New Nvidia Rumors?

[Munky]

I am hoping that Nvidia release a video card like the 8800 GT, I had a XFX 8800 GT and it kicked ass. If Nvidia release a Fermi version of the 8800 GT then put me down for one. 🙂

I'm predicting they'll first release a 8800gtx version of fermi, and then you'll have to wait 6+ months for an 8800gt version.

 

[zerocool84]

The prices are *not* so high. You are comparing to one generation of cards, the hd4x00 series of cards. Every other generation that i can remember in recent history has debuted higher than $400. Sure $400 can be argued as a lot of money but not in the world of highend GPU's

Yea seriously

I remember paying $300 for my 6800nu and $300 for my 7800GS and they weren't even the middle of the road cards like the 5850 is.

 

[Barfo]

Perhaps the prices are not high, but I was eying the 5850 for $260 MSRP and was disillusioned after it was raised, guess I wouldn't be unhappy if the MSRP had been $280 from the start.

 

[bryanW1995]

I am hoping that Nvidia release a video card like the 8800 GT, I had a XFX 8800 GT and it kicked ass. If Nvidia release a Fermi version of the 8800 GT then put me down for one. 🙂

not likely to be anything at all like the 8800gt. even if it magically offers a great bang/buck offering (not likely at all imho), it is a new gen, large and high-heat part that is designed with performance first and everything else secondary. Much more likely to be like 2900xt than 8800gt. In fact, I seem to remember amd fanbois incessantly singing the praises of 2900xt, right up until the time benchmarks were actually released.

The best that fermi can hope for is to achieve 8800gtx status, which would require a card that is fast enough to beat 5xxx AND 6xxx performance. Is that possible? sure, but based on past performance of cards that are 6 mos+ late to the party it seems unlikely in the extreme. Much more likely is something that is overall slightly slower or slightly faster than 5870, causing amd to drop prices on 58x0 cards and pusing out a 5890 with cherry picked gpu's at the top ala 8800 ultra. this scenario also happens to be the most consumer-friendly possible as it would finally exert some downward pressure on gpu prices and allow us gtx 260 owners to upgrade at a somewhat reasonable price.


@barfo: yeah, that is the only problem that amd has, they should have priced the cards higher up front. They had two factors working against them at the time, however: 1. extreme competitiveness of 48x0 cards, and 2. fear/intimidation factor of fermi lurking around the corner. How many of us expected in september 09 that we would be at the end of jan 10 and still not even have fermi benchmarks available? Certainly I didn't, and clearly amd didn't, either. Maybe they should hire me as a consultant...hmmmm...maybe I should track down ranjan...

 

[akugami]

My reference is the 4xxx series MSRP when it came out, which is a fair comparison. You actually back my point up too because one of the primary reasons MSRP of the 5xx series is so high is that Nvidia has no viable competitive offering at the moment.

I'll have to differ with you on the pricing of the Radeon 5 series as well as the 4 series. I actually think the Radeon 5 series has an MSRP right about where it should be for the type of products they are. The Radeon 4 series was actually below what I would consider a healthy MSRP.

Keep in mind that all businesses are run to make a profit. The Radeon 4 series didn't lose money but looking at AMD's finances, you'd see that ATI (their GPU arm) didn't exactly make a huge profit. They barely broke even. Again, businesses exist to make money.

We all knew that the Radeon 4 series were great deals and even those who traditionally only buy nVidia benefited because of nVidia being forced to reduce prices. I think it was unrealistic to expect ATI to keep prices that low, though one can certainly hope. One thing's for sure, at least it isn't the Geforce 8800 days.

Perhaps the prices are not high, but I was eying the 5850 for $260 MSRP and was disillusioned after it was raised, guess I wouldn't be unhappy if the MSRP had been $280 from the start.

Economics at work. In this case it worked against consumers. TSMC had issues with 40nm production, limiting the supply. This usually causes a rise in prices. Lack of competition. This also usually causes a rise in prices.

