Windows 7 AMD's Evergreen DX11 GPUs Set to Launch September 10: What to Expect at QuakeCon

[kemical]

Nvidia stays silent on Fermi delay Link Removed due to 404 Error Link Removed due to 404 Error Written by Link Removed due to 404 Error Tuesday, 09 March 2010 11:52

The most complex chip ever they claim
We asked quite a few Nvidia people why Fermi got delayed and each time we hit a wall. Nvidia's PR department didn't want to talk about what went wrong on the chip.

The only answer we ever got was that Fermi is the most complex chip that Nvidia ever made and that it takes huge amount of engineering to get such a complex chip out in the field. You need to read between the lines, a lot.

One can only imagine that some parts of the chip didn't work in A1 silicon, as it took Nvidia all the way to A3 to prepare it for launch. The launch should happen on the 26 in USA and 27th March in Europe, but we are not sure about the availability as we expect it to sell-out at the launch day.

We will try to dig out what went wrong, but obviously some part of chip didn’t work we only need to find out which one. The glitch was big enough to delay the launch for some six months.

This all remind us of ATI's R600 delay, when the card had problems with getting over 500MHz due to the faulty third party IP.

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[Highwayman]

And whats with the ATI price hikes this week??? as I posted in the graphics section... many E-Retailers are using shortages as excuse to bump up prices beyond reason...Amazon put mine up by £110 since yesterday!

 

[kemical]

Really? I hadn't noticed.... Crap, I want the price to go down not up! I just checked Overclockers and it's seems prices are still around the same but as you say I did hear of a warning about price rises. The fermi is not helping either especially if it's gonna be priced around £400-450..

 

[Highwayman]

Even now if you check whats in stock at overclockers...its not the cheap end of the scale...last i looked was the £250+ in stock all the normal priced 220-230 ones sold out

 

[kemical]

I know what you mean.. The 5870's are the same, all the cheap ones are out of stock. Damn I'm getting tired of waiting for this price drop... Even a small drop in price and I'd probably go for it but I guess all this waiting means I can save up for other stuff.

 

[kemical]

GT470 first look with translation:

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[kemical]

Dual Geforce 400 to come later Link Removed due to 404 Error Link Removed due to 404 Error Written by Link Removed due to 404 Error Thursday, 11 March 2010 13:59

Fermi dual in a few months, at the earliest
It looks like dual Fermi won’t be coming anytime soon. A few partners have said that at this time they are not aware that there will be a dual Fermi card and if Nvidia decides to make one, it won't be close to March 27th's single GF100 launch.

Dual Fermi can be expected hopefully towards the end of Q2 2010 and the high thermal dissipation and complexity of cards are few reasons for this postponement. Nvidia would definitely like to have dual cards out, but it might take a little while before it happens.

A good news is that mainstream and entry level Fermi versions should be coming this summer, slightly delayed from its original plan, but for the Dual card, it’s not certain when should it happen. Nvidia is not telling much to us or its partners either.

So in the next few months we guess that Radeon HD 5970 will remain the fastest card around and this is not something that Nvidia and its fearsome Jensen likes. You can be sure that Nvidia is not at all thrilled for this delay, but everything related to Fermi looks quite delayed and definitely doesn't sound like a walk in the park, but apparently it's possible.

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[kemical]

Inno3D GeForce GTX 480 cards ready to ship



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Won't be long now......

 

[cybercore]

Very intriguing, and so are all the 27 pages that we have posted here.





