PCI-E 1x and PCI are two different versions of the Peripheral Component Interconnect personal computer bus standard, or expansion card slot. They are best known for connecting components such as video/graphics cards to the motherboard of computer systems such as personal computers and servers. The PCI standard was introduced by the Peripheral Component Interconnect Special Interest Group, or PCI-SIG, a non-profit organization consisting of more than 900 technology companies. Succeeding the original PCI, PCI Express -- officially abbreviated as PCIe -- is a faster and more advanced computer bus.
Background
The abbreviation PCI is commonly used for the original PCI, which is also known as Conventional PCI. The organization that developed it, PCI-SIG, debuted PCI in 1993 -- a year after the organization was founded. Two years later, in 2004, PCI-SIG introduced PCI Express. It was then that PCI-SIG officially labeled the original standard as Conventional PCI.
Revisions
At the time of publication, Conventional PCI and PCIe are in their third generation of revisions: PCI with v3.0 in 2002 and PCIe with v3.0 in 2010. Thus, "PCI-E 1x" is a reference to first-generation revisions, which are collectively labeled as v1.x. They consist of PCIe 1.0a and PCIe 1.1, and the other revisions -- apart from the aforementioned PCIe 3.0 -- are PCIe 2.0 and PCIe 2.1. As for Conventional PCI, it had PCI 1.0, 2.0, 2.1, 2.2 and 2.3 preceding version 3.0.
Data Rate
Available as a 32-bit or 64-bit interface or port, Conventional PCI transfers or processes data at a speed of 133MB and 266MB for 32-bit applications or 533MB per second for 64-bit ones. When the PCIe debuted with its first production cycle, or PCIe v1.x, it surpassed Conventional PCI with a data rate of 4GB/s, or 4,096MB/s.
Current Status
Conventional PCI is still used in PCs, although the frequency of its application pales in comparison to the PCIe, which has become the standard expansion port in the computer industry. Not only is it used for graphics cards, but other components such as sound cards, modems, Ethernet and Wi-Fi network cards and television tuner cards as well.
Tags: PCIe PCIe, Component Interconnect, components such, graphics cards, Peripheral Component, Peripheral Component Interconnect, standard expansion