Hi Im new to the forum and this is my first post so im sure that somewhere this question may have already been answered. I am looking to upgrade my system at home with and will be purchasing a new graphics card. I am a liitle confused however. I notice that some specs list the interface as PCI Express and others list as PCI Express 2.0 not to mention PCI Express x16. How can i be sure that my desktop board will be compatible with the graphics card. I am looking to by an 8800GTS card. I know there are a lot on the market but i dont want to come unstuck and find that its not compatible. My mother board is an ASUS P5B-VM. thanks in advance Matt
Since you have a micro atx mobo, Just be sure your new card will fit in you case. And be sure your psu is up to spec. Otherwise, your good to go.
PCI Express 2.0 is a newer version, which supports a higher throughput. It is backward compatible with PCI Express 1.x so you need not worry too much about it. The x16 in PCI Express x16 refers to the number of lanes. Both PCI Express 1.x and 2.0 support the same range of lanes, so both can have x16 lanes.
PCI-Express 1.1 (if it's just listed as PCI-Express, it's 1.1) supports transfers of 250 MB per second, per lane. That's 4 GB per second for PCI-Express x16. PCI-E 2.0 brings that number up to 8 GB per second. But in all probability, you'll never run into the limitation of PCI-E 1.1. Not with the current generation of video cards, anyway. PCI Express - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
When you say its backwards compatible, what would happen if i put a GeForce 8600 GTS card which specifies a PCIe interface into a regular PCI interface. Or would it not fit?
Backwards compatible means a Pci Express 2.0 motherboard can also accept Pci Express 1.0 graphics cards. You can also install a pci express 1x device into a pci express 4x, 8x, or 16x slot and it will work just fine. PCI slots are exclusively for PCI devices.
It's backward compatible with previous PCI Express standards - v1.0 and v1.1. PCI Express is COMPLETELY different from PCI. They may have quite a similar name but they are as different as duck and chicken. Like Ischaemia24 said though, you won't be able to fit a PCI Express card into a PCI slot. They intentionally designed it that way so that no one would ever make the mistake.
eventhough you buy PCIe X16 2.0 graphic card but your graphic performance can only perform up to only PCIe performance so i think you better install GeForce 8600 GTS graphic card
Huh... What do you mean? Even running at PCI Express 1.0, the GeForce 8800 GTS is much faster than the GeForce 8600 GTS.
hmm, if not mistaken, those pcie 1.0 or 2.0 only works in dual gpu mode? as in Crossfire or SLI. Running single won't matter right? correct me if i'm wrong.
What do you mean by they only work in dual gpu mode? If you are talking about performance difference between 1.0 and 2.0 when running SLI/CF mode, it's neglegible.
the performance difference between 1.0, 1.1, and 2.0 is so small you will never notice the difference... And yes the 8800 GTS is faster than the 8600gts.. In terms of video cards such as nvidia the numbers like 8600, and 8800 the higher number is usually faster... then you have gt, gts, gso, etc after that... usually the gt is faster than gts, or gso and same goes with gts and gso... so an 8800gt vs and 8800gts the 8800gt is faster...
