PCI-Express and windows compatibility.

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I'm thinking of upgrading my Athlon XP 2600+ system to something like an Intel 775 at 2.8 ghz with a PCI-Express 16x slot for a high end video card. I was wondering what the current combatibility is with windows. When you install the operating system, does windows detect it as a graphics card? I have heard windows (even XP) detects it as a simple, regular, PCI-Express card, so it can't supprot any texturing from RAM, no GART, etc. If windows XP service pack 2 can detect it, what about Windows 2000? Does it have any luck with it? That is the OS I own.

I was hoping someone on the forum might have installed such a card and what their experience was with it. Also, if anyone knows if it's a good time to buy it. How long will the current standard (voltage) be around? Or how long before a pci-express x32 or something.
 
Any PC hardware out there comes with Windows drivers. Just read the specs and see what version it supports.

If you sell a consumer hardware product that doesn't work with Windows.. You should consider selling cars with square wheels instead.
 
Nodsu said:
Any PC hardware out there comes with Windows drivers. Just read the specs and see what version it supports.

Yes, true. I was simply thinking it wouldn't ever be able to detect the slot, like Linux kernels for a while with AGP, or USB.

Nodsu said:
If you sell a consumer hardware product that doesn't work with Windows.. You should consider selling cars with square wheels instead.

Yes true, most every piece of hardware for PCs works with windows unless of some conflict with the motherboard or other peripherals. I'm new to PCI-Express x16; I've read a few articles about it, but they are mostly long detailed articles about why it is such a revolutionary technology.

I don't understand which PCI-Express cards require the 6 pin power connector. Because I don't see it on the card I'm planning to buy from the pictures.
 
kidicarus said:
Yes true, most every piece of hardware for PCs works with windows unless of some conflict with the motherboard or other peripherals. I'm new to PCI-Express x16; I've read a few articles about it, but they are mostly long detailed articles about why it is such a revolutionary technology.
It isn't revolutionary technology.

PCI-Express is evolutionary old, decades and decades and decades ago, old technology.
 
PCI hasn't even been around for decades and decades it came out in the 90s. It is revolutionary in the sensethat it eliminates the limitations of current PCI in terms of bus speed (one 'lane' of a pci-express card can pass more data than AGP 8x, 2.5Gbps, two lanes = 5gbps all the way up to 16x), bus sharing problems (pci-e directly accesses a switch), and the bottleneck of trying to force too much data over buses that can't support it, and bridges, etc. It's revolutionary in the since that it is technically superior to AGP 8x; even though it's still PCI (I guess).

http://arstechnica.com/articles/paedia/hardware/pcie.ars/1

http://www.gamepc.com/labs/view_content.asp?id=pciegpuso&page=2

They're going to elimate the bus sharing portion of it and so on, plus i think they're going to have PCIe x32 soon too so I don't know if i want to buy pci express now.

I've heard though that it has double the bus bandwidth of agp 8x and quadruple the
 
Despite having the word PCI in it, PCI express has nothing to do with conventional PCI. It is Something Completely Different.

The most obvious difference is that the PCI-E is not a bus at all..
 
Ha ha.... Definitely not a bus, it is decades and decades old Point-To-Point data transport implementations, more than 30 years old "scalable Link Interface" technology. :D

Very revolutionary ideas 30 some years ago.
 
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