Nvidia's upcoming MCP61 single-chip integrated chipset has been certified as being compatible with the PCI Express standard. The part's certification suggests it's finished and nearing shipment - indeed, the part has been rumoured to be scheduled for an August debut.

The chipset is expected to appear in three variants, the MCP61P, MCP61S and MCP61V. The first two are pitched at mainstream systems, while the V part, as its name suggests, is aimed at the value end of the market. It's anticipated the P and S variants will replace the current GeForce 6100, nForce 430 and nForce 410 chipsets by the Christmas sales season.

The MCP61P is believed to support a PCI Express x16 slot, two x1 slots, five PCI slots, four 3Gbps SATA ports, two parallel ATA drive links, Gigabit Ethernet, ten USB 2.0 ports, 7.1-channel HD audio, and digital video out. The MCP61S and MCP61V are said to lack digital video out, have just two SATA ports and support 10/100Mbps Ethernet. The S has PCI-E x8 for an optional external graphics card, but the V is integrated-only.

It isn't yet known what kind of GPU the MCP61 series contains.

The parts will go up against ATI's RC410/RC415 and RS600 chipsets. Incidentally, roadmap leaks suggest ATI will follow up the RC415 with the RC610 in Q4 2006/Q1 2007. ®