Tomorrow, AMD will release its much talked about next-generation Radeon HD 6800 series graphics cards, to reinvigorate the company's competitiveness in a price-segment both it and NVIDIA regard as "the gamer's sweet-spot" price segment, which spans between $189 and $249, offering performance levels very close to enthusiast-grade products. To put it in perspective, you should be able to play any DirectX 11 game at 1920 x 1080 (full-HD) resolution with medium-to-high level of detail. Currently, NVIDIA holds the upper hand in this segment with its GTX 460-768 MB and GTX 460-1 GB, which is exactly what Radeon HD 6850 and Radeon HD 6870 seem to be after, with the HD 6870 also holding the potential to disturb higher-end SKUs that are currently priced around the $299 mark.

With no new SKU for this segment in sight, NVIDIA's immediate reaction is reportedly that of introducing "fairly big" price-cuts on the GeForce GTX 460 duo, the company also plans to cut prices of the high-end GeForce GTX 470. To what extant exactly these price cuts would go is not known, but they will be put into effect either today, or tomorrow. Meanwhile, sources close to AMD told us that in response to this development, the red-team will fine-tune the final pricing of the Radeon HD 6800 series, to step up pressure on the competition. We expect as much as $20 to be cut on the currently expected prices of the Radeon HD 6800 series pair.Update (10/21; 20:50 IST): NVIDIA sent us a circular about revised pricing of certain GeForce products. Details follow.

NVIDIA today introduced the NVIDIA GeForce 400M series of graphics processing units (GPUs) -- the building blocks for the next-generation of NVIDIA Optimus and NVIDIA 3D Vision notebooks that are coming onto the market from leading vendors, including Acer, Asus, Dell, Lenovo, Samsung and Toshiba, with others set to announce soon.

A critical component of the GeForce 400M Series is support for NVIDIA Optimus technology, which enables extra-long battery life by automatically switching on and off the GPU so that it runs only when needed. It has been described by reviewers as among the most important notebook technologies to come to market in recent years.

Swiftech released a pair of hybrid cooling solutions for the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 480, GTX 470 and GTX 465 graphics cards, that are aimed to provide better cooling compared to full-coverage water blocks. The principle revolves around treating the GPU as a separate thermal zone from the rest of the card, so that water-cooling can focus on cooling the GPU, while heat from the GPU isn't transferred to the rest of the relatively cooler heat producing parts (such as memory chips, VRM FETs, etc.). Swiftech's offer includes MCW-GTX480 and MCW-GTX470 (which should be compatible with GTX 465 reference design, too). These consist of the MCW80 GPU water block that's designed to handle the thermal loads of GF100, and a full-coverage aluminum heatsink that covers all critical heat-producing areas on the PCB, including the memory chips and the VRM. The heatsink is further designed such that the user can mount an 80 mm fan onto it, for even higher cooling performance. The sets are priced lower than most full-coverage water-blocks, the MCW80-GTX480 is priced at $99.95, while the MCW80-GTX470 goes for $98.95.

GIGABYTE, a leading manufacturer of motherboards and graphics cards, introduces a powerful new addition to its Super Overclock Series: GTX 470 SOC (GV-N470SO-13I). To qualify for Super Overclock Series, a GPU must go through GIGABYTE's innovative GPU Gauntlet Sorting process and it must be equipped with Ultra Durable VGA or VGA+ boards. Designed specifically for overclocking competition and gaming battle, GIGABYTE's secret weapon GTX 470 Super Overclock Edition is built with NVDIA GeForce GTX 470 GPU.

Based on 40nm processor and advanced GDDR5 memory technology, the powerful new GPU consists of ground-breaking features including Microsoft DirectX 11 and NVIDIA PhysX which leads to incredibly immersive HD gaming experience and unrivaled performance. GV-N470SO-13I also features WINDFORCE 3X, 14 phase PWM design, OC Guru graphic card smart tuner and voltage read point.

Sparkle Computer announced a pair of new graphics cards based on the GeForce GTX 470 and GeForce GTX 465 graphics processors, and sporting Sparkle's own design as far as the cooler goes. The SXX4701280D5-NM (GTX 470) and SXX4651024D5-NM (GTX 465) feature a GPU cooler that makes use of a dense aluminum fin array to which heat is conveyed by five copper heat pipes, and cooled by an 80 mm fan. With this cooler, Sparkle claims to have brought down temperatures by 4 °C on the GTX 470, and 5 °C on the GTX 465. Both cards retain NVIDIA's reference design PCB, except for that it is blue in color. Both models stick to reference NVIDIA clock speeds and other specifications. Sparkle did not give out a price, though one can expect these to be priced just a little over the reference design cards.

