Wednesday, September 7th 2011

MSI Calls Bluff on Gigabyte's PCIe Gen 3 Ready Claim

In August, Gigabyte made a claim that baffled at least MSI, that scores of its motherboards are Ready for Native PCIe Gen. 3. Along with the likes of ASRock, MSI was one of the first with motherboards featuring PCI-Express 3.0 slots, the company took the pains to educate buyers what PCI-E 3.0 is, and how to spot a motherboard that features it. MSI thinks that Gigabyte made a factual blunder bordering misinformation by claiming that as many as 40 of its motherboards are "Ready for Native PCIe Gen. 3." MSI decided to put its engineering and PR team to build a technically-sound presentation rebutting Gigabyte's claims.

More slides, details follow.

MSI begins by explaining that PCIe support isn't as easy as laying a wire between the CPU and the slot. It needs specifications-compliant lane switches and electrical components, and that you can't count on certain Gigabytes for future-proofing.

MSI did some PCI-Express electrical testing using a 22 nm Ivy Bridge processor sample.
MSI claims that apart from the G1.Sniper 2, none of Gigabyte's so-called "Ready for Native PCIe Gen. 3" motherboards are what the badge claims to be, and that the badge is extremely misleading to buyers. Time to refill the popcorn bowl.
Source: MSI
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286 Comments on MSI Calls Bluff on Gigabyte's PCIe Gen 3 Ready Claim

#2
Fx
lol nice! things just got real...
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#3
neliz
Nice to see when Marketing BS is burned to the ground by technical realities.
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#4
kereta
Is the source reliable?
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#5
Easo
Epic popcorn shall be consumed indeed...
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#7
Chaitanya
I see a big storm brewing on the horizon after this press release.
Posted on Reply
#8
DannibusX
False advertising is pretty serious in the States. Can't the FTC look into this? It might suck to be Gigabyte pretty soon. I hope not though, they make good stuff.
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#9
dir_d
Glad to see MSI step up their game.
Posted on Reply
#10
cadaveca
My name is Dave
I'm staying well outta this one. WTF is going on here? Shall I start making popcorn?
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#11
TheLaughingMan
Nope. Using the word "Ready" gives them at least 2 loopholes to get out of this that I see. It will be interesting to see how they respond.
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#12
heky
Busted!, thats what they get for trying to fuck people over.
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#13
TheLostSwede
News Editor
Ok, how easy would it be to fake the lane readout? As for one, are there any Gen 3 PCI Express x16 cards MSI could've fitted to the slot?
And what happens if you put a x8 Gen 1 card in a slot of any board? Wouldn't that revert the slot speed to the same speed as the card?
Also, what utility is MSI using to get that readout?

On top of that, Gigabyte never said it'd work for multiple cards, only that the primary slot would operate at x16 Gen 3 speed.

I dunno about the components on the PCB though beyond the switches, which MSI is making a big deal out as the only choice, but there are at least two more companies that already have Gen 3 switches, none of those are used on the Gigabyte board in question though.
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#14
arroyo
War… War never changes…
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#15
buggalugs
OH Noes!! Gigabyte have done it again. Gigabyte are really screwing up lately....
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#16
Steevo
Has MSI actually gotten honest and better?
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#17
kid41212003
Probably those pictures are just for promotion purpose and not really present the finished products.
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#18
arnoo1
some one is feeling pressure from gigabyte's awesome mobo's
msi that's just lame
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#19
RejZoR
The whole thing is a bit lame, but it's nice to see MSI uncovering the truth. It's only good for us, consumers.
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#20
entropy13
kid41212003Probably those pictures are just for promotion purpose and not really present the finished products.
Huh? Gigabyte is saying their boards are "Ready for Native PCIe Gen. 3", and obviously they're already the "finished products" since you can buy them right now, and all you need is a BIOS update.
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#21
robal
Eagerly awaiting Gigabyte's response :)
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#22
Vincy Boy
arnoo1some one is feeling pressure from gigabyte's awesome mobo's
msi that's just lame
Lame to reveal a company's attempt at misinforming us consumers? What are you some kinda blind Gigabyte fanboy? I've had my eye on a Gigabyte Z68 and this only helped me making a more informed purchase decision.
Looking forward to hear Gigabyte's response on this.
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#23
kid41212003
entropy13Huh? Gigabyte is saying their boards are "Ready for Native PCIe Gen. 3", and obviously they're already the "finished products" since you can buy them right now, and all you need is a BIOS update.
I guess I missed the "In August" part.

And since they use the picture that look like promotional picture, i thought these boards are yet to be released :laugh:.
Posted on Reply
#24
WarraWarra
Cool another win for the end user.
I wonder what could be said for the gpu's that is being produced / labeled as Gen 3 PCIe ?
Makes you think about cpu's as well, at least Intel admitted their bugs and is working on the 2011 fix for that.

MSI = Robin Hood men in Tights LOL.
Who would have though that there is still that ancient mythical concept called democracy and a legal system or that which they embody that still lives somewhere today on planet earth, thought it died out 200 years ago and here MSI shows us this is still alive.

Is MSI Chinese / Russian or something, maybe I should move to that country to find democracy & freedom. :nutkick:

Keep up the good work MSI.
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#25
RejZoR
MSI or MicroStar International (they used to call them self like this in the past but lately they are just MSI) is a Taiwanese company.
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