ASUS nForce 680i PCIe 2.0 Support?

[inSaneELF]

Hello,

I'm not too up on the whole PCIe 2.0 thing, and I was just wondering if the ASUS P5N32-E nForce 680i motherboard (found here) supported PCIe 2.0?

This is because I wanted to buy this motherboard (if it does support 2.0) to use with the ASUS GeForce 8800GTS (G92) 512MB video card (found here).

Would these two components be compatible?

Thanks.

 

[chookman]

These 2 are compatible... however, this is only because PCI-e2.0 is backwards compatible with PCI-e1.1
I havent seen any tests on this but you shouldnt see a performance decrease at all.

 

[inSaneELF]

Oh, okay. It was my understanding that when it was said that PCI-e 2.0 was backwards compatible, that it meant PCI-e 1.1 cards would work in 2.0 slots but 2.0 cards wouldn't work in 1.1 slots. I must be wrong though. So I guess I should get this motherboard instead of the 780i (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188024&Tpk=780i)? There's a huge price difference between the two.

 

[chookman]

You dont need the 780i

Hell unless your going to use SLI youd be fine with a P35 intel chipset board

 

[inSaneELF]

Well I may do SLI with two of those GTS's, but the 680i should support that regardless. My only concern was if that board would support the card, which apparently it will.

The only advantage the 780i has, to my understanding, is PCI-e 2.0 and tri SLI support, which, from what I hear, is simply a gimmick at this point (the tri SLI, that is).

 

[tlmck]

680i does not do PCIe 2.0 or the new Penryn processors. The newer card will work though. As you will learn soon enough, SLi is a gimmick regardless of the number of cards based on price vs. performance. SLi and Crossfire were conceived to sell more video cards.