NV4x - The death blow to P4?

[MadRat]

NVIDIA's Jen-Hsun Talks NV4x

Presumably speaking about NV40 specifically, Jen-Hsun, NVIDIA's CEO states that "if we're not a lot more than 2 times faster I'm going to be very disappointed".

Full DirectX 9.0c compatibility. 130nm manufacturing process for the GPU for its 175 million transistors. Core speeds up to 600MHz. Memory speeds up to 1600MHz effective using 256-bit GDDR-3.

Real-time encoding and decoding of MPEG 1.x, 2.x, and 4.x, plus WMV9 decode support. So this is what Jen-Hsun meant when he said he was looking forward to competing head to head with Intel next year. Well, next year is finally here!

For HDTV, Nvidia claims Transport stream handling, HDTV output (720p, 1080p, 480p CGMS) and HDCP - High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection as well as HDMI High-Definition Multimedia Interface support.

NV40 = native AGP8X
NV41 = native AGP8X to PCI-Express X16 via onboard PCI-Express Bridge chip
NV45 = native PCI-Express X16

PCI Express Bridge, to go from AGP8X signal to PCI-Express X16, for the near term conversion to PCI-Express.

If this is such a hot video encoding chip, will there be a need for the "strengths" of the P4 anymore?

 

[Dman877]

P4 still bests AMD in other areas, rendering was one, mp3 encoding... some others I'm sure. Hopefully the next P4 after the prescot will be a step forward instead of sideways for them though.

 

[EeyoreX]

This hardly sounds like a "death blow" for the P4. A powerfull GPU won't "kill" any CPU. You can run a computer headless without a local GPU at all. You can't run one without a CPU. And as was mentioned, the P4 is strong in areas other than only video.

\Dan

 

[NFactor]

Nothing will ever be a death blow for the Pentium 4 besides the Pentium 5.

Besides that, it would be very impressive if the NV40's held these capabilities. If they deliver on their promises NVIDIA may have a hand which may beat ATI this round.

 

[Pocatello]

Surely Dell will switch to AMD when Michael Dell read about this

 

[MadRat]

Originally posted by: Dman877
P4 still bests AMD in other areas, rendering was one, mp3 encoding... some others I'm sure. Hopefully the next P4 after the prescot will be a step forward instead of sideways for them though.

I don't remember mentioning AMD. Must have slipped in the topic somewhere.

 

[Acanthus]

Originally posted by: MadRat

Originally posted by: Dman877
P4 still bests AMD in other areas, rendering was one, mp3 encoding... some others I'm sure. Hopefully the next P4 after the prescot will be a step forward instead of sideways for them though.

I don't remember mentioning AMD. Must have slipped in the topic somewhere.

Oh so you were planning on replacing your pentium 4 with a VIA C3 because the encoding would be up to par if the graphics card did it all. I see.

No one should buy a P4.

 

[Slogun]

Anybody want to buy my P4 2.6C cheap? With this news I think I'll pull out my ole PII 233MHz from my scrap box.

No need for my 3.3GHz overclock any more

Hey, think I will get good playability on Doom III and HL2?

Sorry MadRat, that thread headline was just too much of a come-on.

 

[andreasl]

Real-time encoding will hardly kill the P4 because those who buy a P4 to do encoding does it for FASTER than real-time. Even an Athlon XP can do real-time encoding (25-30fps) depending on the codec.

 

[labrat25]

most of the time the CPU and GPU are doing different tasks most of the time

 

[apoppin]

The ONLY thing that will be affected by the NV40's performance is the R420.

And nvidia made IDENTICAL claims about their DustBuster . . . (although the NV40 should be really nice . . . really)

(it's call hype and marketing)

And what does a GPU have to do with a "deathblow"to a CPU?

(and should AMD also be worried?

 

[txxxx]

When did the NV40 cook, clean, and crunch seti units?

 

[Vernor]

When they say 'MPEG 4 decoding', they never mean Xvid or Divx - do they ?

 

[MadRat]

Why would anyone need a Prescott when the 2MB L2 caches of the Pentium M could be coming to desktop due to pressure from the large OEM's!? Evidently Carly's bunch is enamoured with the Pentium M to the tune of demanding blade servers be rushed to market sooner than Intel was looking to do. Intel may have to plug in some 64-bit support in them at HP's request, too. Its all speculation anymore as my old friend at HP was suddenly given the axe this last week in Omaha. Looks like they've canned around 600 desktop builders and they plan to close the doors on the local distribution warehouse, too.

Originally posted by: Vernor
When they say 'MPEG 4 decoding', they never mean Xvid or Divx - do they ?

If the engine is programmable then perhaps they could. The driver would need to be either third party or the maker would have to pay royalties. None of the decent compression formats ever seem to come for free. Luckily for us the decoding aspects of the codec formats have largely had free versions available.

If dvdshrink is recoded for the NV4x then there is no need for all these old 1GHz machines to upgrade to the Prescott.

 

[Dman877]

Originally posted by: MadRat

Originally posted by: Dman877
P4 still bests AMD in other areas, rendering was one, mp3 encoding... some others I'm sure. Hopefully the next P4 after the prescot will be a step forward instead of sideways for them though.

I don't remember mentioning AMD. Must have slipped in the topic somewhere.

Sooooo if you aren't using a P4 what are using for a cpu? A video encoder can't run an OS...

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: Dman877

Originally posted by: MadRat

Originally posted by: Dman877
P4 still bests AMD in other areas, rendering was one, mp3 encoding... some others I'm sure. Hopefully the next P4 after the prescot will be a step forward instead of sideways for them though.

I don't remember mentioning AMD. Must have slipped in the topic somewhere.

