New rumor about ATI Southern Islands

[tajoh111]

It might be fakes, it might not, but i tend to hope that they're real & be optimist, because that would keep the technology bandwagon moving forward & pushing the prices down one way or another. 229 US$ GTX 460 1 GB seems nice, but it would be nicer if there's a strong competitor from ATi (Bart based cards) that adds choices and perhaps knocks competitor price down a notch or two.

They are fakes or at the very least modified based on the evidence in this thread and other threads.

Keep prices down? AMD is selling whatever quantities it has of 5xxx. When the 6xxx gets released. There not going to be a lasting price drop on 5xxx products because they are going to be to or close to out of stock already.

If these scores are true, AMD will jack up the price of their card another 100 dollar up the line at the very least to reflect their performance increase. They are already selling out at their current prices. And there's nothings wrong with this, but AMD is not the saint of a company people make it out to be, nor is nvidia the devil.

But its going to be pretty scary for the consumer. 6870, 499 MSRP 600+street price. 6970 750MSRP 850+ dollar street price.

This is almost a certainty to happen in regards to pricing because these card are so underproduced and cards supply are so constrained that the consumer will pay way more than MSRP and along with the increased pricing, its going to be the most expensive generation of cards ever.

If this generation from AMD has taught us anything, supply can screw with the consumer just as much as any company.

The scary thing is if Nvidia doesn't have anything to respond with, which they won't unless they have something underwraps which is unlikely, the consumer is going to be overpaying till Nvidia get a new generation going. The worst part is a solution might not be in sight till perhaps even longer than 28nm considering how unscalable fermi seems at this point considering the size and performance for a new generation at this point. Considering Nvidia may be selling gtx 470-480 at cost, this is really bad for the consumer when a company has to sell a product below cost. It does horrible damage to a company as seen with AMD after the Core 2 duo generation.

[RPGWiZaRD]

Comes bundled with a copy of Duke Nukem Forever!

[Chumbucket843]

The scary thing is if Nvidia doesn't have anything to respond with, which they won't unless they have something underwraps which is unlikely, the consumer is going to be overpaying till Nvidia get a new generation going. The worst part is a solution might not be in sight till perhaps even longer than 28nm considering how unscalable fermi seems at this point considering the size and performance for a new generation at this point. Considering Nvidia may be selling gtx 470-480 at cost, this is really bad for the consumer when a company has to sell a product below cost. It does horrible damage to a company as seen with AMD after the Core 2 duo generation.

fermi is fine. almost every chip in the last 10 years has been designed for process scaling. i wouldnt be surprised if they could get a 1024sp fermi on 28nm. they may do an Si spin and get a considerable improvement on 40nm too. i think GTC will reveal what they are planning.

AMD's losses were not only from inferior products but buying ATi and the TLB bug fiasco. nvidia doesnt have those issues.

[tajoh111]

fermi is fine. almost every chip in the last 10 years has been designed for process scaling. i wouldnt be surprised if they could get a 1024sp fermi on 28nm. they may do an Si spin and get a considerable improvement on 40nm too. i think GTC will reveal what they are planning.

AMD's losses were not only from inferior products but buying ATi and the TLB bug fiasco. nvidia doesnt have those issues.

Whats to stop AMD from doubling up with SI or NI. If they can get more performance for less space, they will keep on getting better and better each generation.

Nvidia needs to get more performance out of the transistors they have and keep the size the same or lower. The simplest way to do this would be to up that shader clock if they can. It was originally rumors thought that this card was going to have a shader clock between 1600-2000mhz. If they can keep the core clock down while increasing the shader clock, this architecture will start to have legs.

The problem with this generation compared to the prior is that they removed the MUL operation which supposedly would not have a drop in performance(it was found in the gtx 280), however it actually did(or drivers still havent reached maturity). If the gtx 295 was clock like a fermi card, it would almost certainly be faster. Also the gtx 480 loses pretty soundly to SLI gtx 285. Per transister, fermi is worse than the gtx 280, which is pretty bad considering it is a new architecture.

The only thing I can think of to turn fermi around at this point is get the power down, up the shader clock and get those original TMU reenabled. Fermi needs 25% more performance at least to be considered a success and to justify its power consumption.

[Manicdan]

If the gtx 295 was clock like a fermi card, it would almost certainly be faster. Also the gtx 480 loses pretty soundly to SLI gtx 285. Per transister, fermi is worse than the gtx 280, which is pretty bad considering it is a new architecture.

this
nvidia is way behind in perf per mm2, and amd is about to get even better. if they continue to lead in perf per $, then gaming market share will continue to head toward them.

the 28nm race could change everything though

[Carfax]

this
nvidia is way behind in perf per mm2, and amd is about to get even better. if they continue to lead in perf per $, then gaming market share will continue to head toward them.

the 28nm race could change everything though

This is only relevant if you take Fermi as a gaming GPU.....which it isn't.

Fermi was designed for both HPC and gaming.. The HPC market is much more profitable than the high end gamer market (and from the benchmarks I've seen, Fermi decimates ATI in that area), so ATI leading in perf per mm2 isn't as important as you'd believe.

