Quote Originally Posted by Solus Corvus View Post
No, there is no hard line. Architectures are so complex that sometimes a small change in one part could result in a major improvement in performance, while major changes to another part might only make minimal difference. There isn't going to be any such hard definition and often it just depends on what the company wants to call a new generation.

Personally I would call 68xx an evolution of the evergreen generation, and did so shortly before launch based on the rumors. We will have to see about Cayman. But as we know, in computers as in biology, evolution is driven by small changes in successive generations (to twist the analogy a bit) .
I agree with most part of you comment, specially when you say 68xx is not new generation. Exactly as GF104 (GTX 460) was not a new generation, even tho it was smaller, cooler, and cheaper.

But we need to make awareness, by raising this question, and find a clear definition. Otherwise, these guys (AMD and nVidia both of them) are going to call these gray-zone evolution/improvements as new generation, and soon run out of new numbers too, LOL.

As you said, the details about upcoming high-end GPUs is still unclear, but I'm afraid they are going to mess it up just for the purpose of marketing (as other are suggesting over too). Whatever is behind it, it will make a lot of confusion, but I want to wait until I see them before jumping to conclusion.