Sooooo if you aren't using a P4 what are using for a cpu? A video encoder can't run an OS...

I think he meant it was likely to allow many users of older pcs, from having to update to a faster P4 or as well Atlhon xp/ 64 system....This foresight is limited in thinking that this is the only use ppl use their pcs for. When in actuality it is not the majority who do this sort of thing anways....I imagine the price will be a pretty penny for that much bells and whistles


MOst of what comes out of nvidia is hype and crap.....I call BS until I see it....I also wonder what other factors may come into play making the claims of older systems not quite accurate...OS requirement???

For the person wondering about Divx I wouldn't count on it...To the world of the developers Divx is a hacked mpeg4, and thus well get limited support....

What the hell are you mentioning dvdshrink for???? I can already dvdshrink a movie with deep analysis and 60% compression in 1/7th the time of the movie...real time doesn't seem like much of an advanatge there...PLus this is extremely IO limited and does not depened much on the cpu as it is often starved for data to run it at the speeds I run it at...It would be amzing if my dvd rom and HDD could actually allow the cpu to run at 100% load....

 

[MadRat]

Aaaaaaaa, DVDshrink? I'm not using DVDshrink for anything.... <looks side to side>

I meant the freeware of tmpgenc. Must of been still ripping the kids movie when I typed that. hehe

 

[JellyBaby]

You still need a P4 to make the internet go really fast.

 

[spclwpns]

Jen-Hsun, NVIDIA's CEO states that "if we're not a lot more than 2 times faster I'm going to be very disappointed".

Well, Mr. Jen-Hsun has been disappointed before, as well as we the buying public with their last product offering.

My question is going to be when is Mr. Jen-Hsun going to step up to the plate and produce ANYTHING close to what he refers to.....

This IS Mr. Jen-Hsun's true challange

 

[BFG10K]

I don't remember mentioning AMD. Must have slipped in the topic somewhere. :

If AMD processors are the same as P4s then it would mean their death blow too. If not then a comparison is in order to keep things in context.

 

[MadRat]

Originally posted by: BFG10K

I don't remember mentioning AMD. Must have slipped in the topic somewhere. :

If AMD processors are the same as P4s then it would mean their death blow too. If not then a comparison is in order to keep things in context.

I don't remember Intel being tied to P4's.

 

[InlineFive]

Originally posted by: BFG10K

I don't remember mentioning AMD. Must have slipped in the topic somewhere. :

If AMD processors are the same as P4s then it would mean their death blow too. If not then a comparison is in order to keep things in context.

Except that Intel is getting wooped so bad that Michael Dell is stepping down so he won't be blamed for profit losses.

 

[MadRat]

Intel has some real kick ass technology that they tell the market it does not want, yet there are signs that it is wanted. The P4 sells for being raw MHz, which in one point of time was king. Well, if the damn Celeron could go 4GHz then nobody that shops for raw MHz would care if its not the whole P4. People in reality have pretty well given up on raw MHz and the word on the market is even the cheap crap is F-A-S-T. People still appreciate silence from their PC's and Intel has the Pentium M that the world would love to have in the desktop, even with its roughly $300 "Intel tax" added that they're commanding. Well, we now have the Prescott slowly replacing the Northwood cores in the market, and this is going to force customers to work with larger fans and potentially more noise.

NV40 offers people with the older equipment to forgoe the P4 progression and head back to where their spirit leads them.

 

[dexvx]

Originally posted by: MadRat

The P4 sells for being raw MHz, which in one point of time was king. Well, if the damn Celeron could go 4GHz then nobody that shops for raw MHz would care if its not the whole P4. People in reality have pretty well given up on raw MHz and the word on the market is even the cheap crap is F-A-S-T.

No, thats the fanboi thinking about how regular people think.

Go to BestBuy, Frys, CompUSA. People avoid the celeron in even mid-range systems like the plague. They have been ever since teh Celeron was launched. They dont know whats wrong with it, but their perception is that the flagship Pentium 4 is superior for whatever reason.

Look at eBay. Pentium 3 Coppermine sells for several times that of a Coppermine Celeron. Pentium4's sell for several times that of a Pentium4 Celeron. AthlonXP/ThunderBird sells for more than Duron.

Mhz is *not* the only thing what the average joe looks at. Its what some enthusiasts think of what the average joe looks at.

 

[CZroe]

Originally posted by: MadRat
NVIDIA's Jen-Hsun Talks NV4x

Presumably speaking about NV40 specifically, Jen-Hsun, NVIDIA's CEO states that "if we're not a lot more than 2 times faster I'm going to be very disappointed".

Full DirectX 9.0c compatibility. 130nm manufacturing process for the GPU for its 175 million transistors. Core speeds up to 600MHz. Memory speeds up to 1600MHz effective using 256-bit GDDR-3.

Real-time encoding and decoding of MPEG 1.x, 2.x, and 4.x, plus WMV9 decode support. So this is what Jen-Hsun meant when he said he was looking forward to competing head to head with Intel next year. Well, next year is finally here!

For HDTV, Nvidia claims Transport stream handling, HDTV output (720p, 1080p, 480p CGMS) and HDCP - High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection as well as HDMI High-Definition Multimedia Interface support.

NV40 = native AGP8X
NV41 = native AGP8X to PCI-Express X16 via onboard PCI-Express Bridge chip
NV45 = native PCI-Express X16

PCI Express Bridge, to go from AGP8X signal to PCI-Express X16, for the near term conversion to PCI-Express.

If this is such a hot video encoding chip, will there be a need for the "strengths" of the P4 anymore?

This has got to go in my HTPC

I could have a quiet HTPC that still encodes media in real-time