PCI-e 4x vs. 16x, PCI-e 1.0 vs 2.0

[bujeezus]

sorry if this has already been discussed.

i recently purchased an Asrock p45xe as an upgrade budget board from my asrock SATAII Core2Duo. i guess i shoulda researched BEFORE i purchased it, but took the "#1 board for under $100" from Tomshardware to be a good sign. with pci-e 2.0 16x (8x in CF) i tho't i would a see noticeable jump form the pci-e 1.0 4x of my old board. i'm runnin a lowly hd 3870 an to my extreme disappointment, after stayin up all nite to swap out my mb, discovered no performance increase what so ever. my 3d mark 06 scores were within 100 points of each other. can this be right? this is my 1st mb install (i'v always gotten the barebone systems with the mb already installed), so is it possible i may have screwed up somewhere or is it maybe a limitation of the video card? am i expecting too much?

 

[techmanc]

I would assume from the info you gave you were running with your old system it maxium potential you tested using 3dmark. You would only see a big increase in performance if your old system was being bottlenecked by the slower pci-e slot. Also 4 thing come to mind for getting a performance boost - faster memory - faster video card - faster system board - faster cpu. The slowest item it that list is generally your system bottleneck.

 

[Arkaign]

Okay :

PCI-E 4x to 16x, yes, big boost, and more importantly, 4x PCIe is a proven bottleneck with many current cards, even into the current midrange/economy cards.

PCI-E 1.0 to 2.0, not a big deal right now. AFAIK, there is no bottlenecking with currently available hardware with 1.0 vs. 2.0. This is futureproofing though, as the hot ATI (hopefully) and Nvidia cards of say, this time next year will likely be approaching the time when you need 2.0 to deal with the card's available transfer rates.

PCI-E 3.0 is coming as well, being announced in 2007, which is more of the same kind of improvement.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Originally posted by: Arkaign
Okay :

PCI-E 4x to 16x, yes, big boost, and more importantly, 4x PCIe is a proven bottleneck with many current cards, even into the current midrange/economy cards.

PCI-E 1.0 to 2.0, not a big deal right now. AFAIK, there is no bottlenecking with currently available hardware with 1.0 vs. 2.0. This is futureproofing though, as the hot ATI (hopefully) and Nvidia cards of say, this time next year will likely be approaching the time when you need 2.0 to deal with the card's available transfer rates.

PCI-E 3.0 is coming as well, being announced in 2007, which is more of the same kind of improvement.

True, my scores are in line with other systems using the same or similar components with PCI-E 2.0 and I'm on 1.0a

 

[techmanc]

So you guys are saying there a big performance boost going from PCIE 4x to 16x why is OP not seeing it?

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: Arkaign
Okay :

PCI-E 4x to 16x, yes, big boost, and more importantly, 4x PCIe is a proven bottleneck with many current cards, even into the current midrange/economy cards.

PCI-E 1.0 to 2.0, not a big deal right now. AFAIK, there is no bottlenecking with currently available hardware with 1.0 vs. 2.0. This is futureproofing though, as the hot ATI (hopefully) and Nvidia cards of say, this time next year will likely be approaching the time when you need 2.0 to deal with the card's available transfer rates.

PCI-E 3.0 is coming as well, being announced in 2007, which is more of the same kind of improvement.

Agreed on the 4x to 16x boost for 4870 class cards
- the 2900xt did not suffer much as the 2nd card in my P35 MB

otoh, i did extensive testing with 4970/512 and 4870/1GB in the 2nd slot of my old p35 MB vs my current ASUS p35e deluxe x48 MB .. some games were relatively unaffected by the bandwidth restrictions; others were more affected compared to being in a 16x slot

As far as PCIe 1.0 or 1.1 to PCIe 2.0 .. yes 1.0/1.1 is a restriction on a card of especially the GTX280 class and above compared to PCIE 2.0; i got more than slight differences between the two motherboards

So you guys are saying there a big performance boost going from PCIE 4x to 16x why is OP not seeing it?

He runs a 3870 .. same basic performance as my 2900xt CF ... the 2nd slot being 4x had little restriction on it
--4870 is more noticeable as the 2nd CF card and i would say you can "get away with" 4850 CF in a PCIe 1.1 mb; sure there is some loss compared to 16x + 16x .. but most of the time you will get decent scaling

However, GTX280 IS restricted by a PCIe 1.0 slot compared to a 2.0 slot

 

[Arkaign]

Originally posted by: techmanc
So you guys are saying there a big performance boost going from PCIE 4x to 16x why is OP not seeing it?

