPLETELY wrong !
Kris: You stated for instance:
"8X AGP solutions run at 2.1Gbps ..."
Which is definitely wrong since AGP supports 32bit*66MHz*8transfers/s = 17066 Mbps which accounts to 2.1GB(bytes)ps or 17.1Gb(bits)ps if you like bits.
All numbers are HALF-duplex naturally.
PCIE supports 2Gbps per lane FULL duplex which is 250MBps and your 2.5Gbps is again out of reality.
16xPEG means 4GBps(GigaBytepersecond) FULL DUPLEX
8xPEG means 2GBps FULL DUPLEX
and APG8x means 2GBps HALF DUPLEX
Therefore your conclusion that PCI-E cards will not be limitted ina bandwith ai correct, but Your bunbers are COMPLETELY wrong !
Kris please correct your nubers as qiuckly as possible to avoid misinterpretation amog your less informmed readers.
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47 Comments
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langles - Tuesday, October 19, 2004 - link
#46Nope. It's not TCPA.
Press release day is here:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/feature_activearmor.h...
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/network/TCP_C...
It seems to be a few steps in the direction I was wondering about. But no details yet on whether or not it supports IPSEC offloading.
quanta - Friday, October 8, 2004 - link
#45, I believe the 'Secure Networking Processor' is just another fancy name for the TCPA, which has nothing to do with protecting owner of the machine. See http://www.notcpa.org/faq.html for details.langles - Saturday, September 18, 2004 - link
Regarding this part of the original article:"... and an obscure device called the Secure Networking Processor. NVIDIA claims the "processor" enhances networking security, reduces CPU overhead and contains specialized features that defend against hacker attacks. Although we will have to see it to believe it, this journalist suspects it is probably nothing more than a tweaked ruleset for QoS and *maybe* some denial of service protection (hopefully outbound as well as inbound)."
IF this version of NForce incorporates the EtherMax technology from IReady which they acquired in April, then it could do all that and more. (That's what I would wish for!)
See:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/IO_12881.html
http://www.national.com/appinfo/networks/files/Mar...
http://www.national.com/appinfo/networks/files/whi...
But I would speculate that it's too soon for this version of NForce to have incorporated technoogy from IReady, unless NVidia had already begun this process before the acquisition occurred.
Myrandex - Monday, September 13, 2004 - link
also gtech, whats up with 'raid using morons'? Is having faster performance that bad of a thing? Or is having increased drive security bad? I personally use raid, and I have enjoyed every moment of it.Myrandex - Monday, September 13, 2004 - link
Reflex, it would be a pretty dumb idea to remove PCI altogether. No one would want to have to buy all new stuff just because PCI wouldn't be supported anymore. I wouldn't want to go out and buy a new TV tuner card, and a new Creative Audigy 2 sound card. Yea I think there needs to be less PCI slots, but not elimination altogether.KristopherKubicki - Tuesday, August 31, 2004 - link
thebluesgnr:1394 can still be implemented by the manufacturer. All these documents say here is that it isnt integrated onto the core logic chip.
Kristopher
ceefka - Tuesday, August 31, 2004 - link
#39 Why? Please elaborate. An additional FireWire PCI-card would of course be possible.Does an add-on FireWire chip also use PCI-bandwith? If not, well great, if so then I still would not want a 1394-PCI card sit in a slot that I'd like to use otherwise. If in fact USB 2.0 would do the trick for me, I'd be OK, but it doesn't. I've been told however that USB is heavier on the CPU than 1394a/b. So if this is true, 1394a/b is still a good feature to add-(on). With or without it, the CK8-04 looks like a smash.
In the end it all depends on your priorities. I wouldn't choose PCI-E over 1394b though I would gladly accept PCI-E if it came with 1394b on a new 754/939 mobo. Let's just bring it on nVidia!
TimTheEnchanter25 - Monday, August 30, 2004 - link
I wanted to upgrade my system last October, but decided to wait when I read early reports of socket 775 and pci-e. Unfortunately when these boards finally arrived their performance didn't compare to amd 64 boards. So, I decided to wait for socket 939 boards, only to be disappointed in the lack of pci-e. I can't justify buying an AGP card today, knowing that there won't be a slot for it if I update my mobo later. The exciting thoughts of SLI make pci-e all the more attractive to me.Nforce 4 is finally what I've been waiting almost a year for and more (I didn't even dream of SLI), but here I am a year later, still waiting.... My computer isn't going to be able to run Doom3 or HL2. I don't know how much longer I can wait to upgrade after HL2 is released (assuming it really will happen)!!