[Iconyu]

This is only relevant if you take Fermi as a gaming GPU.....which it isn't.

Fermi was designed for both HPC and gaming.. The HPC market is much more profitable than the high end gamer market (and from the benchmarks I've seen, Fermi decimates ATI in that area), so ATI leading in perf per mm2 isn't as important as you'd believe.

Does that same defence stand for the 460? It's bigger than the 5870... and designed with lobotomised HPC capabilities.

[Carfax]

Does that same defence stand for the 460? It's bigger than the 5870... and designed with lobotomised HPC capabilities.

Yes and no. The 460 is much more geared towards gaming than the 465/470/480, but it still has many HPC qualities that increase the size of the die.

Basically, none of the Fermi derived GPUs are purely gaming or HPC GPUs. Instead, they are hybrid processors.

[Manicdan]

This is only relevant if you take Fermi as a gaming GPU.....which it isn't.

Fermi was designed for both HPC and gaming.. The HPC market is much more profitable than the high end gamer market (and from the benchmarks I've seen, Fermi decimates ATI in that area), so ATI leading in perf per mm2 isn't as important as you'd believe.

perf per mm2 translates to price and profit.
if amd felt threatened, they would have lowered the price.

funny you bought 2 gpus that arnt even for gaming, lol

[Carfax]

perf per mm2 translates to price and profit.
if amd felt threatened, they would have lowered the price.

But as I said, the HPC market is far more profitable than the gamer market, so increasing the HPC capability of your GPU leads to more profit than just focusing on gaming only.

Just think, how much does a high end Quadro GPU cost? Thousands of dollars....for ONE!

Increasing the HPC and Scientific capability of their GPUs while retaining their ability to be used as primary gaming GPUs, is one of the best moves Nvidia has ever come up with.

Because of Fermi, Nvidia has strengthened it's hold on the HPC market, which like I said, is inherently much more profitable than the gaming market.....even though less GPUs are sold.

funny you bought 2 gpus that arnt even for gaming, lol

They are for gaming. I should have been more specific, but I thought I clarified in my following sentence:

Fermi was designed for both HPC and gaming

Fermi was designed for BOTH gaming and HPC, and as such, it's pretty amazing since they are the top performers in both areas.....at this time.

[spursindonesia]

They are fakes or at the very least modified based on the evidence in this thread and other threads.

Keep prices down? AMD is selling whatever quantities it has of 5xxx. When the 6xxx gets released. There not going to be a lasting price drop on 5xxx products because they are going to be to or close to out of stock already.

If these scores are true, AMD will jack up the price of their card another 100 dollar up the line at the very least to reflect their performance increase. They are already selling out at their current prices. And there's nothings wrong with this, but AMD is not the saint of a company people make it out to be, nor is nvidia the devil.

But its going to be pretty scary for the consumer. 6870, 499 MSRP 600+street price. 6970 750MSRP 850+ dollar street price.

This is almost a certainty to happen in regards to pricing because these card are so underproduced and cards supply are so constrained that the consumer will pay way more than MSRP and along with the increased pricing, its going to be the most expensive generation of cards ever.

If this generation from AMD has taught us anything, supply can screw with the consumer just as much as any company.

The scary thing is if Nvidia doesn't have anything to respond with, which they won't unless they have something underwraps which is unlikely, the consumer is going to be overpaying till Nvidia get a new generation going. The worst part is a solution might not be in sight till perhaps even longer than 28nm considering how unscalable fermi seems at this point considering the size and performance for a new generation at this point. Considering Nvidia may be selling gtx 470-480 at cost, this is really bad for the consumer when a company has to sell a product below cost. It does horrible damage to a company as seen with AMD after the Core 2 duo generation.

You have the right to doubt these rumours/leaks, take a negative perspective, and be a pessimist about it, no problem mate.

But IMHO, all these bad pricing situation in the past 4-5 Q has more factors affecting it rather than just ATi being greedy or wanting to maximize their profit in the short term. This situation is IMHO quite similar with A64 X2 s939 situation of yesteryears, where ATi is limited in supply, that even if they want to slash prices according to cost/profit calculation & expanding the omnipotent marketshare against Intel the behemoth, they still can't. Especially in the graphic card bussiness where market share is very important considering game developers inclination of optimising more to the market leader's mArch design, i think ATi will certainly jump into more sales to grab more market share if situation permitted.

Well, perhaps not like RV 670 & RV 770 experiences where they were quite desperate to maintain market share, not to mention expanding it, but the current situation is certainly not in the best interest for them especially in the long term, if they're not actually supply constrained. And then, you have to take account on materials price inflation, the higher price + low yielding TSMC 40 nm process, & the state of influx of US$ weakening. IMHO, if TSMC promise of significantly increasing their capacity in the 3rd Q 2010 comes true & can supply ATi's demand better, we'll see the situation of inflated ATi's card price abating in the next few Qs.

My .02 centz on it, regards.