# GeForce GTX 400 Series Performance Expectations Hit the Web



## btarunr (Feb 25, 2010)

A little earlier this month, NVIDIA tweeted that it would formally unveil the GeForce GTX 400 series graphics cards, NVIDIA's DirectX 11 generation GPUs, at the PAX East gaming event in Boston (MA), United States, on the 26th of March. That's a little under a month's time from now. In its run up, sources that have access to samples of the graphics cards seem to be drawing their "performance expectations" among other details tricking in. 

Both the GeForce GTX 480 and GTX 470 graphics cards are based on NVIDIA's GF100 silicon, which physically packs 512 CUDA cores, 16 geometry units, 64 TMUs, 48 ROPs, and a 384-bit GDDR5 memory interface. While the GTX 480 is a full-featured part, the GTX 470 is slightly watered-down, with probably 448 or 480 CUDA cores enabled, and a slightly narrower memory interface, probably 320-bit GDDR5. Sources tell DonanimHaber that the GeForce GTX 470 performs somewhere between the ATI Radeon HD 5850 and Radeon HD 5870. This part is said to have a power draw of 300W. The GeForce GTX 480, on the other hand, is expected to perform on-par with the GeForce GTX 295 - at least in existing (present-generation) applications. A recent listing by an online store for a pre-order, put the GTX 480 at US $699.

*View at TechPowerUp Main Site*


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## DanishDevil (Feb 25, 2010)

Guess the enthusiasts will be waiting for the GTX495 then.


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## Boljack (Feb 25, 2010)

ouch!...


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## Semi-Lobster (Feb 25, 2010)

300w!? Is that idle or the max?!


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## EastCoasthandle (Feb 25, 2010)

470 drawing 300 watts 
The 5970 draws 304 watts using furmark.  What is the power draw for the 480??


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## Yellow&Nerdy? (Feb 25, 2010)

So this confirms that the Fermi cards will just be a hot, expensive, power hungry piece of junk. The 470 was listed for 499$ and let's say that it soon drops to 400. The problem is, it's slower, more expensive AND more power hungry than the 5870, which is 399$ now, but will probably drop in price a little, as ATI toughens competition. And the 480. More expensive and power hungry than the 5970, but loses in performance by about 15% (GTX295 vs. 5970). So what's the conclusion? Nvidia is taking it in the butt, atleast in this generation of GPUs. And I'm not a fanboy of either.


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## OBR (Feb 25, 2010)

in original article, is NO WORD about GTX 295, there is GTX 480 has performance as a HD5970!


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## Marineborn (Feb 25, 2010)

HEY good deal you can get yourself a 295 for 700 bux lolerskates


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## EastCoasthandle (Feb 25, 2010)

I find it rather odd that they've not allowed for any leaked benchmark results as of yet.  This is the first time I've seen them only reference benchmark results as being close to another product.  We've at least seen leaked company slides but in this case we've go nothing as of yet.


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## Marineborn (Feb 25, 2010)

EastCoasthandle said:


> I find it rather odd that they've not allowed for any leaked benchmark results as of yet.  This is the first time I've seen them only reference benchmark results as being close to another product.  We've at least seen leaked company slides but in this case we've go nothing as of yet.



maybe they dont wanna cause if they release benchmarks and if they completly blow like 70% of us think there gonna, thats gonna hurt there sales. and make them look like complete idiots


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## Mistral (Feb 25, 2010)

Boljack said:


> ouch!...


Ditto...

GTX 400 expectations have been floating around for months, but if true, this is just painful...


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## Lionheart (Feb 25, 2010)

Very Very disappointing TBH, but I dont believe this source anyways, I will beleive it untill I see it!


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## lism (Feb 25, 2010)

This is proberly the result of designing and making a huge ass chip.

Future revisions, as they did from the 9800GTX and so on, will have tiny improvements, a lower power usage and some better performance. By the time this is done, AMD will already have its second line-up ready to be launched.

They missed the boat with such a chip.


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## Kitkat (Feb 25, 2010)

i expect it to come out too late lol


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## FreedomEclipse (Feb 25, 2010)

EastCoasthandle said:


> What is the power draw for the 480??


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## n-ster (Feb 25, 2010)

I only believe the power draw... Nvidia might be stupid, but they can't be that stupid...


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## afw (Feb 25, 2010)

If this is true ... ATi will definitely beat NV in -price/performance- and -performance/watt-

and moreover I've read that the chips will have a higher rate of failure because of the die size ...


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## fatguy1992 (Feb 25, 2010)

It'll be a shame if It only performs that well, the power draw bit doesn't bother me.  Hopefully it will overclock really well (when cooled down).