Acer, the world's second largest vendor in the PC market, today announced its newest Acer Aspire "Predator" gaming desktop PC is armed for combat and ready to do battle in the U.S. A force to be reckoned with, the power-packed AG7750-U2222 gaming rig harnesses the pinnacle of processor, graphics and memory technologies for conquering the fiercest opponents.

Taking bold style and performance to a killer level, the Aspire Predator is designed for avid gamers with a "take no prisoners" attitude. It's a monster machine outfitted with plenty of ammo, including Intel Core i7 quad-core processors, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 470 graphics with 3-way SLI support and a whopping 12GB DDR3 memory for blowing away the competition.

MSI, the world's leading graphics card and mainboard manufacturer, today launches two of its latest graphics cards, N470GTX and N465GTX Twin Frozr II which are based on MSI's unique Twin Frozr II thermal design. MSI also revealed its limited N465GTX Twin Frozr II golden edition graphics card which adopts the full copper design. The cards are powered by NVIDIA's advanced GeForce GTX 400 GPU and support NVIDIA technologies such as 3D Vision Surround, PhysX and CUDA etc and boast MSI's Twin Frozr II thermal design. As compared to the reference graphics cards, MSI's latest offerings show a reduction in noise by 21.5dB and heat by 16℃ in full load, making them the industry's most outstanding graphics cards with the best heat dissipation and noise reduction features.

Gigabyte displayed its high-end non-reference GeForce GTX 470 based graphics card, the GTX 470 SuperOverclock (GV-N470SO-13I). The card is built using Gigabyte's Ultra Durable VGA Plus (UDV+) technology, and makes use of a 12+2 phase VRM, because of which the PCB is about as long as a GTX 480. The GPU and memory chips used are said to be hand-picked (by binning), to have the highest overclocking potential. The GPU cooler used is no less complex, making use of a large aluminum fin array that's cooled by three fans that's are slightly inclined to reduce turbulence. There is no word on the clock-speeds, though being an SOC model it will likely be on the higher side.

Gainward released a new custom-design GeForce GTX 470 graphics card, which is based on the Gainward GTX 470 GOOD Edition that was launched a month ago, replicated as Palit GTX 470 Dual-Fan. The factory-overclocked model is designated with the Golden Sample (GS) identifier. It packs clock speeds of 650/1301/850(3400) MHz (core/shader/memory), against reference speeds of 607/1215/837(3348) MHz.

As with the GOOD Edition design, it features a slightly longer PCB at 10.5 inches, custom dual-fan GPU cooler, and display outputs which include two DVI-D, and one each of HDMI and DisplayPort (though only two displays can be connected at a time). The DirectX 11 compliant GeForce GTX 470 packs 448 CUDA cores, and 1280 MB of GDDR5 memory across a 320-bit wide memory interface. It is expected to be priced at a slight premium of the GOOD Edition.

ZOTAC International, a leading innovator and the world's largest channel manufacturer of graphics cards, mini-PCs and small form factor platforms, today unleashes the world's fastest air cooled GeForce GTX 400 series graphics cards - the lightning-fast ZOTAC GeForce GTX 480 AMP! Edition and GTX 470 AMP! Edition graphics cards.

ZOTAC takes air-cooled performance to the next level with superior engineering and tweaking to raise performance levels of the GeForce GTX 400 series to unprecedented levels. The ZOTAC GeForce GTX 400 series AMP! Editions go beyond overclocking and features enhanced upgrades over standard GeForce GTX 400 series graphics cards.

MSI is readying three new non-reference design graphics cards based on the entire series of GeForce GTX 400 series GPUs, including the upcoming GeForce GTX 465. The new cards will make use of the company's tried and tested Twin-Frozr II GPU cooler to keep the scorching GF100 GPU running. Unlike Twin Frozr II coolers used on ATI Radeon HD 5800 series GPUs, which have bases with heat pipes making direct contact with the GPU, in its GF100 implementation, the cooler will have large copper bases to quickly transfer heat from the GPU to the cooler. Perhaps MSI's mention of "high density" could also indicate that it would have more aluminum fins. The 8 mm thick heat pipes, which MSI refers to as SuperPipes, stay on. The SKUs will likely be called the MSI N480/N470/N465 Twin Frozr II, for models with the GeForce GTX 480, GTX 470, and GTX 465, respectively.

