I like anything that pushes technology it can only help improve desktop PC's in the long run. Would be nice if all PCIE connectors were all 16x we might not need it but if hardware suppliers new they can access that maybe they will produce faster and better hardware....... or maybe not

I don't believe I've ever heard of Gen-Z. However it sounds like a great idea, and if it works royalty free, then that's a win-win. Because the savings will be passed on the the OEMs & consumers, hopefully lowering the cost of PC's in the future.

When I began to read the article and got to the point where royalty free was mentioned, I knew Intel wouldn't be aboard. Nvidia as well these days loves their restricted in-house technologies, so their participation was pretty much 50-50. I guess they judged that since Intel isn't interested, it will have no private consumer future, and in the pro market Nvidia already has their proprietary NVlink, so they wouldn't want their left hand to compete with the right hand.

Great, now by the time I upgrade, the web will be filled with "Gen-Z is the way to go bro! Pci-E is dead!" ..and I'll be feeling left out 🙁 😛 😀 ...it's Pci-E 2.0 vs 3.0 all over again 😀 🙁!

I thought pcie4 and pcie5 was the successor?

Fox2232:

Not so much, this is like move from AGP to PCIe

What!? those memories were even worse! 🙁:(:( [spoiler]I'm kidding obviously. 😀[/spoiler]

RonanH:

No Intel = No consumer products Do we need more than what PCIe can deliver currently? Looks like there are a few big scale computing companies in there though so might be something for the datacentre/supercomputer crowd maybe?

Maybe in data centers. Consumer grade stuff, no not really.

reminds me of when people were skeptical of hdmi connectors on monitors. obviously no-one any of us knows has a direct application for this standard. but i remember when i didn't have an application (that was worth a darn...at first) for the Apple II. to use a cheesy line from "field of dreams"...."build it and they will come".

This might be the dawn of the truly modular computer. Need more CPU power ? Stick in another CPU "unit" Need more GPU and higher frame-rates for games ? Add more GPU units Need more I/O for your amazing media server ? Stick in an I/O unit with extra SATA/M.2 etc. Need application specific accelerators ? Plug those in. One slot to rule them all ! (And it should be hot swappable... adding or removing units without even bothering to power down or reboot) I can already picture some crazy high-end motherboard that has 8 slots of this thing, all identical, and could go from 1 APU - 1 I/O to a multi-core beast with 6 CPU's or to a massive gaming/processing machine with 4 GPU's, 2 CPU's, 1 I/O and 1 VR/Sensor Interface board and next day swapped to a 4 I/O video-station / 4 CPU for some massive 4K encoding power. I can only dream 😉

RonanH:

No Intel = No consumer products

Intel doesn't matter when it comes to this. If Intel never supports it in their chipsets, then 3rd party controllers will step in, increasing the price of their boards, to make sure it works. It might be slower then intended because it's not accepted by the chipset directly, but it'd still happen, and then Intel motherboards would be that much more expensive. The biggest and really main issue would be Nvidia, since it's going to be the adoption race of cards that'll determine if this goes further. And since Nvidia is as of yet on board, that'll be quite a chunk of devices that will be fitted with PCI-Express instead.

Barry J:

I like anything that pushes technology it can only help improve desktop PC's in the long run. Would be nice if all PCIE connectors were all 16x we might not need it but if hardware suppliers new they can access that maybe they will produce faster and better hardware....... or maybe not

Honestly, we don't need all PCI-Express connectors to be 16x (ultimately would be a waste of materials and cost), what would be better would be for all PCI-Express connectors, except for the 16x slots, to be open ended and allow any size of card to be put there, albeit at lower speeds if the card needs more. This is already a thing, just not a universal thing. https://lnv.i.lithium.com/t5/image/serverpage/image-id/65335iC26DD4175A62FA36?v=1.0 https://img.purch.com/r/600x450/aHR0cDovL21lZGlhLmJlc3RvZm1pY3JvLmNvbS9TLzcvMjU2MzI3L29yaWdpbmFsL3BjaWUuanBn There's even the option to put in the 16x slot clip (the back piece that holds the card in place) http://images.hardwarezone.com/upload/files/2010/06/10cc34a428.jpg

maybe by time i do new build this will be the new standard?

Nice !

I do think that it's nice for this to get some traction for being open. It means lower cost in theory (unless the cost to implement the new controller is high). On the other hand, this makes me think that perhaps not all Gen-Z implementations will be created equal if companies are open to make their own implementations to the bus, with compatibility being all over the place.