A deep dive into PCIe

Shane Colton digs into the PCIe PC bus specification and testing in the latest blog post:

Something I found interesting about PCIe in general is that there seems to be a pretty large barrier built up around the black box. Even just finding learning resources is much harder than it should be. The best I found was PCI Express Technology 3.0 and some accompanying material by MindShare, but even that seems like a prose wrapper on top of the specification. There isn’t anything that I would consider a beginner’s guide, like you might find for USB or Ethernet.

This is a used U4301B that I got in what has to be my second-best eBay score of all time, for less than it would have cost me to rent one for a month. There are only ever a handful of them up for auction at any given time, and the market is so small that the price is basically random, so if you’re actually looking for one I can only wish you luck.

… for now I have Gen3 protocol analysis capability, which is good enough for my purposes. I’ve used it a bunch in the past few months to explore the different layers of the PCIe stack and components within.

Read more here.


Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards

Join Adafruit on Mastodon

Adafruit is on Mastodon, join in! adafruit.com/mastodon

Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.

Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.

Join us every Wednesday night at 8pm ET for Ask an Engineer!

Join over 36,000+ makers on Adafruit’s Discord channels and be part of the community! http://adafru.it/discord

CircuitPython – The easiest way to program microcontrollers – CircuitPython.org


Maker Business — Making sure the CHIPS act isn’t just crumbs

Wearables — And now a word on laser ettiquette

Electronics — Capacitor ESR

Python for Microcontrollers — Python on Microcontrollers Newsletter: CircuitPython 8.1.0 and 8.2.0-beta0 out and so much more! #CircuitPython #Python #micropython @ThePSF @Raspberry_Pi

Adafruit IoT Monthly — Guardian Robot, Weather-wise Umbrella Stand, and more!

Microsoft MakeCode — MakeCode Thank You!

EYE on NPI — Maxim’s Himalaya uSLIC Step-Down Power Module #EyeOnNPI @maximintegrated @digikey

New Products – Adafruit Industries – Makers, hackers, artists, designers and engineers! — New Products 5/31/23 Feat. Adafruit NeoDriver – I2C to NeoPixel Driver Board – Stemma QT!

Get the only spam-free daily newsletter about wearables, running a "maker business", electronic tips and more! Subscribe at AdafruitDaily.com !



No Comments

No comments yet.

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.