If the Nforce4 boards are really out by the end of Q3, I would be happy. But, a recent post in the ABIT forums by their marketing team isn't as optimistic:
"NF4 Fatal1ty board will be available late this year or early next year depends on when the chipset is available. And yes it will have PCI-E, SATA 300 and other ABIT innovative features that I can not talk about right now."
Kris, is the Q3 info reliable enough to convince me to wait another month?? Or, should I just give up and go with the msi neo2 now and be stuck with an AGP card?
Thanks
thebluesgnr - Saturday, August 28, 2004 - link
With PCIe the lack of 1394b support is no big deal.ceefka - Friday, August 27, 2004 - link
#36 Marlin1975: So no point in adding something most will not use.So most DV-camera's, TC FireWorks, RME Fireface and outboard FireWire HDD will be obsolete? Are you unaware of 1394b? IEEE1394b = 800Mb vs USB 2.0 = 480Mb. Then why the hell would they even invent that? Maybe average househould PC's do not rely on FireWire. For audio/video people it's a different story.
Oh well, this is just the chipset, right? 1394b will probably come on a Texas Instruments add-on chip then.
37 I'd be dissapointed if it weren't.
RyanVM - Thursday, August 26, 2004 - link
So is this audio controller Soundstorm2 or not?Marlin1975 - Tuesday, August 24, 2004 - link
Seems less and less companies are making items for firewire and most people buy items with USB2.0 now. So no point in adding something most will not use.BUT GOOD sound, Sata, ethernet, etc... are things everybody can use.
ceefka - Tuesday, August 24, 2004 - link
No IEEE 1394?? Maybe I'm ignorant and those always come with add-on chips. Wouldn't this be a great opportunity to integrate IEEE 1394 a/b?ceefka - Tuesday, August 24, 2004 - link
7.1 audio : onboard 96KHz or 192KHz /24bits ?gtech41 - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
32 - You don't need to install the IDE drivers as part of the nForce package if you don't want to. Non-MS IDE drivers have been problematic for everyone, regardless of the chipset. Even Intel gave up on the regular IAA last year.Anemone - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
First off using the default MS IDE drivers can only be done if skipping the Nforce drivers, seems to me that would be kind of a bandaid since you'd be sacrificing performance to fix a basic problem.Not having heard of Iwill? Well in the server world they are rather large.
If you click on the link for the Google search you'll find that some of the links refer to this commentary going on in AT forums. I'm not sure how much more major or close to home the issue has to get. Maybe a search on said forums would be a good idea.
Can AT reproduce the problem? Has it been tried? Is AT using the MS IDE drivers to avoid problems?
Curious - thought there would be more mental curiousity on this one rather than a "no that couldn't possible be true" responses. But I'll take your thoughts in since maybe you are correct.
KristopherKubicki - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
The Iwill board is real, i saw it at Computex. Iwill is pretty large in Taiwan, i think they made the dual opteron CK8-04 reference board.But anyways yeah that raid thing is kind of dumb.
Kristopher
danidentity - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
First off, I've never even heard of that review site (Burning Issues). Second, they're reviewing an IWill board, not exactly a large and well known mobo manufacturer.I haven't heard of any nF3 issues based on reviews of boards by Asus, Abit, MSI, etc. on well-known review sites.
gtech41 - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
#28 - That review is incorrect. nForce3 supports parallel emulation of SATA drives, so as long as you're not a RAID-using moron you can use the default MS IDE drivers. It works the same as on an Intel platform.Anemone - Monday, August 23, 2004 - link
Check the review for details and link to a query showing a broader view of the "issue".http://www.burningissues.net/hard/DK8N_review/inde...
btw the note on it is on pg 4 and links to a google search for more details :)
danidentity - Sunday, August 22, 2004 - link
Anemone, what issue would that be?Anemone - Sunday, August 22, 2004 - link
Plenty of hints exist that both the GPU's and the chipsets will become available around the same time. And by GPU's I mean ones worthy of the reason you'd be buying a A64 and the CK08 in the first place. Via too, is planning to be in on this Pci-e chipset stuff too I think.Big thing from a go forward standpoint is will the CK08 have the same 'issue' with PATA and SATA and optical drives and so forth that the NF3 does...