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## mdm-adph (Feb 25, 2010)

Well, that's the way it goes.  Nvidia enjoyed their time on the top, and now the crown's passed to ATI/AMD.

3-4 years from now, the GTX 600 series will come out, and will take it back.

Now do you see why a lack of competition is bad?  Nvidia's cards were the fastest for so long, that they apparently skimped on R&D and got left behind.


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## hv43082 (Feb 25, 2010)

Really disappointing if this is true with the new GPU.  Well at least my 295GTX is not obsolete.


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## FreedomEclipse (Feb 25, 2010)

afw said:


> and moreover I've read that the chips will have a higher rate of failure because of the die size ...



below is an article written by the head honcho of Guru3d. its upto you how you wish to take it.




> *NVIDIA and its troubled GeForce 400 series*
> 
> Guru3D.com ImageToday I wanted to write a little 'opinionated' editorial. Typically we do not address rumors and gossip. But an accumulation of things that have been going on over at camp NVIDIA and the Internet leading us to believe things are not as they should be. The rumors are creating a rather negative stigma for NVIDIA.
> 
> ...


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## KainXS (Feb 25, 2010)

lol if this is true nvidia is screwed, if a a 470 sits between a 5850 and 5870 theres nvidia will keep that performance crown for long especially with AMD sitting in the shadows and if the specs for the HD5890 that are currently rumored are true, 48rop, 2400sp, then .  . . . . . disaster

and if the 480 uses more power than HD5970 and it took nvidia this long to come up with that that would be a complete fail on their behalf and means that fermi is doomed.

I don't think this news can be true, it can't be.


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## cool_recep (Feb 25, 2010)

Although I don't believe a word of it I want to translate some parts of it...

GeForce GTX 470 will be about  %20-%25 faster than GeForce GTX 285. The new flagship GeForce GTX 480 will have a performance near ATi Radeon HD 5970.

A possible Fermi X2 will have two GeForce GTX 470 GPUs. More concrete information will be provided at CeBIT 2010. GTX 480's Power consumption will be near HD 5970.

There will be factory overclocked cards...


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## zCexVe (Feb 25, 2010)

300W power draw??? Holly crap


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## mechtech (Feb 25, 2010)

FreedomEclipse said:


> http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t166/Spinningfox/Internet Fads/OVER 9000/9000cat.jpg



epics lawls

photoshop FTW


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## the54thvoid (Feb 25, 2010)

*Will all of you just BE QUIET!!*

Semiaccurate, Bright Side of News, Guru 3D, yadda yadda yadda.

What's the common link? NO CONCRETE INFO.

The pricing will not be high.  Sabre PC website price was a hoax - go check it out.  Another techy website with 'sources' revealed it will be very competitive and sold at a huge loss, just to hit ATI's current dominance.  The cards wont be appearing in big numbers so hypothetically, a 10000 card run sold at a £200 loss each is only £2 million.  Nvidia can easily soak that up.  Think about it people - NV have been hit hard - all they have to do is release a good card (which Fermi will be, power draw aside) and sell it competitively.  They just need to be seen to be 'in the race'.

All the subterfuge over benchmarks is suspect but be realistic, GF100 will perform well.  Remember how good the 4870 was and then NV went 'BAM!!' GTX 280.  All they do is punch with a bigger glove.  I'm a fanATIc now (after converting to two 5850's from a GTX295) but i seriously believe people should stop waving the victory flags.

First and foremost, I'm a sad git and i trawl at least 5 or 6 of the major techy sites to garner info.  It's not all Black and White dudes.  Charlie's still ranting (and he has a 50/50 record so could go either way), BSN* kiss NV's ass a bit too much these days and the other sites play with rumours.
TPU is quite neutral and i like this site for that but the forums have too much gossip - like a day out at a nail salon.

Wait for the release and the reviews (Personally I'll happily wait for the TPU review).  But remember - this is the company that is the power in GFX still.  NV might just take a small financial hit just to make a point.


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## Bundy (Feb 25, 2010)

Yellow&Nerdy? said:


> So this confirms that the Fermi cards will just be a hot, expensive, power hungry piece of junk. The 470 was listed for 499$ and let's say that it soon drops to 400. The problem is, it's slower, more expensive AND more power hungry than the 5870, which is 399$ now, but will probably drop in price a little, as ATI toughens competition. And the 480. More expensive and power hungry than the 5970, but loses in performance by about 15% (GTX295 vs. 5970). So what's the conclusion? Nvidia is taking it in the butt, atleast in this generation of GPUs. And I'm not a fanboy of either.



