At WinHEC 2002 - the leading industry conference for information about future directions for systems and peripherals that run Microsoft Windows operating systems - the PCI Special Interest Group and Arapahoe Work Group have announced that the code-named 3GIO draft 1.0 specification has been successfully completed and is being transferred on schedule to the PCI-SIG, where it will be renamed PCI Express. Read more...

PCI Express is a new serial I/O technology that is compatible with the current PCI software environment and which defines a packetized protocol and a load/store architecture. Previously code-named Third Generation I/O (3GIO), its layered architecture enables attachment to copper, optical, or emerging physical signaling media. PCI Express uses an embedded clocking scheme to enable better frequency scaling and provides many advanced features as well as innovative form factors. It can be used for chip-to-chip and add-in card applications to provide connectivity for adapter cards, as a graphics I/O attach point for increased graphics bandwidth, and as an attach point to other interconnects like 1394b, USB 2.0, InfiniBand Architecture and Ethernet. Related links: ATI announces PCIExpress Support Nvidia does the same Source: PCI-SIG