About PCI-e

A tutorial of PCIe.

http://zone.ni.com/devzone/cda/tut/p/id/3767

• Similar to network protocols, the architecture of PCIe consists of layers: physical layer, data-link layer, transaction layer, software layer.
  
• Lane - a basic physical layer channel, a device can request more than one lanes and combine those lanes for higher bandwidth
• Data-link layer: enable reliable data transmission between pairs. Use sequence number, CRC, and retransmissions to ensure reliable communication.
  
• Transaction Layer: creates request packets and serve corresponding response packets from the data-link layer. Provide address spaces.

Northbridge
Southbridge


IO Virtualization
Part 1: http://www.embedded.com/design/networking/217701325

• What is IO virtualization? why is it needed?