 

[nemesismk2]

Thanks for all of the replies to my I want a Fermi version of the 8800 GT post 😉

 

[Borealis7]

the 8800GT revolutionized the market with its price/performance values, right now i think nVidia is more focused on getting the performance crown back at any cost.
i think the real question is if nVidia can PHYSICALLY make a card stronger than the 5970.
because as we've seen (or read), the 5970 pushes the envelope in power consumption. its right there on the edge of engineering bounderies with the ATX specifications.

can nVidia make a card more powerful but more power hungry than the 5970? so power hungry that it will break ATX specifications?

if we're going to rule out anything that beats the 5970, then why wait for Fermi at all? just to get an expensive card that doesn't beat ATI's flagship? that certainly wont induce any price drops on either side.

if i was looking to buy, i'd buy ATI now and be happy with its great performance.

 

[Dribble]

The parallels are pretty close.

8800GTX was 90nm, 480mm2 die size, 384bit memory bus. The 8800GT was 65nm, 256bit memory bus and arrived almost exactly 1 year later.

Hence as fermi is 40nm, 4-500mm2 die size, 384bit memory bus, the 8800GT fermi should be 28nm, 256bit memory bus and arrive in the first half of 2011.

Obviously the main factor in all this is the manufacturing process - when will firstly 32nm and then 28nm be available?

 

[StrangerGuy]

Radeon 5xxx prices are high? Even without Nvidia competing 5870 is still way cheaper than the days of 6800U/X800XT before inflation. Now THOSE were insanely expensive.

 

[poohbear]

i can't believe nvidia has the GTX285 priced for $390, when u can get a 5850 for $280. Are customers acutally that misinformed??? If ATI had a marketing department they can really do some damage to nvidia if they show how absurd the pricing is.

 

[Barfo]

i can't believe nvidia has the GTX285 priced for $390, when u can get a 5850 for $280. Are customers acutally that misinformed??? If ATI had a marketing department they can really do some damage to nvidia if they show how absurd the pricing is.

I know many people that call video cards "nvidia cards" and think a Geforce 6200 1GB is faster than a Radeon 4870 512MB so yeah, most people are misinformed and with nvidia having a reputation among those people I can see those GTX285s still selling.

 

[Seero]

the 8800GT revolutionized the market with its price/performance values, right now i think nVidia is more focused on getting the performance crown back at any cost.
i think the real question is if nVidia can PHYSICALLY make a card stronger than the 5970.
because as we've seen (or read), the 5970 pushes the envelope in power consumption. its right there on the edge of engineering bounderies with the ATX specifications.

can nVidia make a card more powerful but more power hungry than the 5970? so power hungry that it will break ATX specifications?

if we're going to rule out anything that beats the 5970, then why wait for Fermi at all? just to get an expensive card that doesn't beat ATI's flagship? that certainly wont induce any price drops on either side.

if i was looking to buy, i'd buy ATI now and be happy with its great performance.

I think Fermi is more interesting than just beating the HD 5xxx series. Video card has go through a long way from just a card that does text only. Shader count has got to a ridiculous level and I will say 50% of its horse power are not utilized. Fermi's parallel kernel execution is an very interesting idea and will revolutionize video card again if it works.

Cut the technical terms Fermi is a change from 1 core to 4 cores, which is exactly like a multi core CPU. From 1x10x24 to 4x4x32, breaking down 1 big compute unit to 4 smaller compute units that works independently, and each compute unit has its own polymorph engine. That sounds very interesting. Look at the article in anandtech about the architecture for a more detail explanation.

 

[crisium]

5000 series could only be considered overpriced compared to the 4000 series. Nvidia is still overpriced compared to the 5000. GTX 285 costs nearly as much as a 5870, how can anyone complain about ATi here? 5770 is $30+ cheaper than a GTX 260, and being slightly slower it fits well there. 5750 1GB prices are about the same as GTS 250 1GB prices, and many of those GTS 250s are the lower clocked "energy efficient" version. 5750 still uses less power and gets the performance advantage compared to these slower 250s.

