Does the PCI-E Bandwidth make a difference?

MikeTyson · Dec 21, 2009

In my BIOS, as probably with everyone elses, you can set the link width or bandwidth or whatever it's called between 90 and 150

Does increasing this make a difference, and how so? And what's the max safe?

sneekypeet · Dec 21, 2009

The bus speed you mean?

Sometimes it may help increase stability in a highly overclocked system.

Some people say its a myth.

Usually no matter if it helps or not, you start to loose devices at about 120 to 125mhz.

BradleyKZN · Dec 21, 2009

I dont recommend changing it. Very quick way to damage a card.

sneekypeet · Dec 21, 2009

BradleyKZN said:
I dont recommend changing it. Very quick way to damage a card.

I will just say that is a very uninformed answer. I have run mine at 120 for some time with no ill effects to anything. I just dont have proof of benefits either.

MikeTyson · Dec 21, 2009

So I don't see why the option really exists? lol

Confusing :/

sneekypeet · Dec 21, 2009

there was a card or two at one time that would overclock themselves as the bus was raised. My main point about stability would be a good reason, but I digress with no facts in hand. Other than that the basic idea is to leave it alone.

Try this. Run lets say vantage or you favorite game that runs a FPS counter, with the PCI-e at 100. Bump it to 105 or 110 and see if there are any gains in scores or FPS. If not put it back, no harm no foul!

DrPepper · Dec 21, 2009

sneekypeet said:
there was a card or two at one time that would overclock themselves as the bus was raised. My main point about stability would be a good reason, but I digress with no facts in hand. Other than that the basic idea is to leave it alone.

Try this. Run lets say vantage or you favorite game that runs a FPS counter, with the PCI-e at 100. Bump it to 105 or 110 and see if there are any gains in scores or FPS. If not put it back, no harm no foul!

I agree with Sneeky. I've personally never noticed a difference when I've done it. I'd imagine it would only make a difference if there was alot of textures being swapped between the RAM and the GPU RAM and the PCI-E bus couldn't handle it.

Jstn7477 · Dec 21, 2009

Be very careful when adjusting the PCIe clock. On several boards I've owned, a PCIe clock even as high as 110MHz can cause some SATA controllers to malfunction and cause massive data corruption on hard disks. Results may vary with different boards and controllers. If I do adjust this frequency to try and stabilize an overclock, I usually never go above 108MHz, and most of the time I don't even touch this frequency.

overclocking101 · Dec 21, 2009

they say that with GPU's with 1GB or so it will help with a small add in performance the only real reports of it were with nvidia cards the 9600GT/GSO etc but i asked the same question a while back myself before doing a full fledged internet search for answers. much over 120 you can kill HDD's etc i didnt notice much change myself only about 15 score increase in 3dmark vantage wich really means nothing unless you are 15 away from breaking a world record or something.

Mussels · Dec 21, 2009

some motherboards OC the PCI-E bus fairly well, and people use it to help get higher FSB/CPU overclocks.

Some motherboards, it trips out the SATA controllers and such and can corrupt your data.

In regards to video card performance, it makes no difference.

System Name	Swag
Processor	Intel Xeon E3110 4GHz
Motherboard	GIGABYTE GA-G31M-ES2L
Cooling	Scythe Infinity I Push-Pull w/ AS5
Memory	2x2GB Transcend 800MHz DDR2 @ 890MHz 1.9v
Video Card(s)	Palit nVIDIA GTX460 1GB 800/1600/2000
Storage	Crucial M4 64GB
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Video Card(s)	Asus ROG Strix GeForce RTX 3090 24GB OC EVA Edition
Storage	Addlink S95 M.2 PCIe GEN 4x4 2TB
Display(s)	Asus ROG SWIFT OLED PG42UQ
Case	Thermaltake Core P3 TG
Audio Device(s)	Realtek on board > Sony Receiver > Cerwin Vegas
Power Supply	be quiet DARK POWER PRO 12 1500W
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Motherboard	Asus M4N78-SE
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Memory	2x2GB G.Skill DDR2-800
Video Card(s)	XFX 7900GS
Storage	Samsung 5000GB 7200RPM 16MB cache
Display(s)	Samsung 22'' T220
Case	Coolermaster 590
Audio Device(s)	Onboard Realtek audio
Power Supply	OCZ fatal1ty 550w

System Name	EVA-01
Processor	Intel i7 13700K
Motherboard	Asus ROG Maximus Z690 HERO EVA Edition
Cooling	ASUS ROG Ryujin III 360 with Noctua Industrial Fans
Memory	PAtriot Viper Elite RGB 96GB @ 6000MHz.
Video Card(s)	Asus ROG Strix GeForce RTX 3090 24GB OC EVA Edition
Storage	Addlink S95 M.2 PCIe GEN 4x4 2TB
Display(s)	Asus ROG SWIFT OLED PG42UQ
Case	Thermaltake Core P3 TG
Audio Device(s)	Realtek on board > Sony Receiver > Cerwin Vegas
Power Supply	be quiet DARK POWER PRO 12 1500W
Mouse	ROG STRIX Impact Electro Punk
Keyboard	ROG STRIX Scope TKL Electro Punk
Software	Windows 11

System Name	Swag
Processor	Intel Xeon E3110 4GHz
Motherboard	GIGABYTE GA-G31M-ES2L
Cooling	Scythe Infinity I Push-Pull w/ AS5
Memory	2x2GB Transcend 800MHz DDR2 @ 890MHz 1.9v
Video Card(s)	Palit nVIDIA GTX460 1GB 800/1600/2000
Storage	Crucial M4 64GB
Display(s)	LG Flatron M1917TM 1280x1024 @ 60Hz
Audio Device(s)	Realtek HD Audio
Power Supply	OCZ StealthXStream 2 600W
Software	Windows 7 Professional 64-bit

Does the PCI-E Bandwidth make a difference?

MikeTyson

sneekypeet

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BradleyKZN

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sneekypeet

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MikeTyson

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