AMD/Intel hybrid motherboard

  • Thread starter Thread starter Yousuf Khan
  • Start date Start date
That kind of thing is rarely cost-effective or optimal w.r.t. performance.
Click to expand...

I agree. I'd be very suspicious. But, on the other hand, with
potentially twice the market of a motherboard targetted at just one CPU, the
economies of scale could make it cost-effective. But it would definitely be
hard to 'do it right' for both CPUs.

DS
 
An ECS motherboard that can take either a P4 S775 or an Athlon 64 S939!

Yousuf Khan

HEXUS.net : Review : CEBIT 2005: AMD or Intel? Same Motherboard! : Page
- 1/1
http://www.hexus.net/content/reviews/review.php?dXJsX3Jldmlld19JRD0xMDM2
Click to expand...

Well it *is* a separate riser for the Athlon64... though I still can't
figure why I might want it. Here's another weirdo:
http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/mainboard/mbd/pro_mbd_detail.php?UID=642
- a socket 754 with a PCIe x16 and a "AGR" which takes a limited sub-set of
AGP cards. What the hell am I going to use it for?
 
George said:
Well it *is* a separate riser for the Athlon64... though I still can't
figure why I might want it. Here's another weirdo:
http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/mainboard/mbd/pro_mbd_detail.php?UID=642
- a socket 754 with a PCIe x16 and a "AGR" which takes a limited sub-set of
AGP cards. What the hell am I going to use it for?
Click to expand...

Actually, it looks like this isn't as limited a subset as you think. It
looks like supports almost all AGP video cards since the AGP-4X days.
This might be the answer people are looking for, if they just bought a
high-end AGP video card just recently, then they can continue to use it
here, until they are ready to go with a PCIE card.

Yousuf Khan
 
Yousuf said:
Actually, it looks like this isn't as limited a subset as you think. It
looks like supports almost all AGP video cards since the AGP-4X days.
This might be the answer people are looking for, if they just bought a
high-end AGP video card just recently, then they can continue to use it
here, until they are ready to go with a PCIE card.
Click to expand...

I read elsewhere that "AGR" is the term MSI is using when an AGP
slot has been bridged to a PCI-E bus, as opposed to a "true" AGP
slot on a genuine AGP bus to the chipset.
 
Rob Stow said:
I read elsewhere that "AGR" is the term MSI is using
when an AGP slot has been bridged to a PCI-E bus, as
opposed to a "true" AGP slot on a genuine AGP bus to
the chipset.
Click to expand...

I wonder how many PCIe lanes these rigs will use.

And then insert a "new" AGP card that is actually a
native PCIe chipset bridged back to AGP, and the end-
user ends up with impressive latencies.

I suspect that anything "AGP" and/or "bridged" are
quickly going to become anathema to enthusiasts.
But will the general public catch on?
 
Bob said:
I wonder how many PCIe lanes these rigs will use.
Click to expand...

I would assume they are bridged off of the 16 lane slot for a
PCI-E video card. I didn't read the specs too closely, but I
would expect that putting a card in the AGP slot will either
prevent use of the 16 lane slot or reduce it to 8 lanes.

The latter would be comparable to most motherboards that have
what on the surface seems to be a pair 16 lane PCI-E slots, but
in reality they share only 16 lanes between them. If cards are
inserted into both slots, the slots revert to 8 lanes each.
And then insert a "new" AGP card that is actually a
native PCIe chipset bridged back to AGP, and the end-
user ends up with impressive latencies.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure if that will be much of an issue: if you have one
of these motherboards, then you don't buy a "new" AGP card - you
buy a PCI-E card.

These kinds of motherboards are perhaps targetted at guys who
might want to upgrade their motherboard but either can't afford
to simultaneously replace their AGP card or want to wait for
prices on PCI-E cards to come down.
 
Rob said:
I read elsewhere that "AGR" is the term MSI is using when an AGP slot
has been bridged to a PCI-E bus, as opposed to a "true" AGP slot on a
genuine AGP bus to the chipset.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that would be how I'd look at it too. Might add a very tiny amount
of additional latency but the bandwidth should be the same.

Yousuf Khan
 
Bob said:
I suspect that anything "AGP" and/or "bridged" are
quickly going to become anathema to enthusiasts.
But will the general public catch on?
Click to expand...

Can't see why anyone would care, as it now stands most of the work is
done within the graphics cards themselves, and the only time major
amounts of data passes between the graphics and the rest of the system
are for non-accelerated graphics.

Besides 8X AGP is well below the speed of 16X PCIE. I think 16X PCIE is
approximately equal to 32X AGP, so plugging an AGP card into a PCIE
bridge would still leave quite a bit of headroom.

Yousuf Khan
 
I would assume they are bridged off of the 16 lane slot for a
PCI-E video card. I didn't read the specs too closely, but I
would expect that putting a card in the AGP slot will either
prevent use of the 16 lane slot or reduce it to 8 lanes.

The latter would be comparable to most motherboards that have
what on the surface seems to be a pair 16 lane PCI-E slots, but
in reality they share only 16 lanes between them. If cards are
inserted into both slots, the slots revert to 8 lanes each.
Click to expand...

I have seen boards with a x16 connector with the full sixteen lanes, and
another x16 connector with 8 lanes. The lanes aren't shared in any physical
sense - they can't be, by rule and physics.

What might happen would be the x16 dropping down to x8 if both were plugged.
But that better be strictly for SLI, and not something that happens even if
one of the slots was plugged with a quad gigabit nic...

/daytripper
 
Actually, it looks like this isn't as limited a subset as you think. It
looks like supports almost all AGP video cards since the AGP-4X days.
This might be the answer people are looking for, if they just bought a
high-end AGP video card just recently, then they can continue to use it
here, until they are ready to go with a PCIE card.
Click to expand...

Yeah that is the obvious target but it's been my impression that many of
the people with such a valuable, high end video card have money burning a
hole in their pockets.:-)
 
George said:
Yeah that is the obvious target but it's been my impression that many of
the people with such a valuable, high end video card have money burning a
hole in their pockets.:-)
Click to expand...

Actually, they don't even have to be that high-end. I know I'd feel
extremely pissed off having to replace a $200 card after only a year. In
my case, I haven't upgraded my video card in about four years, I got a
GeForce 2GTS, so I'm more than willing to upgrade the video at the same
time as I potentially upgrade my mobo/processor. I had a friend who had
to upgrade video cards even though he had an AGP, but it was a 2X card,
and the mobo he got (need to replace one that died) had a 4X+ AGP slot,
which was not compatible with the old 2X card.

Yousuf Khan
 
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