AGP is back from the dead. Again.

[honvetops]

 AGP is back from the dead. Again.

Author: Richard Swinburne
Published: 4th Sep 2007

I couldn't find a board in the office with one of these so I actually had to search through the tubes! Yeesh!

I couldn't find a board in the office with one of these so I actually had to search through the tubes! Yeesh!
Thought AGP was dead? Well apparently not. In something not far estranged from a zombie B-movie where you just can't kill the bugger, it seems the life of the antiquated interface is to be drawn out yet again by both AMD and Nvidia. Both companies plan to release cards on AGP in the coming months.

AMD is planning to release AGP versions of its Radeon HD2600 and HD2400 GPUs but has reportedly encountered driver instability issues with DirectX 10 and HDMI. It was noted that these problems should be alleviated by the end of the month, however in typical release-date-speculation-fashion, we won't hold our breath.

Nvidia is currently having to redesign its bridge chip for the G8x series, with the A05 silicon said to be currently working with the GeForce 8600 and 8400 GPUs as well as upcoming G92 and G98 products that will arrive later in the year.

In case you are too young to remember all those years ago, the AGP interface is limited to about 50W of power draw, and you can forget any sort of multi-GPU SLI or CrossFire.

But why AGP still? We're literally days away from PCI-Express 2.0, with 1.0 having been around for three years already. It seems emerging markets are still heavily dependent on the interface, as are many Internet Cafes, which as small businesses can find the cost of upgrading quite significant.

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2007/09/04/agp_is_back_from_the_dead_again/1

[Calum]

Thought AGP was dead? Well apparently not. In something not far estranged from a zombie B-movie where you just can't kill the bugger

That made me laugh.
Seriously though, why bother?
They cite emerging markets and internet cafes as needing new AGP cards - if they can't afford to upgrade to PCI-Express, they can't afford new AGP cards either, surely?

[patio]

I think the reason they have done this is actually a backlash effect...if you consider how touted AGP was when and before it arrived there were a ton of purchases of boards with AGP.
They didn't know it would be such short lived tech but it happened.
Voodo Economics finds out there are a ton of AGP customers out there locked in with 1st gen AGP cards.
They've done their research...i don't think this will bomb as badly as some people think.

[honvetops]

Patio,  or any other member  please tell me*

before AGP     ( cards/ slots )      I have no clue-  was it all onboard video chips before  AGP  on  mobos?

[Calum]

I'd be interested to find that out as well, but I have a feeling it was PCI/ISA.
It was before my time though, so don't hammer me too badly if I'm totally wrong.

[patio]

PCI.
Prior to that ISA..
And if you want to go further VESA.

All boards shipped pretty much with onboard with the addon cards as an option.
I have an 8Mg. PCI card i no longer need if you're interested.....

[soybean]

I had a 486 - that's pre-Pentium for those of you who don't know - that I did some upgrading to in the summer of 2000 for a 8th grade student, who had no computer, to use for school papers, etc.  No PCI slots, only ISA.  I was familiar with PCI video cards and thought perhaps the video in the 486 simply could not be upgraded.  It had onboard video.  But, I did a bit of research and learned that, indeed, there were such things as ISA video cards.  I found one on ebay.  It had 2MB of video memory and did, in fact, improve performance of the system.

I have 4 PCI video cards.  The oldest has 8MB of memory and is installed in a eMachine 466MHz Celeron that came with, I believe, 4MB onboard video memory.  Then, there's a 32MB card installed in an old Pentium.  I also have one (64MB) installed in another computer, along with an AGP card, to run dual monitors.  The fourth one is not being used now.

[The Saviour]

And if you want to go further VESA.

Now that's going back...

Ahh...the good 'ol days...

[honvetops]

patio  =  Obi Won Kanobi

: Calum + Luke

 CBMatt  - Han Solo

 gx1_man    "Yoda"   lmao

 Soybean - Chebakkau

 Carbon Dude -

 Dusty

 Tony   lol  R& Stoney   

John Cena

[Calum]

Well . . . you learn something new every day.
Thanks for the info all.
Especially honvetops - very informative last post.

[wefr0]

this is just like how my pet trojan ran away.... Dilet wont Pop Up!! wahhhhhh

anyways Dang im ticked now

[Calum]

this is just like how my pet trojan ran away.... Dilet wont Pop Up!! wahhhhhh

anyways Dang im ticked now

Exactly what is that supposed to mean?
And how does it contribute?

[Dilbert]

AGP: A special slot on the motherboard dedicated to graphics processing. Seriously, don't mess with perfection; that's a great idea. I know PCI-E is faster and all that, but some of us can't afford to keep up with the latest trends. ($170 for a new AGP card is cheaper than $170 for a PCI-E and a $300 mobo to run it.)

I use an Nvidia GeForce 7800 AGP and I'm perfectly happy with it.

[Calum]

One reason is for multi-GPU technology like Crossfire or SLI.
Another is speed, the latest cards need more bandwidth than AGP can provide.
It's not that it's necessary - no upgrade is actually necessary, you can stay with your 486 and 640k of RAM if you like.
But if you have the money and you want the speed, then upgrading becomes something some see as necessary, they want the latest and greatest and the speed.

[The Saviour]

AGP: A special slot on the motherboard dedicated to graphics processing. Seriously, don't mess with perfection; that's a great idea. I know PCI-E is faster and all that, but some of us can't afford to keep up with the latest trends. ($170 for a new AGP card is cheaper than $170 for a PCI-E and a $300 mobo to run it.)

I use an Nvidia GeForce 7800 AGP and I'm perfectly happy with it.

Nice point, Dilbert...

You can't stay on top of technology anyway...

By the time you get the latest card with all its bells and whistles...it's obsolete already...