What is overpriced here?

 

[Wreckage]

Fermi will be here next month.

GTX360 will be as fast or faster than a single chip 5870
GTX380 will be as fast or faster than the dual chip 5890
GTX380x2 in April? Faster than anything imaginable.

These are based on the rumors I read in and around CES.

Not just a doubling of hardware specs but a radically new architecture.

 

[crisium]

I think you are correct on the GTX 360 predictions, but I don't think the 380 will be quite at 5970 levels. Not if those FC2 numbers were being compared to a GTX 285.

 

[v8envy]

Fermi will be here next month.

GTX360 will be as fast or faster than a single chip 5870
GTX380 will be as fast or faster than the dual chip 5890
GTX380x2 in April? Faster than anything imaginable.

These are based on the rumors I read in and around CES.

Not just a doubling of hardware specs but a radically new architecture.

We'll see when it comes out.

My predictions, for current and "soon" games, not best case benchmarks:

GTX360 comparable to an overclocked GTX285 and sitting between the 5850 and 5870.
GTX380 sliding in between the 5870 and GTX295

The big deal of these cards is GPGPU, not video game performance. In fact I wouldn't be shocked to see these cards come in slower in current games than the available cards from both vendors -- especially if the 380 is released as a 448 core vs 512 core part. It's all down to what kind of yields NV is getting at what clocks.

I'd be happy to have availability of single GPU parts in April, never mind SLI-on-a-stick.

 

[Seero]

Fermi will be here next month.

GTX360 will be as fast or faster than a single chip 5870
GTX380 will be as fast or faster than the dual chip 5890
GTX380x2 in April? Faster than anything imaginable.

These are based on the rumors I read in and around CES.

Not just a doubling of hardware specs but a radically new architecture.

My source stated that Nvidia just got their cards back from the fab and are now working on the clock speed. Having a demo isn't the same as making a mass production. In short, no one knows the exact clock speed yet, and we still needs another 6-8 weeks before it will be released.

... The big deal of these cards is GPGPU, not video game performance. ...

False claim. Nvidia's rep saids that isn't the case.

 

[dguy6789]

Fermi will be here next month.

GTX360 will be as fast or faster than a single chip 5870
GTX380 will be as fast or faster than the dual chip 5890
GTX380x2 in April? Faster than anything imaginable.

These are based on the rumors I read in and around CES.

Not just a doubling of hardware specs but a radically new architecture.

I'd be interested in seeing any information that suggests the 5970 will lose to a single GPU Fermi that is even remotely believable.

There is no chance the GTX 380 will beat the 5970. The 5970 is two next(current) gen GPUs stuck together. Nvidia would have to increase performance by almost 300% on their GPU between Fermi and GT200 for that to be feasible. Nvidia has rarely managed to make their next gen GPUs 100% faster than the previous gen GPU, let alone 300%. Does anyone here expect the GTX 380 to be nearly four times as fast as the GTX 285? Anyone? Didn't think so.

The GTX 380 will in all likelihood be anywhere from 100% to 130% as fast as a Radeon HD 5870, maybe 150% in the very best rare cases Nvidia can come up with. The GTX 380 will more likely than not match GTX 295 performance for the most part.

A dual GPU fermi will be composed of two chips that are each slower than the GTX 360 because it would not fit into the thermal envelope otherwise. As a result of this, there is a very real chance that the dual GPU Fermi will not even beat the 5970.

 

[akugami]

Fermi will be here next month.

GTX360 will be as fast or faster than a single chip 5870
GTX380 will be as fast or faster than the dual chip 5890
GTX380x2 in April? Faster than anything imaginable.

These are based on the rumors I read in and around CES.

Not just a doubling of hardware specs but a radically new architecture.

Most rumors put Fermi being released at the end of March. I'd say that's pretty accurate judging by what various press and nVidia itself has hinted at.

As far as speed goes, most say that Fermi should be faster than the Radeon 5 series. The question is at what price. Most also say that Fermi will be expensive.