KristopherKubicki - Saturday, August 21, 2004 - link
danidentity: True, although the 6600 is showing up now and i just dont have it in the engine yet.Kristopher
zakath - Saturday, August 21, 2004 - link
WoW!!! More paper-tastic goodness from nV! (to steal a phrase from Ars Technica)danidentity - Saturday, August 21, 2004 - link
Kristopher,The best cards available in PCIe are the ATI X600 and the NVidia 5900. Both of those cards are from the last generation. The X600 is basically a 9600 in PCIe.
When I made that comment I was wondering if NVidia 6800's in PCIe would be available when the CK8-04 is released. ATI's X800 is also nowhere to be found in PCIe at the moment.
Dan
PrinceGaz - Saturday, August 21, 2004 - link
This is good news, one of those nForce4 Ult, oops sorry I meant CK8-04 Ultra will be just what I was after (I've no use for SLI as theres no way I'd waste money on two gfx-cards of the same generation). I just hope AMD manage to get the 90nm process churning out nicely overclockable A64s before the year is out (or very early '05).Anemone - Saturday, August 21, 2004 - link
Buy a new cpu? If you don't already own a 939, then changing over to it, should be an expense you expected anyway, imo. The decision on when to do that switch is up to budget of course.I was referring to a large amount of people who currently own 939 A64's and have wanted pci-e for a while (yes the videocards will match the release of the boards from looking at news on both), or those who have been waiting to dive into 939 until they could get pci-e. That is a large amount of folks, honest.
Waiting 2 months? You still need bios revisions and the like, but the days of having to wait for hardware changes to get refined over time for Nvidia chipsets are 'mostly' behind us. In fact, if you think about it, this is really building on the NF3, which is a well working chipset, as you know. If you want to wait till January, super, then I won't be competing with you to get my board :)
Budgets are what they are, and I am not saying that it'll be an easy thing to go out and buy tons of stuff to start using the CK08's, but I do think a great many folks have been avidly awaiting this board or a similar NV board with pci-e and 939, and I think those folks are going to be buying a lot of these boards.
$.02
KristopherKubicki - Saturday, August 21, 2004 - link
Falco.: It does not say, although i would assume so.danidentity: PCIe is here....
http://www.anandtech.com/guides/priceguide.aspx?AT...
Kristopher
danidentity - Saturday, August 21, 2004 - link
If boards with the CK8-04 will be out by the end of Q3, does that mean NVidia's video cards will be available in PCIe at the same time? The boards sure aren't going to sell very well if PCIe video cards aren't available.AtaStrumf - Saturday, August 21, 2004 - link
I don't think these boards will be selling like crazy, because with a board like this, you'll have to change the CPU and GPU at the same time. That's a huge expense, considering that you will most likely be buying a high performance CPU and graphics.Personally I'm still figuring out how the hell I'm gonna pull it of, because god knows I want to, but I just don't know how.
And I wouldn't suggest you buy right away, since new MOBOs are well known for having all sorts of problems. Wait a month or even better two. I know I'll definately wait untill early next year for my A64/GF6800GT/CK8-04 combo :'(
Falco. - Saturday, August 21, 2004 - link
does " with the addition of 7.1 high definition audio " = soundstorm or just regular onboard audio ??Anemone - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
I think Nvidia will be floored by how many of these boards fly off the shelves. Tons of folks at least that I've been reading, have been holding for pci-e on A64's, and to offer them that plus SLI, will be quite amazing to watch the sales.Even just upgrading the mobo, lots of folks will be doing. These things are going to sell like crazy.
danidentity - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
Boards on shelves by the end of Q3? If that's true, you just made my day. I've been waiting for this for so long, and it looks like it's right around the corner. WOOHOO! :)johnsonx - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
OK, now that we're being picky about all of this, I don't think Half-Duplex is quite the right way to describe AGP.Half-Duplex usually describes a link that can be used full speed in either direction, but only one way at a time, such as Ethernet when used with a hub rather than a switch.
AGP doesn't work this way. The 2.1GBps is downstream (from the host bus to the 8xAGP interface on the graphics card). Upstream, which isn't used for much at all, is standard 66Mhz PCI signalling, or only 266MBps. So it's assymetrical. I guess it is still half-duplex from the point of view that the link can still only be used one way at a time.
Of course, as in many things (everything according to my wife), I could be wrong here...
