AMD first to market with USB3/SATA6?

Newegg at the moment has 14 X58 and P55 mobos listed with SATA 6Gb/s support. Most of em have USB 3.0 too.

Your C2Q is just as good as anything AMD has got right now. You should hang onto it for a bit and wait for more 32nm parts to come out.
 
I agree...no need to replace your setup. I'd wait a little bit since neither USB 3 nor SATA 6 is really going to make a BIG difference before 32nm comes out.
 
Are those Intel motherboards with native Intel SATA and USB? Because if not (and I dont think they are) then I'm not interested in NEC chips or the like. I want the real AMD or Intel implementation or nothing, just seems to work out better for me in years past to stick with their designs as far as compatiblity and reducing strange issues is concerned.
 
According to Anandtech the AMD 800 series supports SATA3 natively but not USB 3.0. Thats fine with me.
 
housecat said:
Are those Intel motherboards with native Intel SATA and USB? Because if not (and I dont think they are) then I'm not interested in NEC chips or the like. I want the real AMD or Intel implementation or nothing, just seems to work out better for me in years past to stick with their designs as far as compatiblity and reducing strange issues is concerned.
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It's all in your head. Most motherboards use 3rd party audio and ethernet chips and you wouldn't know the difference.
 
housecat said:
Are those Intel motherboards with native Intel SATA and USB? Because if not (and I dont think they are) then I'm not interested in NEC chips or the like. I want the real AMD or Intel implementation or nothing, just seems to work out better for me in years past to stick with their designs as far as compatiblity and reducing strange issues is concerned.
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This makes little sense. The NEC/Marvell chips are the REAL deal. Just because Intel or AMD makes the southbridge chip doesn't mean its fool proof or problem free. I mean I can kind of understand where you are coming from, but as this tech get deployed and its looking solid, I wouldn't worry about so much how makes its.

I've got my primary HDs of my sig rig hooked up to the Marvell SATA 6Gb/s and so far so good. No problems.
 
I want the real AMD or Intel implementation or nothing, just seems to work out better for me in years past to stick with their designs as far as compatiblity and reducing strange issues is concerned.
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I'll stick with Intel for anything drive related.

The Marvel/JMicron integrated drive controllers I have used have had lower performance than the Intel units especially when stressed or in RAID mode.

I'll wait. :D
 
why do motherboard manufacturers even use realtek/marvell network/ethernet chips when the intel soluction is probably MUCH better. I always have to end up either buying an Intel motherboard or buy a $30 Intel NIC.:mad:
 
Daemas said:
why do motherboard manufacturers even use realtek/marvell network/ethernet chips when the intel soluction is probably MUCH better. I always have to end up either buying an Intel motherboard or buy a $30 Intel NIC.:mad:
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I can understand this thinking to some extent. I don't do RAID on my desktops anymore so I've not run into those issues personally for a while, but I've had plenty of non-Intel chips and chipset motherboards and they actually have worked well.

Since Intel hasn't produced any SATA 6Gb/s or USB 3.0 chips, as a motherboard maker looking to add features to my products, I'm not going to wait on Intel another year to implement something I can add today as long as it works and so far the non-Intel SATA 6Gb/s and USB 3.0 in my sig rig seem to be working fine, though granted I don't have any SATA 6Gbp/s or USB 3.0 devices.
 
My main concern with the NEC/Marvell add-on chips with P55 boards is that it seems all of them leech off one of the PCI-E x16 slots. So you can't have Crossfire/SLI AND USB/SATA3 at the same time. At least that is the impression I am getting with the P55 boards I've looked at.
 
Ravynmagi said:
My main concern with the NEC/Marvell add-on chips with P55 boards is that it seems all of them leech off one of the PCI-E x16 slots. So you can't have Crossfire/SLI AND USB/SATA3 at the same time. At least that is the impression I am getting with the P55 boards I've looked at.
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There's something like that going on I believe, the problem isn't the chips, the problem is lack of PCIe lanes and its a problem with the X58 as well I believe. I don't think that you're going to get full bandwidth on USB 3.0 regardless.
 
Daemas said:
why do motherboard manufacturers even use realtek/marvell network/ethernet chips when the intel soluction is probably MUCH better. I always have to end up either buying an Intel motherboard or buy a $30 Intel NIC.:mad:
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cost.. when you can buy box loads of realtek and marvel chips vs spending the money designing/manufacturing the chip themselves..
 
Daemas said:
why do motherboard manufacturers even use realtek/marvell network/ethernet chips when the intel soluction is probably MUCH better. I always have to end up either buying an Intel motherboard or buy a $30 Intel NIC.:mad:
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Probably costs a few bucks extra to put the Intel PHY down -- money better spent on multi-colored heatsinks or bigger louder graphics on the box. :(
 
I have had no trouble with Realtek chipsets (at least for lan and audio). In fact, I have had far more problems with my nVidia based chipsets (nForce3).
 
