Perfect Match for High-End Aorus Builds
Not to be outdone by ASUS, motherboard manufacturer rival Gigabyte is also launching their own NVLink bridge for their high-end AORUS gaming brand. It is available in a 3-slot or 4-slot spacing variant, both taking aesthetic cues from AORUS motherboards. Both are also RGB LED capable, and compatible with Gigabyte’s RGB Fusion Sync technology. That means users can synchronize and match their NVLink bridge LED with the rest of their build from the same software.
The NVLink connector is the new standard, originally used in NVIDIA’s Quadro cards. The old SLI connectors were simply intended for syncing framebuffers between cards. It has limited bandwidth of only up to 4GB/s. Meanwhile, NVLink specifies point-to-point connections with data rates reaching up to 50GB/s on RTX 2080 Ti and 100GB/s with the latest Quadro RTX 6000/8000 video cards.
The 30-slot variant has a 60mm gap between both NVLink connectors. This supports SLI setups of dual-slot cards with a PCI-e slot in between, or triple-slot cards with no space in between. Meanwhile, the 4-slot variant has an 80mm gap. This is ideal for motherboards with a two PCIe slot gap between the two PCIe x16 slots.
How Much is the Gigabyte AORUS NVLink Connector?
Expect the pricing to be similar to other NVLink connectors with RGB LEDs. The ASUS Republic of Gamers NVLink connector for example costs around 85~89 EUR. Both the 3-slot and 4-slot variants also have the same prices.