(Nvidia details next graphics chip, codenamed 'GF100' -- Joystiq)

 

[kemical]

SemiAccurate wrong about Nvidia 480GTX power use

GDC 2010 Officially raised 50W, OEMs livid

by Charlie Demerjian

March 12, 2010

Link Removed due to 404 ErrorIF YOU WANT to learn about Nvidia's Tesla and GTX480 cards at GDC, don't ask Nvidia, it has problems with the truth. The real story is found with the users, and they have interesting things to say about the upcoming card's upward bound TDP.
If you recall, the official story is that the card, in it's cut down and underclocked version, pulls 225W. That number, along with stunningly poor performance, has lead to some notable backpedaling. If that isn't bad enough, some sources at GDC told SemiAccurate that Nvidia jacked up the TDP by 50W last week without warning.
We will be the first to admit we were wrong about the TDPs of the cards. At CES we said the GTX480s shown there were pulling 280W, something Nvidia vehemently denied. Engineers beavering away at the things Dear Leader thinks are important, like the style of the wheels on his Ferrari, have been pulled off to work on cards for some unfathomable reason. Working hard, they have managed to reduce the TDP of the cards 5W to 275W. Yeah, Nvidia finally admitted that the card is the burning pig anyone who has used one knows it is.
There are two problems here, one internal and one external. The internal one is that this is a big flag saying Nvidia admits defeat and has no hope of fixing the problems that plague the chip. Nvidia can't get the power to a reasonable level, and that is the end of it. The only way to get numbers of chips to salable quantities is to jack power through the roof to mask the broken architecture, so that is what it is doing.
More problematic is what about the OEMs? Officially raising the TDP three weeks before launch by a very substantial 50W is massively stupid. Nvidia just can't do this to OEMs without causing them lots of pain. For high end desktops with lots of space, that can be worked around, but if the system is a little closer to the edge, 20+ percent more TDP can have a profound and negative effect on cooling.
Even worse, think about all the companies that make Fermi based Tesla cards. If you put four in a system, and Nvidia jacks TDP 50W per card, that is 200W more you have to dissipate. Three weeks before launch, your cases are built and in a warehouse, your cooling system is finished, and you don't have time to change things, much less test them. 200W is a lot in a 2U server case. 21 of these in a 42U rack is an added 4.2kW that you need to dissipate, roughly 3 hair dryers on full blast.
Then there are the laptops. I feel bad for those guys, first Link Removed, now this. There is no way you can redesign a laptop cooling system in six months, much less three weeks. Silly ODMs, no cookie, but you will probably be blamed by Nvidia PR for 'Link Removed' so badly.
In the end, Fermi is turning into a running bad joke. You have to wonder about how many high margin orders will be shown the door when word of this leaks out. Nvidia might be "Oak Ridged" a few more times yet.S|A

SemiAccurate :: SemiAccurate wrong about Nvidia 480GTX power use

 

[kemical]

XFX HD 5850 Black Edition tested

XFX was working hard to bring AMD cards to the market while waiting for Nvidia’s Fermi. They launched a bunch of AMD Direct X 11 cards starting from the smallest and cheapest HD 5450 which will costs you €35 all the way up to the currently priciest HD 5970, for the price of which you can get as many as fifteen HD 5450 cards. But, XFX is mainly known for their overclocking business, and they’re always among the first to jump aboard the overclocking train. XFX took only the creme of the crop Cypress LE chips and created its HD 5850 Black Edition series of cards. Of course, Black Edition naming scheme says that the card comes overclocked.

The HD 5850 Black Edition’s core is up from reference 725MHz to 765MHz, and the memory up from 1000MHz (effective 4000MHz) to 1125MHz (effective 4500MHz). So the card's GPU is some 5.5% faster than reference, whereas the memory is 12.5% faster than reference.

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[kemical]

Geforce GTX 480 aims for €450 price Link Removed due to 404 Error Link Removed due to 404 Error Written by Link Removed due to 404 Error Monday, 15 March 2010 10:15

Shops might go higher

It is quite natural that the most famous and yet delayed chip called Fermi won’t be cheap but it turns out that it won't be that expensive either.
People have expected single GPU Geforce GTX 480 to end up at close to $600 or €600 in Europe after tax but it turns out that the amount Nvidia wants for its new high end card should be closer to €450.