There's really no point in being the first to market a product nobody has a use for yet.
 
John Vuong said:
Whats wrong with third party chip implementations? If they work fine, who cares?
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Some do, some don't.

I have no problem with 3rd party audio/network chips because I can and do, upgrade them myself.

But when it come to drive controllers I want the MB to have quality performance and my experiences with the cheap 3rd party stuff (Marvel/JMicron) has been less than favorable.

Compare the Intel specs running RAID0 with nVidia and AMD.

I will admit the the JMicron eSATA controller on my P6T is pretty decent for simple transfers but I don't really ask too much of it. :)

I'm with Arkuatika....I run 2 Intel SSDs in RAID0 have no need for SATA6 and use eSATA for my externals.

The guys that have to have these features "Now" must really have some major equipment.
 
Daemas said:
why do motherboard manufacturers even use realtek/marvell network/ethernet chips when the intel soluction is probably MUCH better. I always have to end up either buying an Intel motherboard or buy a $30 Intel NIC.:mad:
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I did a completely unscientific comparison between an RTL8111 and an Intel PRO 10/100 Ethernet adapter. Configuration for the RTL8111 was a Pentium Dual-Core with 512 MiB of RAM and a GMA 3100 running XP 32-bit. Configuration for the Intel was a Pentium 4 @ 2.8 GHz, 1.5 GiB of RAM (hence why it's not 100% fair) and Intel Extreme Graphics running XP 32-bit. Both were connected to the exact same network. The RTL8111 had a 65ms or so ping to a game server hosted at The Planet, while the Intel had a ping of 45ms. The game used was Return to Castle Wolfenstein.

Once again, not scientific by any means, and considering the specification differences (with RAM) there are other reasons for this. This was enough for me to get an Intel Gigabit NIC for my X58 build though.
 
Nice post Eddieck and welcome to the forums!

I've never done or read any tests about NIK performance but have updated all my machines with Intel units for @ $30.00.

MB manfgs are always under the gun to produce cheaper units and the NIC is something I can easily upgrade and carry from unit to unit.
 
Sata 6Gb/sec is useless as there is no drive out that that can max out the current interface let alone a6Gbs one. it will be a while before USB 3 is prime time so you can proabably wait until you are ready to build a new system for that one as well.
 
ASUS uses a bridge chip for SATA 6G. Specifically they use the PEX PLX8613 bridge chip. For the actual SATA 6G support they use the Marvell 9132 chip. Because this uses a PCI-Express x1 lane the bandwidth is limited to 500MB a second which is below the 600MB a second theoretical maximum transfer speed of SATA 6G. Granted this shouldn't be an issue in reality given the actual performance of SATA 6G drives. They won't be able to hit their maximum burst speeds but they'll be more than capable of reaching their average sustained transfer rates without issue.

ASUS Implementation
PCIex1Gen2.jpg


For USB 3.0 support they use the NEC controller attached to the PCI-Express bus which still allows for the maximum theoretical transfer speed of 4.8Gb/s using a 1x PCI-Express 2.0 lane.

The problem with most "non-native" chipset based solutions is typically slightly lower performance, compatibility problems with some hardware, and fairly bad drivers. I wouldn't worry about it so much in regard to things like USB controllers, but for drive controllers, it's not the best solution.
 
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So how's this work with the different implementations for Intel chipsets, with P55 it looks like Asus is connecting it to the P55 chipset using the PCIe 2.0 x1 link which then needs to go over the DMI link to hit the CPU. With the X58 implementation, are they going directly to the X58 chipset using one or more of the PCIe 2.0 links and communicating over the QPI link to the CPU or are they connecting to ICH10R using the PCIe 1.0 links and then going over DMI to X58 and then hitting the CPU through the QPI link?

This is one of the reasons I like the Asus U3S6 addin card, since it'll directly connect to the X58 chipset using the PCIe 2.0 lanes and you skip the DMI link all together and don't have to worry about saturating it. Although, you'll need a multidisk raid setup to saturate the DMI link at this point in time.
 
ND40oz said:
So how's this work with the different implementations for Intel chipsets, with P55 it looks like Asus is connecting it to the P55 chipset using the PCIe 2.0 x1 link which then needs to go over the DMI link to hit the CPU. With the X58 implementation, are they going directly to the X58 chipset using one or more of the PCIe 2.0 links and communicating over the QPI link to the CPU or are they connecting to ICH10R using the PCIe 1.0 links and then going over DMI to X58 and then hitting the CPU through the QPI link?

