i think i did a fairly long post about the upcoming technologies a while ago, but i can't find it (and I'm bored, waiting at the university library for my bus), so i'll just write whatever comes to mind. i hope it's appreciated

btx: new case form factor that'll allow for HUGE (1kg) heatsinks, just so intel can keep making overly hot cpus and not come up with something new. pretty much everything will be installed the opposite way of what we're used to with atx, but it's said to allow for better air cooling, improved wifi stuff, etc. it's funny really, because btx is almost totally intel's brainchild, and they're pushing hard to get case companies started on the manufactoring process. In reality i doubt it's needed, at all. i think the btx form factor will be fine for casual users; people who play a few games and surf the web, but for the enthusiast who has tons of exotic cooling and whatnot installed it'll make things harder. Enthusiasts have a way of making stuff work either way, and i'm sure that'll be the case this time too.

ddr 2: this is another of intel's brainchilds. two of the major things you need to keep in mind when thinking about ram performance is the speed it's running at, and the timings. relaxed timings can let the ram run at higher frequencies, but by making the latencies higher you're losing a lot of performance as a direct result. with ddr 2 you have for instance cas latencies of 4 to 5, compared to 2 to 2.5 with for instance socket a bartons. ddr 2 will however run at a different voltage, and have various other improvements - and that's what can be exciting in the long run. because right at launch the ddr 2 ram sticks won't be any faster than the current ddr ramsticks, but the key is that ddr 2 has potential to go farther. the big downside is that ddr 2 costs a huge amount of money, so if you want to jump on the bandwaggon (a waggon that might not even be faster) you better ready your savings.

gddr3: i'm reasonably sure that his is essentially ddr 2 sticks, only running at a different voltage / speed. it's by far not as different as going from ddr to ddr 2 (think radeon 9800 pro -> 9800XT).

pci express: going from agp 4x to 8x didn't do much at all, so the question is whether pci express will make much of a difference. oddly, the only samples that are out are basically slow old cards, which makes it hard to get a good idea of the speed difference. however, (i think) pci express busses can run at different speeds, and can allow you to use multiple video cards. how this'll be done in practice (and the performance benefit) remains to be seen.

939 pin amd cpus: current a64 cpus use 754 pins. current athlon fx cpus use 940 pins. sometime during march / april / may we'll start seeing amd's new and improved versions. even though a64 cpus are meant for the consumer the a fx cpus (and their motherboards) are more geared towards workstations and entry level servers. what this means is that motherboards value things that are more important for people who rely on their servers (stability, special kinds of ram, and so on), instead of just insane gaming performance at a lower cost (which is what we want). the cool thing about 939 pin cpus is that motherboards developers will get to make cheaper motherboards (the PCBs will have less layers), and we'll have support for things like dual channel memory, and such. it's uncertain what big of a difference dual channel memory will have, but in general it'll be a better buy for gamers, and high-end consumers in general.

intel's new crap: even though the prescott is new, and hasn't had time to mature it's safe to say it just sucks. it's just barely faster than the northwood p4's, and it's MUCH hotter. anandtech has had previews of intel's next offerings, which are obviously very early samples, but gave an idea of what's to come. in short, they'll suck. they may be a little faster in some benchmarks than some of amd's cpus at the same frequency, but keep in mind that these are cpus that we'll have to wait months for. in that time amd will have 939 pin cpus probably rated at about 4000+, which I suspect will dominate intel.

honestly, i don't see huge performance benefits from the stuff I've written about - at least not for now. current ddr ram can be very fast, and so can the videocards. i think ram and motherboard developers will have some really challenging months ahead, because personally there's not that much of an incentive to go with all the new things. i'm personally waiting for a motherboard with support for 939 pin amd cpus, good ddr 1 ram, and pci express. even though we'll see both pci express and agp versions all during 2004 it'll be smart to migrate if you're upgrading. i'll do my best to stay away from intel, btx, and ddr 2 for as long as possible, but who knows what'll happen. what really interests me is what nvidia and ati have up their sleeves. the latest rumour is that the r420 WON'T have support for pixel shader 3.0 and vertex shader 3.0 - something that nv40 definitely will have. unfortunately both these two cards won't be publically shown at cebit, but i wouldn't be surprised if both companies release interesting tidbits.

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