Athlon XP will have no PCI Express support

[apoppin]

System Builder Summit 2004 So future graphics upgrades will be tricky

AMD HAS CONFIRMED that it will not include support for PCI Express for future Athlon XP processors.
We asked Via whether it would produce chipsets supporting PCI-E for XPs, and it said it has no such product in its roadmaps.

This might leave Athlon XP owners with no hope of future graphics upgrades, but it comes as no surprise. AMD has publicly said it wants to displace its XP chips with 64-bit processors.

This means that if you are an Athlon XP owner and you want to buy a new graphics card after June/July, you will have to change motherboard and processor too.

I searched (but with all the GPU discussions, i may have missed it) and am surprised it was not posted.

 

[drag]

Does anybody actually make Althon motherboards with PCI express? Does anybody have any plans or announcements that they are even making a 32bit mainboard that supports PCI Express?

 

[Alptraum]

Thats not really surprising. The XP is their older tech and they want to move on. Though I think saying if you want to buy a new card after June/July you are screwed is abit extreme. I am sure AGP will be with us for awhile.

 

[The Green Bean]

Graohic cards will come in 2 flavours, PCI-E and AGP 8X. 8X should be fast enough.

 

[Lonyo]

If they make processors for the 939-pin motherboards (32-bit ones, basically XP's), as their budget line, then it'll be a case of buying a new motherboard and processor, which will still be doable on a budget.
The next gen cards (X800/6800's) are already CPU limited in some games, but are available in AGP flavours. By the time the gen after comes about, they CPU will be a big bottleneck, so you'd need to upgrade CPU/mobo and graphics card together anyway.

 

[agnitrate]

Athlon XP is old news anyways. Athlon64 is where it's at and where their profits are. You'll see support there guaranteed.

-silver

 

[DaveSimmons]

Not much point adding graphics cards faster than X800 PE to a slow XP anyway.

By the time they stop making new high-end AGP cards (at least a year), it will seem silly to be buying one for your turtle of an XP 3200+, you'll be buying it for your A64 4000+ instead.

 

[JackBurton]

Hey, I heard Intel has confirmed they are not adding PCI-E support for their PII CPU line. Imagine that! I guess all the PII owners are out of luck.

What the hell is the point of adding PCI-E support to the Athlon XP line? If you are going to buy a new PCI-E equipped AMD motherboard, you better be getting an Athlon64/FX/Opteron.

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: agnitrate
Athlon XP is old news anyways. Athlon64 is where it's at and where their profits are. You'll see support there guaranteed.

-silver

Is there gonna be the equilalent of the "Duron" in the A64 line?

I woulda thought amd would keep their budget line up-to-date as it is still a really fine proc and it doesn't seem that difficult or expensive to add PCIE support for XP. (is it?)

Unless they have another 64bit cpu variant as their 'value' cpu.

edit: Son of (a) Duron

WORD IS TRICKLING in about the new chips from AMD, and there are some changes in the wind, all for the good. By now you all know about the Athlon64 3700+ launching in about a month, that should shock no one. You also know about the 939 pin chips launching at about the same time.
You may have heard about the speeds: it looks like the 939 pin socket will bring a 100+ speed boost to the ratings, a pretty fair assessment of the kick a dual channel unregistered DDR setup will give you. The first set of 939s you will see are the 3500+ and the 3800+, but that will be no surprise to anyone who is paying attention. There will also be a 939 pin FX-53, and that should be the gamers chip of choice until it is replaced in Q4 by the FX-55.

There are some big changes in store for AMD though. What happens to socket 754 after the 3700+ comes out? The new AMD value line, that?s what. It seems AMD is about to launch a new ?son of Duron?, with a completely new name. Since AMD?s stated goal is to have all desktop chips on 939 by the end of ?05, there has to be something for the cheaper S754, big box price conscious retailers won?t sit still.

found it myself, even if it's speculation . ..

 

[SneakyStuff]

the Athlon XP processors WILL have PCI-E support, just not PCI-x16 graphics support. The reason for this is that the mobo makers can pair the PCI-E southbridge chipsets, with existing northbridge chipsets. But new northbridge chipsets won't be compatable with the Athlon XP. Or so VIA says.

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: SneakyStuff
the Athlon XP processors WILL have PCI-E support, just not PCI-x16 graphics support. The reason for this is that the mobo makers can pair the PCI-E southbridge chipsets, with existing northbridge chipsets. But new northbridge chipsets won't be compatable with the Athlon XP. Or so VIA says.

We asked Via whether it would produce chipsets supporting PCI-E for XPs, and it said it has no such product in its roadmaps

 

[SneakyStuff]

well, then i guess a week of time can change a lot, i stand corrected

 

[Warder45]

Originally posted by: Alptraum
Thats not really surprising. The XP is their older tech and they want to move on. Though I think saying if you want to buy a new card after June/July you are screwed is abit extreme. I am sure AGP will be with us for awhile.

ATI and Nvidia said this is the last line of graphics cards that will be AGP. So I'd assume the either the fall refresh will be AGP free or next springs. But since Nvidia has a bridge solution you still can use their PCI-express cards in AGP slots. But this means your stuck with Nvidia.

 

[darkswordsman17]

The real question here is will PCI-E matter when it first comes out? Since there is little difference between AGP 4X and 8X then will it matter that much? I'm sure it will eventually and maybe even right away, but just something to consider. If it won't make a difference until it matures (later this year) then its a moot point, because by then AMD will have its XP line on socket 754. Also, if a kind of go between solution that has both PCI-E and AGP is popular enough (I think one mobo manufacturer has said they will do this) then I'm sure other companies will make one too, so AGP will likely live on for at least a little longer.

 

[Darkhawk28]

Well, for those with a 3200+ and at least a 9800Pro (or similar) will probably be fine until PCI-E comes out and solidifies itself. Plus by then, AthlonXP users can justify changing platforms at that point rather than changing to non-PCI-E boards and then changing AGAIN a few months later.


Just a thought.

Edit: Sorry darksward, you pretty much stated what I was thinking.... just had some delay writing the post while changing a dirty diaper.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

What I get from this is what I've been saying for weeks, sktA is dead for all intents and purposes so deal with it.

 

[RussianSensation]

No. Right now AGP8x (2x the speed of 4x) doesnt make any difference in games. So PCI Express which toughts 16x the speed of AGP8x will surely not make any negligible difference for graphics cards for a while. The big advantages of PCI express is taking away the lack of bandwidth to other components like hard drives and so on but by the time hard drives start using up more than ATA133 and graphics cards require the transfer of speeds of greater than 8x I think we'll be looking at 2006+ and Athlon XP system will be far outdated for any type of upgrade even if it did support this feature.

 

[JBT]

Who cares? I think anyone sticking with SOcket A itsn't going to be buiying the latest and greatest video anyways. the new NV40 and R420 should be able to perform well enough for the current Socket A's for quite some time. My next video card will be PCI-Express and the mobo will have it too. Not a big deal IMO.