At a time when every NVIDIA board partner is designing catchy non-reference design graphics cards based on the GeForce GTX 470, EVGA applied its wisdom on simply bettering the NVIDIA reference design to make the card look not only better, but also work cooler. Dubbed the EVGA GeForce GTX 470 SuperClocked+, the card has two new features, the High Flow bracket, and a back-plate. The High Flow bracket is merely a bracket with more opening than the reference design one, which allows better ventilation.

The back-plate works as a heatspreader over components on the reverse-side of the PCB, especially drawing heat from the area behind the GPU, it is highly perforated and attracts convectional air-flow. Aside from cooling, the back-plate adds to the card's aesthetics. With SC clock speeds of 625/1250/850 (3402) MHz (core/shader/memory), the EVGA GTX 470 SC+ is priced at $375 on the company's online store.

Inno3D is excited to launch the i-ChiLL GeForce GTX 470 Black Series equipped with liquid cooling technology. The "full cover" water-block cools the GPU, Voltage Regulators, I/O chip, memory modules, and other critical components allowing for longer care-free gaming knowing your GPU is well looked after. This is definitely the ultimate cooling solution for enthusiast gamers.

In the i-ChiLL Black Series system, the water block first takes up the heat and passes it to the water flowing into it. Through the hose system, the water carries the heat to the radiator. Once it arrives in the radiator, the water passes the heat to the air via the ribs. The thinner the ribs and the larger the radiator's surface is as a result, the more powerful the cooling system. The "cooled" water flows from the outlet side of the radiator back into the CPU water block. The air flow within the water block is also important in ensuring adequate cooling. That is because the more thermal discharge the water can absorb from the surrounding material in the block, the better the cooling performance.

EVGA started offering the Hydro Copper water-block for GeForce GTX 470 as an accessory. Until now the block was available only as part of the EVGA GTX 470 Hydro Copper FTW graphics card, which is priced at $499.99. With the block being sold loose, users with the air-cooled variants of GTX 470 have the option of upgrading to water-cooling. The Hydro Cooper block costs $139.99.

Manufactured by Swiftech, the EVGA Hydro Copper water-block consists of a central portion from which the coolant flows, this part is directly over the GPU and memory, and makes use of 0.6 x 0.6 mm thin copper pin matrix for heat dissipation. The base consists of chrome electro-plated copper. The other two segments are heatsinks which convey heat to the central portion, cooling the VRM areas. Both both 1/2" and 3/8" high-flow fittings are supported.

Galaxy is working on a single-slot graphics card based on the GF100 in its GeForce GTX 470 version. If that didn't boggle your mind, the fact that it's not another card with a water-block, but a single-piece air-cooled card surely will. Enter the Galaxy GTX 470 model known as "Katana" in Japan and "Razor" in other markets. The PCB appears to be a little over 10 inches long, looks-wise makes use of Galaxy's Blue-silver-copper scheme from its other non-reference GTX 470 GC card.

The single-slot air cooler covers the entire length of the PCB, with a fan that draws air from both sides of the PCB, and has grills that reveal the cooler's internal network of copper air-channels, and a slab of copper that is spread across most of the PCB's area that holds the GPU and memory. The cooler makes use of vapour-chamber technology. The card draws power from 8-pin and 6-pin power connectors. It is 4-way SLI capable. It is expected that the card comes with at least NVIDIA reference clock speeds, all other specifications remain the same: 448 CUDA cores, 1280 MB of GDDR5 memory across 320-bit interface, and connectivity which includes two DVI-D and a mini HDMI. It is expected to deck up Galaxy's Computex booth.

NVIDIA reported revenue of $1.0 billion for the first quarter of fiscal 2011 ended May 2, 2010, up 2 percent from the prior quarter and up 51 percent from $664.2 million in the same period a year earlier. On a GAAP basis, the company recorded net income of $137.6 million, or $0.23 per diluted share, for the first quarter of fiscal 2011. That compares with $131.1 million, or $0.23 per diluted share, in the previous quarter and a net loss of $201.3 million, or $0.37 per share, in the same period a year earlier.