Best guess (only possibility) ; something else is holding him back. Configuration in OS, in bios, driver issue, etc.

http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2797&p=14

Even old cards like the X1900XTX show bottlenecking on that mobo due to the 4X PCI-E slot.

Example : 68.7FPS on ASrock, 78.9FPS on Asus P5N32.

Those are old mobos, new ones are even faster, not to mention the 3800 series ATI card he has is worlds faster than the old X1900.

 

[apoppin]

nope

it is "only" a 3870

NP in a 4x slot as the 2nd CF'd card or even as the primary card
- especially if he does not have a very fast CPU

when i went from 2900xt is an ASROCK 4x PCIe primary slot to a 16x slot in my p35 1.0 PCIE MB, there was little difference until i got my CPU overclock way up there

 

[bujeezus]

yeah, i can see what you're saying, but NO performance increase? i just assumed my pci-e slot was the bottleneck. i take it research or getting advice from you gurus (no sarcasim here guys) is the only way to figure out what your bottleneck is? thanks for the reply.

 

[bujeezus]

so you think i should've seen an improvment? would more info be beneficial in troubleshooting whether i have an issue or not? if so...

E2160 o/c'd to 2300 (yeah, yeah, i know...)
DDR2 667 (ditto)
WinXP Pro
SATAII hdd
single HD 3870

not real confident in my o/cing abilities so i've just got the fsb turned up. haven't messed with anything else like vcores, etc.

i'm just lookin to increase my fps 10 maybe 20 in general. thanks for the reply.

 

[bujeezus]

sorry i didn't read all the way down.

so you're sayin the 3870 can't make full use of the 16x correct. i'd see a noticeable gain with 4870 then.

 

[bujeezus]

thanks again for all the responses guys.

so, what would be the most noticeable upgrade, fps-wise? faster memory, faster cpu or a faster card? would it even be worth throwin another 3870 or even a 3870x2 to CF with the card i have now? i game on a 19" widescreen lcd with a native 1400x900 which is just fine by me. don't have a desire to jump up in resolution. i remember when i was happy with 800x600. i'd just like a smoother, higher fps.

 

[techmanc]

Well the combo is what will work best but if you can only choose one got for a faster cpu as it will help your entire system overall performance.

 

[vj8usa]

http://www.tomshardware.com/re...xpress-2-0,1915-9.html
Looks like they saw the same results you did (that's with a 3850, which is definitely slower than what you have, but I'm thinking it's close enough for the results to be similar to your card).

 

[yh125d]

How much ram do you have right now? If you have less than 4gb, get there. Other than that I'd upgrade CPU first

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: bujeezus
so you think i should've seen an improvment? would more info be beneficial in troubleshooting whether i have an issue or not? if so...

E2160 o/c'd to 2300 (yeah, yeah, i know...)
DDR2 667 (ditto)
WinXP Pro
SATAII hdd
single HD 3870

not real confident in my o/cing abilities so i've just got the fsb turned up. haven't messed with anything else like vcores, etc.

i'm just lookin to increase my fps 10 maybe 20 in general. thanks for the reply.

go for a bigger overclock on your CPU .. just that will give you some performance difference; i got my e4300 to 3.3Ghz to really see a difference with 2900xt
- i am guessing you should see near 3.0Ghz with yours .. head over to CPU forum for help
- since you now have a PCIe 2.0 MB, get a faster Video card .. 4850 or 4870 if you stay with AMD

Win XP you don't have to worry about DX10's overhead and 2GB RAM would be fine

 

[Stumps]

Originally posted by: apoppin
nope

it is "only" a 3870

NP in a 4x slot as the 2nd CF'd card or even as the primary card
- especially if he does not have a very fast CPU

when i went from 2900xt is an ASROCK 4x PCIe primary slot to a 16x slot in my p35 1.0 PCIE MB, there was little difference until i got my CPU overclock way up there

I had very similar results when I went from my 4coredual to my current gigabyte board, cards like 2900XT's and 3870's don't really see a major performance jump when changing from the Asrock board to a full 16x board...not sure why that is really, possibly because the Asrock is already a very fast board despite being limited by the PCI-E 4x slot.

Although synthetic benchmarks should show some increase in performance, I gained a little over 700 points in 3dmark 06 when I changed boards...way back when I was still using my E4300@3ghz and my old Gigabyte 2900XT.

