PCI Express System Architecture

Introduction

Since its definition in the early 1990's, PCI has become one of the most successful interconnect technologies ever used in computers. Originally intended for personal computer systems, the PCI architecture has penetrated into virtually every computing platform category, including servers, storage, communications, and a wide range of embedded control applications. From its early incarnation as a 32-bit 33MHz interconnect, it has been expanded to offer higher speeds (currently in widespread use at 64-bit 133MHz, with faster versions on the way). Most importantly, each advancement in PCI bus speed and width provided backward software compatibility, allowing designers to leverage the broad code base.

As successful as the PCI architecture ...