KristopherKubicki - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
Ive been here 20 some years and im still having trouble with the language :'(Kristopher
johnsonx - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
Kristopher: Fair enough ;)Mino: Your grammar is pretty good. You're far easier to read than half of the supposedly educated Americans that post online.
Regards,
Dave
p.s. No, that isn't America(n) bashing. I am one, and proud of it. I'm bashing the general lack of grammar used in online posting, which becomes particularly evident when a foreign speaker shows better English skills than most of the 'natives'.
KristopherKubicki - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
Fixed the numbers, i already wrote 3 other articles about PCIe so i dont know how i managed to mess that up other than lack of coffee.Kristopher
Anemone - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
Put a CK8 ultra on the shelf from a major board maker, and I'll be buying it. I've waited a long time for these to arrive and was losing faith that they were ever going to arrive.The use of a chip to interpret 1 slot 2 slot SLI capable systems is extremely helpful, since I won't initially commit to SLI, but a second 6800 ultra would make a nice self present down the road a bit.
If these chips were sitting in boards right now, I'd own one.
mino - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
#7 You're 99% right.I have no idea how could chipset support defined amount off A64's since the hypertansport interface DOES NOT make difference betwen CPU, NB, SB or any other HT device. therefore it should not depend on desing of NB wheter it supports multi-CPU systems. As I see it only way it may be incompatible with multi-CPU systems may be driver issue even which is highly unlikely.
I suspect they just are not targeting CK4-08 to these markets.
themelon - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
Sorry, I mean the SLI version...themelon - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
I can confirm that the Ultra will infact support more than 1 Opteron. Infact I believe it will support up to 16.mino - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
bunbers ... LOLActually k(ilo), M(ega),G(iga), T(era) should ALWAYS be written the way a did in this sentence, since they are from SI-units convention about metric measurements.
B(Byte) should be as far as I know ALWAYS in capital to avoid misinterpretation with b(bit).
However in recent years I frequently see "b" meaning bytes and in the same article "b" meaning bits. It is usually caused by people who are lacking even basic education about computer science. Also they are in many cases wery skilfull in hardware topic, they lack some theoretical background.
Please excuse my grammar since I'm Slovak and I hated English classes during my high school;)
johnsonx - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
to mino,yeah, I was thinking when I read that "no way does a SINGLE PCIe lane have as much bandwidth as 8x AGP". I didn't have the exact numbers in my head, but I was thinking that 8x PCIe and 8x AGP have about the same bandwidth, and you've shown that to be correct.
At one time, I think the convention was that when abreviating computer capacities and speeds, a small leading letter (i.e. kbps, mbps, gbps) meant bits, while a capital leading letter (i.e. Kbps, Mbps, Gbps) meant bytes. Now I often see the 'B' itself small or capital to denote bits and bytes, which is more intuitive I admit, but I don't think that's correct. That said, to be on the safe side I often use all letters small for bits (i.e. gbps) and the first two capital for bytes (i.e. GBps).
BTW, I knew it was a typo, but I thought 'bunbers' was actually kind of appropriate. New definition:
bunbers = bungled numbers
mino - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
#3 some minor correction:Therefore your conclusion that SLI PCI-E cards will not be limitted by PEGx8 in bandwidth are correct, but Your numbers presented are COMPLETELY wrong !
sorry for little typo ;) we're all human...
mino - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
Kris: You stated for instance:"8X AGP solutions run at 2.1Gbps ..."
Which is definitely wrong since AGP supports 32bit*66MHz*8transfers/s = 17066 Mbps which accounts to 2.1GB(bytes)ps or 17.1Gb(bits)ps if you like bits.
All numbers are HALF-duplex naturally.
PCIE supports 2Gbps per lane FULL duplex which is 250MBps and your 2.5Gbps is again out of reality.
16xPEG means 4GBps(GigaBytepersecond) FULL DUPLEX
8xPEG means 2GBps FULL DUPLEX
and APG8x means 2GBps HALF DUPLEX
Therefore your conclusion that PCI-E cards will not be limitted ina bandwith ai correct, but Your bunbers are COMPLETELY wrong !
Kris please correct your nubers as qiuckly as possible to avoid misinterpretation amog your less informmed readers.
Best regards.
thatsright - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
Uhh, and when would we actully see retail boards based on this chipset. The article left this a bit unclear.Reflex - Friday, August 20, 2004 - link
This is closer to what I am looking for, although I would have liked to see more PCIe lanes, or even a complete removal of standard PCI slots....