Like Apoppin stated, OC'ing the processor helps considerably, although the jump from 3ghz on my Asrock to 3.33ghz on my gigabyte was barely noticible

 

[cusideabelincoln]

Yo apoppin do you mind posting (or linking to) your benchmarks of PCI-E 1.0/1.1 vs. 2.0? I'm curious to see what the improvement is for a single card like the GTX280.

 

[doubleOseven]

To the OP... you might not see much of a boost going from 4x to 16x if you're using low resolutions i.e.1280x1024 and lower... (there 4x is fine). However, when you use higher resolutions, that's when your 4x becomes a bottleneck since the graphic card gets starved for bandwidth.

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: cusideabelincoln
Yo apoppin do you mind posting (or linking to) your benchmarks of PCI-E 1.0/1.1 vs. 2.0? I'm curious to see what the improvement is for a single card like the GTX280.

sure .. pm sent

in fact i might have accidentally sent you a 2nd one

 

[davidtb]

I have a 650 sli board with 2-7600GS silent cards, My PS has plenty of muscle, and I'm running 8gigs of mem.
My weak link is the Mbord, and PCI-e 1.0 and the 7600GS work in DX-9.
Would cards for PCI-e 2 (say 9800GTs) be a good upgrade by themselves?

 

[Arkaign]

Originally posted by: davidtb
I have a 650 sli board with 2-7600GS silent cards, My PS has plenty of muscle, and I'm running 8gigs of mem.
My weak link is the Mbord, and PCI-e 1.0 and the 7600GS work in DX-9.
Would cards for PCI-e 2 (say 9800GTs) be a good upgrade by themselves?

!!!

One 9800GT would be a RIDICULOUSLY huge upgrade from 2x 7600GS. Hell, 2X 7600GS was slower than one 7800GT.

Don't worry bout 1.0 vs. 2.0, meaningless outside of bleeding edge at this time, and even then, it appears it's ~5% or less so far.

I wouldn't get two 9800GTs though. Look for a single GTX260 or 4870, you'll be plenty happy, and have room for a bigger upgrade later. Or, if on a budget, start with one 9800.

 

[destrekor]

Originally posted by: apoppin

Originally posted by: Arkaign
Okay :

PCI-E 4x to 16x, yes, big boost, and more importantly, 4x PCIe is a proven bottleneck with many current cards, even into the current midrange/economy cards.

PCI-E 1.0 to 2.0, not a big deal right now. AFAIK, there is no bottlenecking with currently available hardware with 1.0 vs. 2.0. This is futureproofing though, as the hot ATI (hopefully) and Nvidia cards of say, this time next year will likely be approaching the time when you need 2.0 to deal with the card's available transfer rates.

PCI-E 3.0 is coming as well, being announced in 2007, which is more of the same kind of improvement.

Agreed on the 4x to 16x boost for 4870 class cards
- the 2900xt did not suffer much as the 2nd card in my P35 MB

otoh, i did extensive testing with 4970/512 and 4870/1GB in the 2nd slot of my old p35 MB vs my current ASUS p35e deluxe x48 MB .. some games were relatively unaffected by the bandwidth restrictions; others were more affected compared to being in a 16x slot

As far as PCIe 1.0 or 1.1 to PCIe 2.0 .. yes 1.0/1.1 is a restriction on a card of especially the GTX280 class and above compared to PCIE 2.0; i got more than slight differences between the two motherboards

So you guys are saying there a big performance boost going from PCIE 4x to 16x why is OP not seeing it?

He runs a 3870 .. same basic performance as my 2900xt CF ... the 2nd slot being 4x had little restriction on it
--4870 is more noticeable as the 2nd CF card and i would say you can "get away with" 4850 CF in a PCIe 1.1 mb; sure there is some loss compared to 16x + 16x .. but most of the time you will get decent scaling

However, GTX280 IS restricted by a PCIe 1.0 slot compared to a 2.0 slot

Hey, would you mind providing some more information regarding the PCIe 1.0/1.1 and 2.0 bottlenecking?
I've had a DFI P965-S, no idea if I have 1.0 or 1.1.
I just got a GTX 285, haven't even installed it yet (fever, otherwise it probably would have went it the moment I received the package)...
Am I going to have a hit in performance due to not having PCIe v2.0?

 

[apoppin]

Yes you will have a hit in performance with either a PCIe 1.0 or a 1.1 MB compared to using a 2.0 PCIe MB using a GTX280/285
- in many situations and with many games .. at 16x10 and 19x12 with a fast C2D or quad CPU

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