UD 1.

COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Introduction
A bus is a system of communication that connects several components to each other, so that they
can exchange the data that are necessary to carry out the operations that are required of them.
Computer buses are the highways where data travels. And, as in any good road system, there are
those that are much faster than the rest.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Introduction

In a very general way, there are three types of buses, according to the function they perform.
Address Bus: It is a unidirectional bus because the information flows in a single direction, from the
CPU to the memory or to the input and output elements. The CPU alone can place logic levels in
the n address lines, with which 2n possible different addresses are generated. Each of these
addresses corresponds to a memory location or I / O device.

Data Bus: it is a bidirectional bus, as data can flow to or from the CPU. They can be inputs or
outputs, depending on the operation being carried out (reading or writing).

Control Bus: Set of signals is used to synchronize activities and transactions with system
peripherals. Some of these signals, like R / W, are signals that the CPU sends to indicate what type
of operation is expected at that moment. Peripherals can also send control signals to the CPU,
such as INT, RESET, BUS RQ.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Introduction

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types

We have seen in the introduction the types of buses by technology, in the types that we
are going to see now, both data and addresses will circulate that will be processed by
the devices and the processor:

Memory bus
As its name suggests, this bus is in charge of communicating the memory controller,
currently inserted in the processor, with the system's RAM. This bus has taken
different names depending on the manufacturer of the processor, since

were HyperTransport ( HT), Quick Path Interconnect ( QPI) or

Direct Media Interface ( DMI).

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types

Front Side Bus (FSB, extinct)

This is the data bus that was responsible for communicating the processor with the North
Bridge, where the memory controller.
Since the memory controller has now been integrated into the processor itself, this bus
no longer exists. In fact, modifying this data bus is what was originally used to overclock
computers.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types

FSB (Front Side Bus)

FSB is a Bus technology used in processors Core 2 Quad / Duo and earlier. FSB
allows the processor to communicate with other components of the computer,
including memory, PCI, Video, as well as IO devices such as USB, hard disk,
network, etc.

Everything that goes in and out of the processor goes through the FSB. You can
see it in the diagram that is below a typical Core 2 Duo processor and the FSB
communication channels.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system: FSB scheme

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types

DMI (Direct Media Interface)

DMI Bus technology used in processors Intel Core i3, i5 and i7. The basic
difference in architecture is that the processor communicates through a different
channel with RAM, a different channel with PCIe, and a third DMI channel to
communicate with all other components of the computer. This increases
performance significantly. In the diagram below you can see a Core i7
architecture typical

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system: Intel vs AMD Ryzen

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4. The bus system

Bus Peripheral Computer Interconnect Express (PCIe)

The PCIe bus was designed to be the substitute for AGP and PCI buses ( we just talked
about) with an interface that was modular in design. This means that there is no single slot size
for expansion cards, but they can be longer or shorter, depending on the amount of traffic to be
sent through them. Thus, we have PCIe x1, x4, x8 and x16 slots. Generally, it is the processor
in charge of managing the system's PCIe bus. Although in certain motherboards high-end,
there are usually PLX that allow you to give more data paths to the PCIe bus.

Currently, most components connect to the system's PCIe bus, be it the graphics card, sound
card, network card (wired or wireless), or USB. Therefore, it is, together with the memory bus,
the most important of all computer buses.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types

PCI Express is a communication standard for computers thought of as a local I / O bus.

You will see it abbreviated as "PCI-E" or "PCIe" and it is used both for internal
connection in the integrated circuits of the motherboards and to connect external cards
punctured in the corresponding slots.

The PCI Express standard is the responsibility of the “ PCI Special Interest Group
”( PCI-SIG) and the goal of its development was for it to completely replace as single
standard to older buses such as ISA, AGP or the same PCI on which it is based. PCIe
offers a fundamental advantage over PCI by being structured as point-to-point, full-
duplex lanes, working in series. Basically, each individual PCIe port and its installed
cards can get the most out of the bus, versus slower and crowded PCI when the
computer mounts multiple connectors.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types

This is obviously a fundamental standard in the current structure of computers,

because it is used for communication of graphic cards and can be used for other types
of expansion cards, network, sound, video editing and in recent times to connect the
fastest SSDs on the market. It is still early because the market is not mature and the
"memory war" has cut the price drop of solid state solutions, but it is likely that PCI
Express will end up also ending in the future with the SATA ports that we use for hard
drives or SATA, imposing itself as the only interface.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types

PCI Express versions

The most used version currently is v3.0. An improvement over the original PCI 1.0 that quadruples
its transfer speed up to 8 GT / s; its total bandwidth up to 126 Gbit / s (15.8 GB / s) and its
bandwidth per lane up to 15.8 Gbit / s (1969.2 MB / s).

Recently, the PCI-SIG consortium announced the final specifications of the next generation PCI
Express Gen 4.0. A version that will offer higher performance than the current PCIe 3.0, increasing
the number of channels through which the signal passes to double the bandwidth up to 16
Gigatransfers per second. Will also offer lower latency, higher RAS capabilities, improved I / O
virtualization, to tackle the increasing needs of the industry, especially in the graphics market with
truly photorealistic video games, but also in professional applications with high workloads and
bandwidth such as technologies related to artificial intelligence. Another improvement will come from
the smaller physical size of the bus, which will allow smaller cards and not in the monstrous sizes
that we can find -for example- in current high-end dedicated graphics.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types

PCI Express types

PCIe has gone through several revisions as we have seen, but they all have a common
denominator, they use the same physical connections that you will see in four primary sizes: x1, x4,
x8, x16, x32 ...

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4. The bus system

Different physical sizes allow different amounts of connections and data to be moved
simultaneously to the motherboard. The larger the port, the greater its maximum capacity. These
connections are known colloquially as "lines" or "lanes", where each PCI-E lane is made up of two
signaling pairs, one for sending data and the other for receiving. In practice, the greater number of
lanes allows to gain in performance and capacity and the data will be able to flow faster between
the peripheral and the rest of the computer system.

In version 3.0 of PCI Express (the most used currently), the theoretical maximum throughput per
line is 8 GT / s, which in practice translates to slightly less than 1 Gbyte per second per lane. Not
all devices need the same capacity and although there are no established guidelines on what type
of slot to use, we can point out some practical examples of its use.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types
For a common sound card or a Wi-Fi, a PCI-E x1 is enough, while a high-end
network card, RAID controllers or USB 3 expanders, use x4 or x8. Graphics cards
typically use x16 for maximum transfer capacity. SSDs in M.2 format for PCIe are
usually connected to x4 ports, but everything indicates that it will be small in future
generations.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types

USB bus
This data bus is responsible for transmitting or receiving data from the devices
connected to it. Generally, this
bus is used to connect peripherals to the computer, such as keyboard, mouse,
external storage drives, etc. The most modern specification of USB (USB 3.1 2nd
Generation) allows data transmission up to 10 GB / s.

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UD 1. COMPONENTS OF A COMPUTER SYSTEM

4. The bus system

Types

Old buses

Peripheral Computer Interconnect (PCI)

This data bus, dating from 1992, was originally used to serve both graphics cards as
well as auxiliary cards that could be connected to a computer. Unlike the PCIe bus, it
is a parallel and non-serial bus like this one.
Serial AT Attachement Bus (SATA)
The SATA bus is known to all, since it is the one that connects the storage units from
our computer. This bus hit the market in 2003 and, unlike the PATA bus (Parallel AT
Attachement), it is a serial bus. As such, already in its first revision it presented great
improvements over the old PATA bus, such as the higher speed achievable by each of
the communication channels, or the possibility of hot plugging with the storage units.

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