PCI Express 3.0 details surface

PCI 2.0's doubled-up speed boost was something to celebrate, but think again if you're looking for such a bump with PCI Express 3.0. The PCI SIG started eking out some details about the new standards, and as of now it looks like PCI express 3.0 will see transfers speeds of 8-gigatransfers per second, compared to 2.0's 5.0-gigatransfers per second. Channel width and transfer protocol will ultimately determine the amount of information transferred, of course, so the new standard could have some tricks up its sleeves. The good news is that PCI Express 3.0 will use the same connector and will be backwards-compatible with 2.0. PCI Express' specifications should be complete in 2009 with a rollout in 2010, so don't go stressing about your motherboard's I/O options just yet.

[Some Kid @ Jun 12th 2008 11:24AM]

3 sems like a popular number this week
3G, 3.0, i started posting this at 11:23
hmmm
is 3 the tech number like 7 is the biblical number of choise?

[Josh L @ Jun 12th 2008 12:01PM]

3 is also a Biblical holy number.

[OneLove @ Jun 12th 2008 12:01PM]

what?

[fourthletter @ Jun 12th 2008 1:00PM]

3G was out 4 years ago Apple just caught up.

4 is the new 3

Who really needs this no card touches the high end of 2 yet so *YAWN*

[bolezhinkov @ Jun 12th 2008 2:28PM]

three is also one of the smallest numbers, statistically you can probably find a three in more things that any number but one and two. don't get too excited.

[waterboy99troop @ Jun 12th 2008 8:22PM]

3 is also the number thou shalt, no more, no less... 4 shalt thou not count, neither count thou 2, excepting that thou then proceed to 3...

[bored analyst @ Jun 16th 2008 8:10AM]

Indeed Waterboy, then one doth unleash thy holy hand-grenade.

[Dave @ Jun 12th 2008 11:27AM]

You know what would have been even more awesome? Graphics cards that could actually USE the bandwidth this generation instead of ones that just threw the 2.0 on their box to seem cooler.

[eggothewaffle @ Jun 12th 2008 12:34PM]

Exactly what I was thinking.

[Wwhat @ Jun 12th 2008 2:09PM]

Be careful asking for that, next they'll release those RAMless cards again that use system RAM, sigh.

[bjorn_ahlm @ Jun 12th 2008 9:00PM]

The bandwidth isn't the important part. It's the increased power output (doubled to 300W) of the connectors so you don't need those extra power cables to the cards. For some reason this article doesn't mention that part, but it's the first thing they say in the original story.

[ryan @ Jun 12th 2008 11:31AM]

If ANYONE asks "will it play crysis?" im going to hunt you down and force you to watch a jerry springer marathon for 30 hours straight

[Thi mam(kris120890) @ Jun 12th 2008 11:34AM]

jerry, jerry, jerry, jerry.

(even though when they fight he just stands there)

[schagg @ Jun 12th 2008 11:50AM]

will it play crysis? :P ooh! what about doom too!?

ok, I had to.

[Juaquin @ Jun 12th 2008 12:40PM]

Schagg: There needs to be a super-low rank for those like you.

[gm76 @ Jun 12th 2008 1:26PM]

A PCI-E 3.0 slot being able to play Crysis without a GPU??? OMG that's hawt.

[Wwhat @ Jun 12th 2008 2:11PM]

Will people that ask if things play crysis blend? Over to ryan for a report on that.

[ryan @ Jun 12th 2008 2:17PM]

I dont consider the will it blend as annoying so only 5 hours of watching the View for them

[Backwards People @ Jun 12th 2008 11:33AM]

AGP 8x with 256MB aperature FTW!

[Pochi @ Jun 12th 2008 11:33AM]

I don't think my current video card is even fully utilizing the 1.0 spec. I bet the same applies to 95% of consumers with a PCI-E slot right now.

[iofthestorm @ Jun 12th 2008 5:37PM]

Yeah, it does. This might be useful for multi-GPU situations, but other than that, nothing really even approaches the limit of PCI-E 2.0. Most cards don't even use PCI-E 2.0.

