By that logic nobody should release new cards.
I can guarantee you both Nvidia and AMD will launch GP106 and Polaris as fast as they can. They are not waiting for anything but getting the cards ready.
AMD is not stupid. First, they are waiting for retail prices of 1070 cards because that's the biggest current threat to the P10. If the cheapest good 1070 is $399, then Polaris 10 can be $299 and still be perfectly viable even if it's 25% slower. Second, they need to build up real inventory for true retail availability not 1080 Paper Launch. This is critical because $249-299 P10 will target key market segments that no $380-450 card is aimed at. You cannot have 20-25 $249-299 cards at MicroCenter per store and call that a launch. Such paper launch would tarnish P10 more for AMD since there are 5-10X more gamers who want $249 cards over $400-700 ones. Having 200,000 cards for sale July 15th is better than having 20,000 cards that all sell out with no inventory in sight. You cannot win market share by just having a good product in reviews -- there needs to be actual availability in retail channels and AMD understands that. Another point is AMD needs to clear the channel from R9 390/390X cards and there are a lot of them left.
AMD never confirmed June 4th retail launch. All of that was pure conjecture online. NV never confirmed 1060's launch either. We know it's rumored for August but since NV never said when it's launching, they could release it in September and not be late. AMD always said mid-2016 launch and volume sales for back-to-school season. Who knows if GloFo has issues, maybe P10 isn't meeting expectations, maybe AMD is secretly allocating the full RX 480X 2560 P10 cards for Apple, which means they'll need time to build up desktop inventory of crippled RX 480 2304 parts. Either way, a generation lasts 1.5-2 years. Considering NV has no retail availability in North America of 1080 and 1070 is likely to repeat 1080's paper launch, as long as AMD's Polaris can hit Fury Air performance for $299 or less, they will get their sales. Many gamers eyeing 1070 won't even buy the garbage FE model; meaning the June 10th launch is useless for them. Until we see AIBs with retail availability of 1070, there wont be a single worthwhile 1070 for purchase yet. OTOH, AMD may have AIB P10 cards for hard launch mid-July, then it's barely a month gap between AIB 1070 and P10.
Maybe you forgot 4850/4870 launches but back then everyone thought AMD is done. What happens if AMD releases a 390X + 10-15% for $249-269? We don't know, but what if they do? Such a card would make both the 1070/1080 look worthless for 1080p 60Hz gamers - the majority of PC gamers.
Apparently even though AMD has always said Mid year,before back to school for Polaris.
Now that NV has released two cards which dont even address the same market ,the fact that they wont rush out their release is an obvious sign of failure.
Never mind that they may have several corporate partners that have made plans expecting launch at a certain date,let's also ignore how terrible of an idea it is to launch a product in to a high volume market without having the production to back it.
I have to agree this is a blunder of epic proportions on AMD's behalf almost as bad as not pushing the 380X forward to launch at the same time as the GTX 970 launched. I mean what were/are they thinking ? 🙄
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It's way better to do it NV style apparently. Paper Launch >>> Hard launch. Hitting F5 and religiously following NowInStock is better than walking into a store or logging into Amazon and ordering a card, then moving on with your day. Better AMD charge a $70-100 premium for AMD's Typhoon Blower Edition than have cheaper AIB cards for sale in volume. The funny part is 1080 FE owners already got destroyed by the 1070 which in AIB form makes a joke out of the $699 FE 1080; but they are too busy trolling AMD threads as if they ever intended to buy P10. Ha!