Sli board press release

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bap4201

Senior member
Oct 13, 2004
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YEAH BABY!!! WHOHOO BRING IT ON!!! I want this baby too! Thanks for the link! HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE!!! YEAH!
 
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Thermalrock

Senior member
Oct 30, 2004
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looks like it doesnt have any pci-e x1 slots either just like the msi doesnt. this is horrible. i was supposed to be able to but a pcie hdtv card in my new comp. now its either sli or proper upgradability which is dissappointing. im gonna go cry for a lil bit and prolly order the ultra :( version when my store has it.
 
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Caveman

Platinum Member
Nov 18, 1999
2,537
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Where Can I read up on what the PCI-E 1x slot is supposed to do for someone... I don't think this affects me but I'm not sure...

BTW, I emailed the point of contact on that press release; called Asus for confirmation as well and got the same answer...

Availability at retailers by 1st week in Dec... hardware sites should have reviews in next few days... Yay!
 
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Thermalrock

Senior member
Oct 30, 2004
553
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the 1x slots would be nice to have for stuff like hdtv cards and scsi controller as the pci bus with its 133mb/sec for all slots together sucks and should be eliminated asap. each pcie lane (1x) does almost twice as much as all the pci slots together. thats why its good to have.
 
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Thermalrock

Senior member
Oct 30, 2004
553
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go to the asus site and look at the drawing they made of it looks just like the msi. 2 pcie 16x and 3 regular pci.
 
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gobucks

Golden Member
Oct 22, 2004
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I think all the pictures i've seen of the ASUS board include the x1 slots, so hopefully they didn't pull an MSI on this one. On the other hand, the Ultra board has an extra PCIe x1 slot, and costs 40 pounds less ($80, is that right?), so I'm not sure which one to get.

As for the x1 slots, I completely agree with Thermalrock. They are crucial, more important than the PCIe graphics, even. All the people in these forums seem to be getting so swept up in SLI fever that they've lost sight of what is really important. The fact is, probably 90% of people looking into SLI are looking at it as a cheap way to ensure a good upgrade path. Only the remaining 10% are actually gonna spend $200+ on a mobo and then shell out $1000 for dual 6800 Ultras (more considering the current markup on them due to limited supply). For the vast majority, SLI is just an added convenience, a way to be sure that if the next generation of hardware is underwhelming, you'll still have a way to boost performance for cheap, rather than getting stuck paying loads of money for essentially a clock boost, like the X850 etc cards will be. (Oooh, 540/1120 versus 520/1080, where do I sign up!!!). However, if you force these people to pay a large premium for the upgrade path, or make them wait months longer for the upgrade path, or remove another upgrade path to make room for SLI, then the value is gone. PCIe x1 slots are an upgrade with no alternative. When Creative releases their new PCIe-only Zenith sound cards, or new HDTV recorders come out, or controllers for SATA-III, 10GB ethernet, 802.11n, 802.16 (wimax), and future USB and firewire specs are all released, you will only be able to get them if you have PCIe. With graphics, on the other hand, unless the entire industry comes crashing to a halt, you will always be able to find something faster, for cheaper. Maybe the in-between releases are underwhelming, but every year or so, there is a new core that puts old hardware to shame, whether it's through improved architecture, pure speed, image quality, or new features, and if you wait long enough, your window will pop up. Maybe being able to double your cards as a contingency plan is a nice bonus, but it's hardly worth never being able to have a high speed peripheral in your computer EVER. It would be like buying an ISA based computer 10 years ago with an AGP slot but NO PCI slots! Can you really say "oh, we won't need the PCI slots, ISA will be just fine." No. (yes, I know AGP wasn't out when PCI first came out, but it's the closest parallel I could find).

Anyways, don't let the mobo makers win, if this is their decision. If it's just MSI, then don't buy their SLI boards. If Asus does the same thing, don't buy theirs, either. If they want to cut out features for no reason, we need to let them know we won't put up with it, and the easiest way is to cut into their wallets.
 
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Thermalrock

Senior member
Oct 30, 2004
553
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Originally posted by: gobucks
I think all the pictures i've seen of the ASUS board include the x1 slots, so hopefully they didn't pull an MSI on this one. On the other hand, the Ultra board has an extra PCIe x1 slot, and costs 40 pounds less ($80, is that right?), so I'm not sure which one to get.