This is one of the reasons I like the Asus U3S6 addin card, since it'll directly connect to the X58 chipset using the PCIe 2.0 lanes and you skip the DMI link all together and don't have to worry about saturating it. Although, you'll need a multidisk raid setup to saturate the DMI link at this point in time.
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So far I've only worked with P55 Express chipset based boards that have USB 3.0 and SATA 6G support. I haven't touched an X58 other than the ones I personally own in several months now. Just to add to my earlier statement, even if AMD does integrate USB 3.0 and SATA 6G into their next chipset, it will probably still be slightly under par when compared to Intel's solution. The entire SB/RD chipset line has been that way. Granted AMD has improved much in this regard, but they still haven't managed to quite equal Intel's offerings in regard to chipset SATA/RAID/USB support.
 
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Dan_D said:
ASUS uses a bridge chip for SATA 6G. Specifically they use the PEX PLX8613 bridge chip. For the actual SATA 6G support they use the Marvell 9132 chip. Because this uses a PCI-Express x1 lane the bandwidth is limited to 500MB a second which is below the 600MB a second theoretical maximum transfer speed of SATA 6G. Granted this shouldn't be an issue in reality given the actual performance of SATA 6G drives. They won't be able to hit their maximum burst speeds but they'll be more than capable of reaching their average sustained transfer rates without issue.
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Add two of those Micron RealSSDs and you'll saturate that bus during reads. That's why I bought a P6T SE because the layout is perfect - graphics (of course), Ethernet NIC, sound card, SATA 6Gbit RAID card, USB 3.0 card.
 
Hello All,

I just wanted to clarify on a few details.

It is true for X58 platforms there is no issues with adding in the NEC and Marvell Controllers due to the higher number of pci-e lanes on the board

for P55 our ASUS - E series starting from the PRO and going up all allow for the same high level of performance approx 500mb for usb and sata6g. Our implementation with a PLX chip does not limit the ability to use crossfire or sli ( so you maintain the ability for x16 for the top pci-e slot or dual x 8 ).

Additionally as already communicated only SATA6G will be part of the upcoming AMD chipset lineup usb3.0 will be implemented though via our use of the NEC host controller.

As always if there are additional questions please let me know. Please enjoy the rest of your day.
 
any idea when Intel will be natively implementing USB 3.0 and SATA 6 into their mobos?...a few months?...a year?
 
so i guess all the usb 3.0 devices and sata 6gb/s drives you guys have are just screaming out for the missing bandwidth?
 
I've had enough problems with VIA, SIS or Nvidia implementations of USB or SATA in the past that I only use the "real" AMD or Intel designs.

I read AMD was going to be first to market with their implementation. I have no problem with AMD or their CPU performance, it's really pretty good so I don't mind going that way if they can beat Intel to these latest specs.

For everyone saying "do you have a USB3 or SATA6gb device??!!!", no. But that's how the cutting edge works. Something has to come first, and I like to have the latest standards at all times, as soon as possible. DirectX, or USB or SATA, I want to be there first (an enthusiast).
 
housecat said:
I've had enough problems with VIA, SIS or Nvidia implementations of USB or SATA in the past that I only use the "real" AMD or Intel designs.

I read AMD was going to be first to market with their implementation. I have no problem with AMD or their CPU performance, it's really pretty good so I don't mind going that way if they can beat Intel to these latest specs.

For everyone saying "do you have a USB3 or SATA6gb device??!!!", no. But that's how the cutting edge works. Something has to come first, and I like to have the latest standards at all times, as soon as possible. DirectX, or USB or SATA, I want to be there first (an enthusiast).
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Even the "real AMD" controllers are behind Intel's in regard to performance. They seem to close the gap more and more with each generation, but still Intel rules in this area.
 
That's true, but I'll take AMD over SIS/VIA/Nvidia. I have nothing against AMD's engineering and we'll see how they do with SATA6gb up against Intel.
 
housecat said:
That's true, but I'll take AMD over SIS/VIA/Nvidia. I have nothing against AMD's engineering and we'll see how they do with SATA6gb up against Intel.
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NVIDIA's USB performance was always decent, though some chipsets had a high failure rate for them. It wasn't the best, but it was solid. Their SATA controllers on the other hand were mediocre at best. Especially in RAID mode. Performance aside, the data corruption issues are the worst part about using them.
 
Something has to come first, and I like to have the latest standards at all times, as soon as possible
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Everyone's more than welcome to buy the first generation of any technology and maybe if you keep your MB for years a SATA6 purchase now might be in your best interest.

I'm waiting for SATA6 to be incorporated into Intel chipsets and unless someone is planning on exceeding SATA3 standards in the near future, I'd recommened they wait also.

USB3 is pretty much at moot point to me.
 
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