Gross margin increased to 45.6 percent for the first quarter fiscal 2011 from 44.7 percent in the previous quarter and 28.6 percent in the same period a year earlier.

• Revenue grew 2 percent quarter-on-quarter to $1.0 billion
• GAAP net income increased to $137.6 million, or $0.23 per diluted share
• GAAP gross margin improved to 45.6 percent

Inno3D released the non-reference design GeForce GTX 470 Hawk graphics card. The card is characterized by the large iChill heatsink which uses a large aluminum fin array that's cooled by three fans. Despite its proportions, the company claims the cooler's noise level to be only around 18 - 29 dBA (max), compared to the up to 38 dBA of the reference cooler. As far as performance goes, Inno3D claims the cooler keeps temperatures up to 22 °C lower than what the reference cooler manages, around the 70 °C mark on load.

Apart from the cooler, the Inno3D GTX 470 Hawk uses a fairly standard NVIDIA reference design PCB that is green in color, and comes with reference clock speeds of 608/1215/837 MHz (core/shader/memory). Like any other GTX 470, the card has 448 CUDA cores, and 1280 MB of GDDR5 memory installed on a 320-bit wide memory interface.

Galaxy is ready with its 100% non-reference design graphics card based on the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 470 GPU, the Galaxy GTX 470 GC Version. The card makes use of Galaxy engineering with both the PCB and cooler designs. The card features a blue PCB, which is 0.5 inch shorter than the reference design (at 9 inches), and pushes the two 6-pin power connectors to the rear-end of the card. The cooling assembly uses a large aluminum fin array cooling all vital parts, covered with a silvery plastic found on action figures. Galaxy innovated a little with the fan, which can be partly detached from the rest of the cooler to help clean it and the heatsink under it.

The card is overclocked out of the box, with speeds of 625 MHz / 1250 MHz / 837 or 3348 MHz (effective), for the core, shader, and memory, respectively. Like every other GTX 470 based card, it is DirectX 11 compliant, and has 448 CUDA cores, 1280 MB of GDDR5 memory across a 320-bit wide interface, and is 2/3/4-way SLI capable. Display connectivity includes two DVI-D, and HDMI with integrated audio. A test by the source shows that with this cooling solution, the GTX 470 GC Version manages to keep the GPU at around 88 degrees Celsius with Furmark load. It is expected that the card will be available in the US as early as by tomorrow.

A "GOOD" news announced by Gainward, a leading brand in enthusiastic graphics cards, keeps its glorious traditions, redefines performance by release of Gainward Optimized Own Design (GOOD). Gainward races against competitions and develops the market first own designed GeForce GTX 470 "GOOD" Edition with "Gamer's Spirit" in mind. The card received optimized circuit layout on a longer PCB (10.5 inches to NVIDIA reference 9.5 inches), which enables better overclockability owing to plentiful PWM power modules with rugged solid-state components on better ground, also allows to accommodate larger heat-pipes cooler with dual 8 cm double bearing fans, which improved thermal characteristics and significantly reduced noise at full load. Even better, the card is geared with "QuattroPorts" integrated 4 ports in 1 including DisplayPort, HDMI 1.3a (upgradeable to HDMI 1.4 support for 3D format with upcoming NVIDIA 3DTV Play) & Dual DVIs, fulfill universal connectivity for diverse displays.

Gainward GeForce GTX 470 GOOD Edition features 1280MB GDDR5 memory clocked at 1674MHz (Bandwidth 133.92 GB/sec), core clock is set at standard 607MHz. Although clockrate is rather modest by default, better cooling and optimized circuit have left lots of headroom for overclocking by Gainward award winning graphics tuning utility - Expertool, which activates clockrate settings and fan control with user-friendly interface and fail-safe clock-down override. Even the first-timers can exercise overclocking with peace of mind.

