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Why so FREAKIN' big...?

Anomaly1964

Anomaly1964

Platinum Member
In this day and age where technology is making everything SMALLER, why are video cards getting BIGGER AND BIGGER?
 
You're not comparing apples to apples. The same processing power of a massive card from five years ago would probably fit in a low-profile passively-cooled card today.
 
slash196 said:
You're not comparing apples to apples. The same processing power of a massive card from five years ago would probably fit in a low-profile passively-cooled card today.
Click to expand...

You could probably get the power of a Vidcard 4-6 generations ago into a small USB flash drive. Connecting it would be an issue though.

OP is definitely not considering the vast improvements in GPU capabilities.
 
Anomaly1964 said:
In this day and age where technology is making everything SMALLER, why are video cards getting BIGGER AND BIGGER?
Click to expand...

It is simply a matter of tradeoffs.

Design cost + manufacturing cost versus time-to-market, reliability, density (size), etc.

To be sure they could design cards that are 1/2 the size without sacrificing 1% of the performance...but are you ready to pay 2-3x more for the product?

It is called many things - the Project Triangle, the Project management triangle, the triple constraint - and basically it is meant to communicate the fact that you have basically three options but you can only have two of the three come true.

You can have the product developed fast (fast time to market) and cheap (low quality)...or fast and good (but expensive)...or cheap and good (but it will take a long time to develop).

320px-Project-triangle.svg.png
 
Idontcare said:
It is simply a matter of tradeoffs.

Design cost + manufacturing cost versus time-to-market, reliability, density (size), etc.

To be sure they could design cards that are 1/2 the size without sacrificing 1% of the performance...but are you ready to pay 2-3x more for the product?

It is called many things - the Project Triangle, the Project management triangle, the triple constraint - and basically it is meant to communicate the fact that you have basically three options but you can only have two of the three come true.

You can have the product developed fast (fast time to market) and cheap (low quality)...or fast and good (but expensive)...or cheap and good (but it will take a long time to develop).

320px-Project-triangle.svg.png
Click to expand...

Great post and diagram.
 
If size of the video card wasn't limited, how powerful and cheap could a GPU be made with today's technology? In other words, if we could all fit 15" cards or if they made cards double thickness. Current cards are what, 1.5" thick, and what if every gamer's mobo and case had room for a 3" by 10.5" card? Or, hell, screw that, what if cases could hold both the motherboard, and a GPU the same size as a motherboard? Think 2 motherboards 2 inches apart connected with I don't know what we'd call it but it would have of course more bandwidth than PCI-E, except one of them isn't a motherboard, it's just a 12" by 8.5" GPU that looks like a second motherboard...lol...

The CPU and RAM etc on the mobo and the GPU chips on the mobo sized GPU would all be facing in different directions, naturally..
 
Simply because video cards are for desktops so there is no reason to make them smaller. More and more features are being integrated into the motherboard so all of those slots are going empty, why not use them for bigger coolers or extra video cards?
Sure there are htpcs, but they have half height cards for those already .
 
They are getting bigger but not bigger.
For example, my HD6850 is smaller than my HD4850 (although it's a dual slot card, but has better cooling for that), but physically the PCB is smaller, so it fits in my case more easily, but it's also a faster card.

So while at the high end the size gets bigger, and the cards also get faster, when you move down, you get both faster cards AND they are smaller.
 
Idontcare said:
You can have the product developed fast (fast time to market) and cheap (low quality)...or fast and good (but expensive)...or cheap and good (but it will take a long time to develop).

320px-Project-triangle.svg.png
Click to expand...

That same diagram also applies to food! (though probably better replace 'cheap' with 'healthy').
 
sorry, we're going to disney, she'll be incommunicado for a week or so. at least we were until I found out about these "extracurricular activities" of hers...
 
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