Just got word that the guy's at 3DCenter have now translated their early article on Nvidia's upcoming range of grahics cards NV40, NV41, NV45! from German to English and have added a bit more Info.
The decision to equip the NV40 with internal AGPx8 interface was probably made at an early developement stage - and this cannot be changed in a rush, at least not without a substantial time delay. Furthermore during the planing of the NV40 there couldn't be foreseen, when the age of PCI Express would begin. However we know now, that Intel will start it with the mainboard chipsets Alderwood and Grantsdale on 28th of March 2004.
Here nVidia surely doesn't want to stay behind and so they developed a PCI Express Bridge, which is soldered as an extra chip on the graphics board. This converts the AGPx8 signals of the graphics chip in PCI Express x16 signals - with which the graphics board can have a PCI Express x16 interface, even if the actual graphics chip is AGPx8. This chip is ready at nVidia and will be used for the current AGPx8 graphic cards to make them capable of PCI Express.
However the nVidia-graphics chips, which will be equipped with that PCI Express Bridge, get special code names, even though the graphics chips remain the same. The code name of the NV40 with the PCI Express Bridge will be NV41. This chip will be entirely identical to the NV40, with nVidia only adding an extra PCI Express Bridge chip to the graphics board manufacturers' delivery.
nVidia NV40, NV41, NV45 & CO Information
The decision to equip the NV40 with internal AGPx8 interface was probably made at an early developement stage - and this cannot be changed in a rush, at least not without a substantial time delay. Furthermore during the planing of the NV40 there couldn't be foreseen, when the age of PCI Express would begin. However we know now, that Intel will start it with the mainboard chipsets Alderwood and Grantsdale on 28th of March 2004.
Here nVidia surely doesn't want to stay behind and so they developed a PCI Express Bridge, which is soldered as an extra chip on the graphics board. This converts the AGPx8 signals of the graphics chip in PCI Express x16 signals - with which the graphics board can have a PCI Express x16 interface, even if the actual graphics chip is AGPx8. This chip is ready at nVidia and will be used for the current AGPx8 graphic cards to make them capable of PCI Express.
However the nVidia-graphics chips, which will be equipped with that PCI Express Bridge, get special code names, even though the graphics chips remain the same. The code name of the NV40 with the PCI Express Bridge will be NV41. This chip will be entirely identical to the NV40, with nVidia only adding an extra PCI Express Bridge chip to the graphics board manufacturers' delivery.
nVidia NV40, NV41, NV45 & CO Information