NVIDIA released its latest version of the GeForce driver suite, version 197.55, specific to the GeForce GTX 400 series graphics cards. The WHQL-signed drivers don't announce any more changes than a major feature change - official support for 4-way SLI on both GeForce GTX 480 and GeForce GTX 470. The drivers only work with GeForce 400 series products. No Release Notes documents were published along with the drivers.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 197.55 WHQL for Windows 7/Vista 64-bit, Windows 7/Vista 32-bit

NVIDIA released version 197.41 of its GeForce driver suite, specifically for the DirectX 11 compliant GeForce 400 series GPUs. These drivers are WHQL-signed, and come in time for the market-availability of GeForce GTX 480 and GTX 470 graphics cards. Although NVIDIA didn't mark out any significant changes to this version, it bundles PhysX system software v9.10.0129, and on-chip HD audio driver v1.0.9.1. These drivers enable support for CUDA 3.0 and OpenGL 3.2. A proper release-notes document from the company is awaited for more details.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 197.41 WHQL for GeForce GTX 400 series

Koolance is ready with water blocks designed for NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 480 and GTX 470 graphics cards. The Koolance VID-NX480 and VID-NX470 are full-coverage water blocks that cool all vital heat-producing components on the obverse side of the PCB, including the GPU, memory and VRM areas. Both measure 6.25" x 5.75" x 0.62" (15.9cm x 14.6cm x 1.6cm), weighing 1.5 lbs (680 g), slim and light enough to make the card occupy a single expansion slot. The block makes use of nickel-plated copper, with an acrylic top. The area over the GPU has an array of 0.5 mm micro-fins that increases surface area for heat dissipation. While the VID-NX480 is priced at US $119, the VID-NX470 goes for $109, as listed on the company store.

Inno3D's quest for the first non-reference GeForce GTX 470 has taken a turn with the company now planning to design its own cooling assembly. First surfaced in late March, Inno3D's non-reference GTX 470 wasn't much more than a reference-design card with green colored PCB instead of black. It also retained the reference cooling assembly, albeit slightly toned down with four copper heat-pipes instead of five.

The new cooling assembly, now in the form of CAD drawings, makes use of an elaborate aluminum fin arrays to which heat from the GPU is fed by heat-pipes. These are cooled by three 80~90 mm fans. While cooling the GPU, the three also blow air onto heatsinks over the memory and VRM areas. Inno3D plans to brand its new card the Inno3D iChill GTX 470 Hawk 1280 MB. The DirectX 11 generation GeForce GTX 470 GPU packs 448 CUDA cores, and addresses 1280 MB (1.25 GB) of memory across a 320-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface. The company did not share when it plans to get these out.

Long awaited by hardcore gamers and overclockers in every part of the world, the latest generation of graphics processors from NVIDIA is finally here, and ASUS is the first to prepare and release fully-optimized products that build on its many new features to deliver total gaming frills and immersion.

The new graphics cards from ASUS deliver all the benefits of the debuting 40nm NVIDIA GPUs, possessing considerable power improvements compared to their predecessors. They come in two varieties in the initial launch. The flagship ENGTX480 uses the GTX480 core with 480 CUDA cores at 1401 MHz and a 384-bit memory interface. This is a frontline extreme performance board with a 700MHz core clock and 1536MB of 3696MHz GDDR5 memory. It's accompanied by ASUS' powerful mainline ENGTX470, which is a 448 CUDA cores running at 1215 MHz version of the NVIDIA GTX470 chip. It packs a 607MHz core and 1280MB of GDDR5 RAM at 3348MHz with a 320-bit interface.

XFX is getting cozier with AMD by the day, which is an eyesore for NVIDIA. Amidst the launch of GeForce GTX 400 series, XFX did what could have been unimaginable a few months ago: abandon NVIDIA's high-end GPU launch. That's right, XFX has decided against making and selling GeForce GTX 480 and GeForce GTX 470 graphics cards, saying that it favours high-end GPUs from AMD, instead. This comes even as XFX seemed to have been ready with its own product art. Apart from making new non-reference design SKUs for pretty-much every Radeon HD 5000 series GPU, the company is working on even more premium graphics cards targeted at NVIDIA's high-end GPUs.

The rift between XFX and NVIDIA became quite apparent when XFX outright bashed NVIDIA's high-end lineup in a recent press communication about a new high-end Radeon-based graphics card it's designing. "XFX have always developed the most powerful, versatile Gaming weapons in the world - and have just stepped up to the gaming plate and launched something spectacular that may well literally blow the current NVIDIA offerings clean away," adding "GTX480 and GTX470 are upon us, but perhaps the time has come to Ferm up who really has the big Guns." The move may come to the disappointment of some potential buyers of GTX 400 series, as XFX's popular Double Lifetime Warranty scheme would be missed. XFX however, maintains that it may choose to work on lower-end Fermi-derivatives.