PCIe 4.0 feature pops up in X470 Motherboard BIOS

by Hilbert Hagedoorn on: 05/20/2019 07:40 AM | source: tomshardware | 31 comment(s)

The motherboard manufacturers are hard at work prepping X570 series motherboards for the new Ryzen 3000 processors. These will also bring PCI-Express 4.0 towards the eco-system. Interesting, Gigabyte released new BIOS updates for Ryzen 3000 compatibility to their (among others) X470 motherboards. And guess what the BIOS is showing?

IT seems that the company has added the option for PCIe 4.0 in the most recent bios update for its X470 Aorus Gaming Wi-Fi motherboard. This information was spotted by an observant Reddit user and then got verified by Tom's Hardware. Gigabyte has not yet made an official announcement about the new option.

It might be a crossover feature intended for X570 which propagated somehow towards X470. In an update from AMD they write:

300- and 400-series AM4 motherboards can support PCIe 4.0. AMD will not lock the out feature, instead it will be up to motherboard vendors to validate and qualify the faster standard on its motherboards on a case-by-case basis. Motherboard vendors that do support the feature will enable it through BIOS updates, but those updates will come at the discretion of the vendor. As mentioned below, support could be limited to slots based upon board, switch, and mux layouts.


PCIe Version	Line Code	Transfer Rate	x1 Bandwidth	x4	x8	x16
1.0	8b/10b	2.5 GT/s	250 MB/s	1 GB/s	2 GB/s	4 GB/s
2.0	8b/10b	5 GT/s	500 MB/s	2 GB/s	4 GB/s	8 GB/s
3.0	128b/130b	8 GT/s	984.6 MB/s	3.938 GB/s	7.877 GB/s	15.754 GB/s
4.0	128b/130b	16 GT/s	1.969 GB/s	7.877 GB/s	15.754 GB/s	31.508 GB/s

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Astyanax
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#5670989 Posted on: 05/20/2019 07:49 AM

Some of the existing boards are built well enough to handle Gen 4 from the CPU controller.

Update: We spoke with AMD representatives, who confirmed that 300- and 400-series AM4 motherboards can support PCIe 4.0. AMD will not lock the out feature, instead it will be up to motherboard vendors to validate and qualify the faster standard on its motherboards on a case-by-case basis. Motherboard vendors that do support the feature will enable it through BIOS updates, but those updates will come at the discretion of the vendor. As mentioned below, support could be limited to slots based upon board, switch, and mux layouts.

Our sources tell us that after unlocking the feature via a BIOS update, the older motherboards supply a PCIe 4.0 x16 connection to the first slot on the motherboard, but the remainder of the slots revert to PCIe 3.0 signaling rates. That's because any trace routing on the motherboard that exceeds six inches requires newer redrivers and retimers that support PCIe 4.0's faster signaling rates. That means the PCIe slot nearest to the CPU will easily support PCIe 4.0, while the other slots, including M.2 ports, will run at a PCIe 3.0 signaling rate.

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd-ryzen-pcie-4.0-motherboard,38401.html

fantaskarsef
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#5671006 Posted on: 05/20/2019 08:18 AM

That's actually pretty cool, even if the bandwidth doesn't find much practical use as of now, or am I wrong?

Undying
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#5671008 Posted on: 05/20/2019 08:33 AM

That's actually pretty cool, even if the bandwidth doesn't find much practical use as of now, or am I wrong?

Not right now but it could be the near future. We just need more powerful gpus.

asturur
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#5671015 Posted on: 05/20/2019 08:56 AM

or faster disks

Astyanax
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#5671022 Posted on: 05/20/2019 09:14 AM

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/ssd-pcie-4.0-phison-nvme,38418.html

Clawedge
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#5671023 Posted on: 05/20/2019 09:16 AM

I know it's not adding much to the discussion, but there is no way in hell a particular competitor would allow this. They would demand a new socket and a new chipset and a new CPU.

Thanks AMD for being cool.

Clawedge
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#5671024 Posted on: 05/20/2019 09:18 AM

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/ssd-pcie-4.0-phison-nvme,38418.html

Sweet mother of holey moley

Astyanax
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#5671027 Posted on: 05/20/2019 09:22 AM

found some more deets on it
https://pcper.com/2019/01/phison-previews-pcie-gen4-x4-nvme-with-ps5016-e16-controller/

fantaskarsef
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#5671038 Posted on: 05/20/2019 09:44 AM

Not right now but it could be the near future. We just need more powerful gpus.

or faster disks

You are both right only that... I don't see it making sense right now, on a now "legacy" mainboard. Besides professional use I honestly doubt there's a need to surpass PCIe3.0 at this time.
BUT the future always has to start somewhere, and it doesn't cost more for consumers, so as long as those new BIOS will still be stable with PCIe 4.0 enabled, it's only a good thing imho.

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/ssd-pcie-4.0-phison-nvme,38418.html

found some more deets on it
https://pcper.com/2019/01/phison-previews-pcie-gen4-x4-nvme-with-ps5016-e16-controller/

Thanks for sharing the articles / benches

nizzen
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#5671052 Posted on: 05/20/2019 09:58 AM

You are both right only that... I don't see it making sense right now, on a now "legacy" mainboard. Besides professional use I honestly doubt there's a need to surpass PCIe3.0 at this time.
BUT the future always has to start somewhere, and it doesn't cost more for consumers, so as long as those new BIOS will still be stable with PCIe 4.0 enabled, it's only a good thing imho.

Thanks for sharing the articles / benches

The ssd barly go over pci-e x4 3.0 speeds on seq read/write :p

Pci-e 4.0 maybe offer even lower latency, like 3.0 did over 2.0.

Intel Optane pci-e 4.0 incoming?

fantaskarsef
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#5671056 Posted on: 05/20/2019 10:07 AM

The ssd barly go over pci-e x4 3.0 speeds on seq read/write :p

Pci-e 4.0 maybe offer even lower latency, like 3.0 did over 2.0.

Intel Optane pci-e 4.0 incoming?

At least until they discover that the optane algorythm is actually less safe than anything else Intel "invented" in the last decade.

Athlonite
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#5671086 Posted on: 05/20/2019 12:09 PM

erm What's the 3DMark01 Enhancement

Netherwind
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#5671092 Posted on: 05/20/2019 12:40 PM

Is there a BIOS update that will transform my 6700K to a 9700K?

spine
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#5671154 Posted on: 05/20/2019 03:34 PM

erm What's the 3DMark01 Enhancement

It's a tweak which solely makes that one benchmark run faster. My Asus Z87 Hero has it, as do many others.

Reddoguk
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#5671180 Posted on: 05/20/2019 04:33 PM

Well those transfer speeds of Gen4 is probably the reason for active fan/chipset cooling on the 570 mobos. If you could push both PCIe slots to X16 i think 300/400 chipsets would melt. ^^

But there's not powerful enough GFX cards out yet that could push those gen4 numbers.

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