But a dual GPU Fermi at April? I have never read that anywhere. Care to state where you read it from? Only thing I've heard is late Q2 or early Q3 of 2010. Judging by the 40nm issues and the ramping of more 40nm parts (top to bottom ATI Radeon 5 series, new nVidia 40nm parts) as well as how expensive a dual GPU Fermi will be, it seems like this is not a part nVidia is rushing to get out and even if it does, it'll be a limited part at first.

A dual GPU Fermi will run into the same 300 watt limitations as the Radeon 5970. This will limit what speeds you can get from Fermi out of the box. Although much like the 5970, you should be able to easily overclock it provided your PSU can handle it. Essentially, the power boost, without overclocking, may not be as great as one would think.

 

[Munky]

Fermi will be here next month.

GTX360 will be as fast or faster than a single chip 5870
GTX380 will be as fast or faster than the dual chip 5890
GTX380x2 in April? Faster than anything imaginable.

These are based on the rumors I read in and around CES.

Not just a doubling of hardware specs but a radically new architecture.

Uh huh, whoever made up those rumors must have been on crack, and nowhere near seeing the actual performance.

 

[ScorcherDarkly]

A dual GPU fermi will be composed of two chips that are each slower than the GTX 360 because it would not fit into the thermal envelope otherwise. As a result of this, there is a very real chance that the dual GPU Fermi will not even beat the 5970.

I think a lot of people are missing this point. The 5970 is two 5870 chips, but both are downclocked to fit inside the ATX power specification. The 5870 is a power efficient chip. Fermi is not, from everything released about it to this point. That means the downclock on Fermi is going to have to be much much larger than the downclock on the 5970. As such, dual Fermi isn't going to be two fully functioning GTX380 chips, its going to be two neutered GTX 360 chips, or maybe two absolutely crippled 380 chips. For this reason, I think its possible that Fermi could be a generation where the only reason to buy a dual chip card is if you want to go Tri-SLi or higher.

 

[Wreckage]

I'd be interested in seeing any information that suggests the 5970 will lose to a single GPU Fermi that is even remotely believable.

Fermi is a new architecture. The 5xxx series is not and that's why the 5870 gets beat by an old GTX295. It's why the 5xxx series is not significantly faster than the GT2xx series. Probably why they lost marketshare last quarter.

Either way I'm just going by the information that came out in and around CES. Not my own personal feeling on the issue.

My source stated that Nvidia just got their cards back from the fab and are now working on the clock speed. Having a demo isn't the same as making a mass production. In short, no one knows the exact clock speed yet, and we still needs another 6-8 weeks before it will be released.

NVIDIA's CEO stated at CES that the cards are already in production.

 

[Munky]

I'm suspecting we won't see a dual-chip fermi until it's shrunk down half a node. Historically, whenever Nvidia made a huge gpu, a la g80 or gt200, it hasn't made a dual-gpu version on the same node.

 

[ScorcherDarkly]

Fermi is a new architecture. The 5xxx series is not and that's why the 5870 gets beat by an old GTX295. It's why the 5xxx series is not significantly faster than the GT2xx series. Probably why they lost marketshare last quarter.

The reason they (and Nvidia, I might add) lost market share last quarter was because Intel's crappy integrated graphics are everywhere. And you must have a different definition of 'significant' than everyone else. Or else you're just trying to tilt everything favorably towards Nvidia, like you normally do. "5xxx is faster, but it's not significantly faster so it doesn't matter." Right.

 

[TemjinGold]

Fermi is a new architecture. The 5xxx series is not and that's why the 5870 gets beat by an old GTX295. It's why the 5xxx series is not significantly faster than the GT2xx series. Probably why they lost marketshare last quarter.

Either way I'm just going by the information that came out in and around CES. Not my own personal feeling on the issue.


NVIDIA's CEO stated at CES that the cards are already in production.

LOL!

What may I ask then IS your personal feeling on the issue? That the GTX360 will beat 5970 CF?