Note that high demand might easily make shops push this price even further but Nvidia's suggested retail price should end up around €450 including VAT. Higher prices will be reserved for some dual card that is supposed to come in the next few months.

Since most available Radeon 5870 cards are selling at €375 and higher, we believe that Nvidia's price is quite OK, and some partners have told us that Nvidia might have plenty of cards to launch on the 27th.

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[kemical]

Fermi boxes are ready Link Removed due to 404 Error Link Removed due to 404 Error Written by Link Removed due to 404 Error Monday, 15 March 2010 14:35

But still empty

Last few days the Internet was flooded with a bunch of pictures of GTX 480/470 boxes but you should know that although partners have made those, they are still empty.

Quite a few boxes have appeared online including Palit's, Galaxy's, EVGA's and some others, but according to our info, all of those boxes are still empty as Nvidia still didn't ship GF100 based cards to its partners. Partners did get one or two samples just so they know what to expect when the full batch comes.

According to a couple of our sources close to Nvidia, cards should hopefully be in partners' hands next week, and this is another delay that Nvidia played in last six months. We already wrote that the cards pictured during Cebit might not be the final design, and although we suspect this is the reason for the delay, we can't confirm it as Nvidia is still trying to hide as much info as it is possible.

In any case, the 26th is pretty close, and partners should hopefully start to fill those boxes as of next week. Until then we can look at those cardboard boxes and pretend that they are full.

You can find some box pictures over at TechPowerUp forums here.

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[cybercore]

Hopefully by the end of this year ...

 

[Highwayman]

Since most available Radeon 5870 cards are selling at €375 and higher

Makes me even happier that I got a Powercolor 5870 for £235 (258 Euros roughly) , although I see Amazon got some Sapphire ones on pre-orders for £267 if peeps are quick.

 

[kemical]

I just ordered mine yesterday..

Powercolor ATI Radeon HD 5870 "Dirt 2 Edition" 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card [AX5870 1GBD5-MDHG] Graphics and Video ATI HD 5870 Series

 

[kemical]

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GeForce GTX 480 has 480 cores, AIBs confirm

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The saga called "Fermi" is slowly but certainly, coming to its peak. The long-delayed NV100 architecture and its first GPU, GF100 i.e. GeForce Fermi 100 will debut on Friday, March 26th at 6PM Eastern Time. We expect to see the unveiling of articles that will reveal all the details behind this architecture. If everything remains the same, there should be a review on these pages as well.

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nVidia's GF100 block diagram was clear what hides inside those three billion transistors

However, it was only last night when we were finally confirmed the reason for renaming the parts from GeForce GTX 370 and GTX 380 into GTX 470 and GTX 480 series. When nVidia introduced their GF100 chip, the company claimed the part comes with 512 cores, 64 Texture units and 384-bit memory controller. However, due to problematic yields for 40nm process for both AMD and nVidia, the number of 512-core parts is quite limited. In fact, it is limited to the point where only Tesla C2070 [coming in 3Q 2010] and top-end Quadro board, the "FX 5900" should feature 512 cores [Tesla is announced, Quadro is not]. If our multiple sources are to believe, GeForce GTX 480 is set to debut with 480 shader cores, a number that will certainly curb a lot of enthusiasm for the part.

Then again, bear in mind that even with 480 cores, performance of GTX 470 and GTX 480 got AMD to the point where "HD 5890" is being prepared to undercut nVidia's prices, while AIBs got the green light to Link RemovedLink Removed, a dual GPU part that is making sure AMD keeps the GPU performance crown - at least until dual-Fermi board debuts.

Also, we received news about targeted prices for the parts, and they look quite competitive against six-month old ATI 5800 Series: according to the benchmarks leaked some time ago, GeForce GTX 470 will beat out HD 5850 and in some cases, even HD 5870 - for the price of HD 5850 - we were told that the ballpark figure is $299-349, while GTX 480 will run between $449-499.