[Some Kid @ Jun 12th 2008 11:34AM]

3 is aparently a popular tech number this week
3G, 3.0, this is 3 gigatranfers faster than the prior version?
hmmm coincidink
i think not...............

[Pochi @ Jun 12th 2008 11:49AM]

...WTF?

[Noah @ Jun 12th 2008 11:38AM]

Firefox 3 comes out next tuesday! Is gonna be huge!

PCI 3.0 huh? Number 2 just started getting products, this isn't needed for a few years. Perhaps enterprises need it?

[Thi mam(kris120890) @ Jun 12th 2008 11:41AM]

Im using it now and it far out does everything. The page loading speed is phenominal. Supposedly safari 4 is going to be even faster next year.

[Ravindra @ Jun 12th 2008 11:42AM]

Even though the serial rate increase is 5GT/s - 8GT/s, the encoding scheme has been changed from a scheme where 2 bits were added to every byte to a scheme where 2 bytes are added to every 128 bytes. This coupled with other changes actually doubles the speed from 2.0 to 3.0.

So, just looking at the serial data rates can be misleading.

[Ravindra @ Jun 12th 2008 11:43AM]

Read that 128-bits instead

[Nik @ Jun 12th 2008 1:06PM]

The 3.0 spec will double the bandwidth compared to 2.0. PCIe 1 & 2.0 specs us 8b/10b encoding, so 20% of the bandwidth is eaten up by the encoding scheme. For example a single lane PCIe 1.0 has a nominal bandiwdth of 5Gb/s, but is really only capable of 4Gb/s data transfer. Similarly a 1x PCIe 2.0 slot has a nominal bandwidth of 10Gb/s but is actually limited to 8Gb/s of data. PCIe 3.0 does away with 8b/10b encoding, so the nominal and real bandwidth are th same, i.e. a 16Gb/s 1x PCIe 3.0 link can transmit 16Gb/s

[Wwhat @ Jun 12th 2008 2:17PM]

There's a reason for the encoding though isn't there? reliability, errorchecking, it has to be done doesn't it?

[marc @ Jun 12th 2008 12:47PM]

Just give me a board with 3-4 full bandwidth x16 slots.

[Sal @ Jun 12th 2008 12:48PM]

will it play crysis? Doom II? What about Xwing vs Tie Fighter? Frame rates are important...

[andres @ Jun 12th 2008 5:02PM]

will it play battletoads?

[Towncivilian @ Jun 12th 2008 12:59PM]

Psst, Engadget, I think you mean PCI-E 2.0, not PCI 2.0.

[Stranger @ Jun 12th 2008 1:38PM]

I really wish that they would have chosen a different name than PCI Express. First of all it's says nothing about the technology used, second it's a bit confusing for the layman with PCI vs PCI-E vs PCI-X and third (and most important) it's a hell to read and wright in a simple manner. Why not call it NPC for Next Peripheral Connector or SNP for Serial Line Connector or anithing wich doesn't resemble PCI.

[Wwhat @ Jun 12th 2008 2:15PM]

In a surprising plot-twist it turns out that I'm OK with PCIe.

[barlow.aaron @ Jun 14th 2008 2:51PM]

3 is the number of pips on commander Riker's collar.

[Jimmy @ Jun 12th 2008 3:53PM]

YAY FOR PROGRESS! But i really don't care as 2.0 cards have JUST started arriving. Nonetheless, by 2011ish maybe we will be glad they started work on this so early.

[Arjy @ Jun 12th 2008 4:40PM]

I'm still waiting for a card that can take full advantage of 2.0. I'm pretty sure even those next gen card from nVidia and ATI wont use 2.0 to their full advantage yet.

[H0rK @ Jun 12th 2008 6:51PM]

Most hard drives max out at around 80meg/sec transfere, IDE is capable of 130meg a second, yet we all use SATA which is capable of 1.5gigs a second... no wait we use SATA II which can do 3gigs a second...

[Exprice @ Dec 25th 2008 8:58PM]

Geez, guys. PCI-E 2.0 is already good enough for today's stuff. I really don't see the need to step it up quite yet.