AGP will live for the next 12 to 18 months
IN OUR PLEASANT chat with top ATI chip chap we learned that AGP cards will live on even after the recent PCI Express announcement.
X300, X600 and some other cores that are PCI-E only will get AGP chips and we understood that this solution should be native.
ATI believe that there is a space for AGP and PCI-E to coexist so they want to offer their customers right products.
Nvidia already solved this problem since Jen Hsun said that HSI works both way so as it can turn AGP card into PCI-E one it can turn PCI-E card to AGP.
Dave sees transition from AGP to PCI-E as something that wont happen overnight but generally sees benefits from new marchitecture as well. Its not backward compatible standard with existing AGP so you can not upgrade just the card, you have to get motherboard with PCI-E support as well.
With time there will be more PCI-E cards and less AGP's until this buss that served us for quite some times fades away completely.