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Leaked images of GTX 470 and GTX 480 from CeBIT 2010

The specs are again, quite interesting as GTX 470 comes with 448 cores and 320-bit memory interface [1.28GB GDDR5], while GTX 480 features 480 cores, full 384-bit memory interface and 1.54 GB of GDDR5 memory. Once that supply constraint ends, we might even see "64-bit OS only" versions with 2.56GB and 3GB of GDDR5 versions of GTX 470 and 480. For now, the only company with "64-bit OS only" boards will be AMD with the afore mentioned Dual-Cypress "5990" parts that feature 4GB of GDDR5 memory.

At the end of the day, the shroud of secrecy that company raised around their walls only lead to the lack of trust on the side of their partners. In fact, during CeBIT one of executives even told us that this is slowly starting to turn into 3dfx while Alex Leupp was in charge. The reference was clear - Alex Leupp became CEO of 3Dfx and just like John Sculley at Apple Computer, made several moves which ultimately, ran the company into the ground. In case of 3Dfx, purchase of STB resulted in destroying the AIB ecosystem around Voodoo and created nVidia's ecosystem with RivaTNT, TNT2, TNT2 and GeForce 256.

nVidia tightened the grip around the GeForce GTX 400 series to the point of openly telling their AIB partner that nVidia does not trust them. We got numerous complaints from AIBs during CeBIT show in Hannover and a sharp warning that one or two might fold during 2010. We also heard that nVidia will sample press directly with AIB-branded products - a move that is a verbatim copy of what AMD started doing few years back. Back in 2006, ATI started to sample press with retail branded boxes featured ATI GPUs, with the 3850, continuing with 3870, 4800 and so on. Now, nVidia is continuing AMD's tradition, even though we're not certain it is for the best.

We wonder what's the next step for nVidia - purchasing Flextronics and becoming and AIB all on its own? Given the continuous string of limitations to existing manufacturers, we would not be surprised if the company is even contemplating such a move. After all, that is one of reasons why Intel's revenues are so high is the fact that Intel sells Intel motherboards, Intel workstation and server chassis, Intel NAS and many more.

Then again, Intel has multiple ASICs - processors, chipsets, controllers etc. nVidia only has two: a SoC and a GPU. Is that enough to act in the same way? Only time will tell.

GeForce GTX 480 has 480 cores, AIBs confirm - Bright Side Of News*

 

[Highwayman]

so £232 upper range for the 470gtx and £331 for the 480GTX hich is almost identical price points to current 5850s and 5870s....very interesting...that said with all the cockups Nvidias already made in developing this chipset and all the lies or amendments to the specs can we really trust them till its actually in the shops?

 

[kemical]

Well you know as well as I do that Nvidia will be talking this release 'up' big time but as you say the proof will eventually out...

 

[kemical]

Geforce GTX 470 to cost €349 Link Removed due to 404 Error Link Removed due to 404 Error Written by Link Removed due to 404 Error Tuesday, 16 March 2010 10:17

£299 in the UK

We managed to get some additional prices of upcoming Fermi-based cards and the slower of two will sell for €349 or £299 in the UK market.

The plan is to attack the Radeon HD 5870, which is currently selling at roughly the same or a very similar price, as Geforce GTX 470 should end up at least slightly faster in most benchmarks.

We would not be surprised to see ATI dropping Radeon HD 5870 price further down, but this is yet to happen. Bear in mind that ATI increased HD 5850 prices a few weeks following the launch, so it clearly has some room to tweak the prices.

Of course, these are Nvidia’s recommended prices and they include taxes, distributor, partner costs and the shop’s part of the financial cake. However, as we warned you yesterday, the shops might increase the price if they feel like that the product will see huge demand and if it sells great.

This is the price to hope for on launch day, March 27th in Europe and March 26th in the US, but only if Nvidia sticks to what it said in its announcement.

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