Is the 780/780ti a lot more expensive to make than the 290 series?

[Irenicus]

I ask because the die size for both seems to be 551 square mm vs around 435-438 mm^2 for the 290 series.

I did the math and the 780 series is around 25% bigger than the 290 series with roughly comparable performance. Is chip cost mainly a function of die size in this case, or do the specific configurations play a bigger role between these two card series?

 

[wand3r3r]

Probably somewhat, however the little piece of silicon is only a portion of the final sale price. How much exactly they will probably never reveal.

The cooler is somewhat more, the die itself is more, both are unknown as to how much (AFAIK). Either way, past generations have been $550 and when they sell the same thing for $1000 this generation you know they are milking the customer all the way to bank.

 

[GaiaHunter]

I ask because the die size for both seems to be 551 square mm vs around 435-438 mm^2 for the 290 series.

I did the math and the 780 series is around 25% bigger than the 290 series with roughly comparable performance. Is chip cost mainly a function of die size in this case, or do the specific configurations play a bigger role between these two card series?

Depends on how much NVIDIA and AMD pay per wafer and if they have other arrangements that they might have with TSMC like paying per successful die and whatnot.

Quality of components, memory size, etc will have some impact but probably minor.

If AMD and NVIDIA pay the same per wafer it should be cheaper to produce the 290 chip, even more than 25% since bigger dies have generally lower yields.

I'm not sure if the higher Xtor density of the AMD chip has yields impacts or not.

If my calculations aren't off, AMD can at most fit 129 dies in a wafer.

At $5000 per wafer that is a minimum of $38 per die.

 

[Abwx]

561mm2 and 438mm2 , the 780ti has a 28% bigger chip ,
of course cost is not simply 28% higher per chip due to
higher defective rate on the bigger chip but still the gross
cost of the chip is not that significant in the net cost result
of a graphic card.

 

[p0rkguy]

Chances are you're paying 2-3x as much as it does for them to manufacture it, maybe even 3-4x for Nvidia's super high end (780/780Ti/Titan).

 

[Saylick]

Chances are you're paying 2-3x as much as it does for them to manufacture it, maybe even 3-4x for Nvidia's super high end (780/780Ti/Titan).

This. If the following picture is true, then nVidia's big die strategy only adds a couple dozen at most to the cost of the card itself but they end up selling the card for a hundred, if not hundreds, more for the high-end SKUs.

 

[96Firebird]

Shape of the die should also matter, since you can fit more rectangular-shaped GPUs on a 300mm round wafer compared to a square chip. But that really depends on the dimensions...

 

[Wall Street]

Don't forget that the 4 GB 512 bit memory bus adds some PCB and memory costs which offsets some of the price difference from the chip.

 

[Haserath]

This. If the following picture is true, then nVidia's big die strategy only adds a couple dozen at most to the cost of the card itself but they end up selling the card for a hundred, if not hundreds, more for the high-end SKUs.

If both are true, a 7.1B transistor die should be ~$194 and a 6.2B die should be $164.

But with AMD's greater density, that should shrink to maybe $130-140.

Nvidia must also use 3GB 7Ghz GDDR5 memory(780Ti) while AMD uses 4GB 6Ghz. Could go either way on cost.

They're within $100 of each other. I'd say $300 for the Ti and $220-240 290X.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

That's cost, you need to earn a profit off that.

Then the board partners need a profit.

Then the retailer needs a profit.

Add logistics, R&D, marketing, software...

There are a lot of hands in our cookie jar /\

 

[p0rkguy]

That's cost, you need to earn a profit off that.

Then the board partners need a profit.

Then the retailer needs a profit.

Add logistics, R&D, marketing, software...

There are a lot of hands in our cookie jar /\

That's not even how much it costs for them in bulk prices, just the value of the parts used.

 

[KingFatty]

This is very interesting. Anybody know what kinds of profits can be made in Video cards?

Usually with cell phones there are websites dedicated to analyzing the cost of materials vs. the costs we pay.

But I never saw that for video cards. It would be pretty cool! I definitely think that if you choose two random video cards, there can be a vast difference in quality feel between the two, and I'm sure that's due to cost to build.

 

[ShintaiDK]

The main expense is R&D, not production cost.