As for the x1 slots, I completely agree with Thermalrock. They are crucial, more important than the PCIe graphics, even. All the people in these forums seem to be getting so swept up in SLI fever that they've lost sight of what is really important. The fact is, probably 90% of people looking into SLI are looking at it as a cheap way to ensure a good upgrade path. Only the remaining 10% are actually gonna spend $200+ on a mobo and then shell out $1000 for dual 6800 Ultras (more considering the current markup on them due to limited supply). For the vast majority, SLI is just an added convenience, a way to be sure that if the next generation of hardware is underwhelming, you'll still have a way to boost performance for cheap, rather than getting stuck paying loads of money for essentially a clock boost, like the X850 etc cards will be. (Oooh, 540/1120 versus 520/1080, where do I sign up!!!). However, if you force these people to pay a large premium for the upgrade path, or make them wait months longer for the upgrade path, or remove another upgrade path to make room for SLI, then the value is gone. PCIe x1 slots are an upgrade with no alternative. When Creative releases their new PCIe-only Zenith sound cards, or new HDTV recorders come out, or controllers for SATA-III, 10GB ethernet, 802.11n, 802.16 (wimax), and future USB and firewire specs are all released, you will only be able to get them if you have PCIe. With graphics, on the other hand, unless the entire industry comes crashing to a halt, you will always be able to find something faster, for cheaper. Maybe the in-between releases are underwhelming, but every year or so, there is a new core that puts old hardware to shame, whether it's through improved architecture, pure speed, image quality, or new features, and if you wait long enough, your window will pop up. Maybe being able to double your cards as a contingency plan is a nice bonus, but it's hardly worth never being able to have a high speed peripheral in your computer EVER. It would be like buying an ISA based computer 10 years ago with an AGP slot but NO PCI slots! Can you really say "oh, we won't need the PCI slots, ISA will be just fine." No. (yes, I know AGP wasn't out when PCI first came out, but it's the closest parallel I could find).

Anyways, don't let the mobo makers win, if this is their decision. If it's just MSI, then don't buy their SLI boards. If Asus does the same thing, don't buy theirs, either. If they want to cut out features for no reason, we need to let them know we won't put up with it, and the easiest way is to cut into their wallets.
Click to expand...


hehe i like that you value pcie 1x slots but it doesnt have enough bandwith for 10gb lan. youd need 5 pcie lanes to take full advantage of that i think. i think itd gonna be a few years till we see any of that tho anyway. at the moment 125 mbyte/sec seems plenty and 1.25 gbyte/sec makes me think of old ram bandwiths rather than what a local area network needs. this is for now, im sure well get there at some point.
 
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Thermalrock

Senior member
Oct 30, 2004
553
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any way my mood is alot better now. i decided ill believe the photography that shows 2x pcie 1x slots (even tho 3 would be nice but oh well) and not the drawing. seems like ill get sli and pci-e 1x after all.
 
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gobucks

Golden Member
Oct 22, 2004
1,166
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yeah, there isn't technically enough bandwidth to run 10GBE, but most peripherals don't run anywhere near their max. If they did, SATA controllers, firewire, USB 2.0 cards, and 1GB Ethernet wouldn't be able to run on PCI. Their typical usage runs well below 133MB/s, but even so, current cards are clogging up the PCI bus. with PCIe x1, it would be possible to provide enough bandwidth to satisfy the typical maximum load on 10GBE without saturating the entire bus, something that is not possible with PCI. Also, PCIe v.2.0 and 3.0 will up the x1 throughput to 500MB/s and 1000MB/s, respectively, without an infrastructure change.
 
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Thermalrock

Senior member
Oct 30, 2004
553
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but id have to buy a new motherboard anyway then as a bios update wont turn my pci-e into pcie 2-0 or 3.0. then is the pci bus is almost enough to run gigabit (not full duplex tho, just one direction) if the rest of the pci things are idle. 10gb lan would be more than 4x a pcie lane at all times. 10gb is just a whole lot bandwith.
 
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slurmsmackenzie

Golden Member
Jun 4, 2004
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please correct me if i'm wrong....

so the best price performance route at this point is cheap 939, sli mobo, and two nvidia 6's?
 
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slurmsmackenzie

Golden Member
Jun 4, 2004
1,413
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so if it's going for 160lbs. (i know that's not the sign, but screw it), british, then what can we expect to pay in american scratch?
 
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DCrew1X

Member
Nov 5, 2004
78
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0
well at least we have 2 manufacturers who officially released nforce 4 boards for the US. (gigabyte and asus) just gotta wait on actual availability from distributors. too bad abit ax8 is expected to come out around the release of nforce 4 mobos in the market; not a smart move by abit IMHO.
 
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stickybytes

Golden Member
Sep 3, 2003
1,043
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finally asus has annouced their nforce 4 board. im not sure will i get the sli or non-sli version of this board. even though sli is a great technology, im not sure i have enough money to cough up the money for two video cards. still, this board is great for all those enthusiasts who have the money to splurge 400+ on video cards alone. for me, 200 is about the max ill go.
 
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bap4201

Senior member
Oct 13, 2004
265
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0
Originally posted by: stickybytes
finally asus has annouced their nforce 4 board. im not sure will i get the sli or non-sli version of this board. even though sli is a great technology, im not sure i have enough money to cough up the money for two video cards. still, this board is great for all those enthusiasts who have the money to splurge 400+ on video cards alone. for me, 200 is about the max ill go.
Click to expand...

I understand that the sli board would be approx 20% faster than non sli.
 
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