What I conclude is that most opinions on this new card are not based on solid evidence.



OBR said:


> in original article, is NO WORD about GTX 295, there is GTX 480 has performance as a HD5970!



Well picked up.

Perhaps Bta can clarify whether this is correct?


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## OnBoard (Feb 25, 2010)

_"the GeForce GTX 470 performs somewhere between the ATI Radeon HD 5850 and Radeon HD 5870."_

No way that's true. GTX 470 is almost twice the card my GTX 280 and I lose 12% to 5850 and 23% to 5870. If they don't get 25% more performance out of it, then it's a driver problem.


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## Benetanegia (Feb 25, 2010)

OnBoard said:


> _"the GeForce GTX 470 performs somewhere between the ATI Radeon HD 5850 and Radeon HD 5870."_
> 
> No way that's true. GTX 470 is almost twice the card my GTX 280 and I lose 12% to 5850 and 23% to 5870. If they don't get 25% more performance out of it, then it's a driver problem.



Agreed. Also the link is not saying that anyway, idk where did bta's numbers come from, but it's not from the link he provided. Even with Google translate is easy to understand they are comparing the 480 with the HD5970 performance wise and they are saying the 470 will be 20-25% faster than a GTX285, or as fast as the HD5870. Two members (OBR and cool recep) have confirmed that.


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## Bundy (Feb 25, 2010)

OnBoard said:


> _"the GeForce GTX 470 performs somewhere between the ATI Radeon HD 5850 and Radeon HD 5870."_
> 
> No way that's true. GTX 470 is almost twice the card my GTX 280 and I lose 12% to 5850 and 23% to 5870. If they don't get 25% more performance out of it, then it's a driver problem.



It might be true if the newer cards don't clock as fast.


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## Benetanegia (Feb 25, 2010)

Bundy said:


> It might be true if the newer cards don't clock as fast.



Yeah, but not even Charlie Demerjian, always the most "pesimistic"  regarding Nvidia, is clocking Fermi below 600 Mhz. 625 mhz and 650 mhz is what most are saying. The GTX285 is clocked at 648 Mhz and GTX280 was clocked at 602 Mhz, so 625-650 is not bad at all and Fermi should be close to 2x the performance of a GT200. It should be closer to 100% faster than closer to 25% faster at least.


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## xrealm20 (Feb 25, 2010)

Benetanegia said:


> Yeah, but not even Charlie Demerjian, always the most "pesimistic"  regarding Nvidia, is clocking Fermi below 600 Mhz. 625 mhz and 650 mhz is what most are saying. The GTX285 is clocked at 648 Mhz and GTX280 was clocked at 602 Mhz, so 625-650 is not bad at all and Fermi should be close to 2x the performance of a GT200. It should be closer to 100% faster than closer to 25% faster at least.



Remember that nVidia's stream processors clock differently than the GPU --- so, fermi may have lower stream processor clocks ---

I'd imagine that the 470 will be between the 5850 and 5870 and the 480 in some bmarks will be on par with the 5970 and in other bmarks it will be around GTX295 performance.

But both cards are going to be power hogs, without a doubt.

my 2 cents.


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## Bundy (Feb 25, 2010)

Benetanegia said:


> Yeah, but not even Charlie Demerjian, always the most "pesimistic"  regarding Nvidia, is clocking Fermi below 600 Mhz. 625 mhz and 650 mhz is what most are saying. The GTX285 is clocked at 648 Mhz and GTX280 was clocked at 602 Mhz, so 625-650 is not bad at all and Fermi should be close to 2x the performance of a GT200. It should be closer to 100% faster than closer to 25% faster at least.



Fair enough. We shall find out for sure soon.

Given the specifications, and thinking hypothetically, there would also be plenty of room for nvidia to offer heavily downclocked cards for mid-range performance? I guess it all depends on what we don't know, how these chips are binning.


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## Arrakis9 (Feb 25, 2010)

im surprised there ist a ton of nvidia hating ati fanbois here bashing and laughing at this


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## DanishDevil (Feb 25, 2010)

Me too, but it's such unestablished evidence, I think everybody's a bit skeptical.


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## troyrae360 (Feb 25, 2010)

Arrakis+9 said:


> im surprised there ist a ton of nvidia hating ati fanbois here bashing and laughing at this



Thats some troll bate if ever i seen it 

I think ATI fanboys got that out of there system 6 months ago when the other firmi thread was started, besides that are all probley too busy being immersed in DX11 and pushing GPUs to new limits, or prehaps they are just content that they alredy own the most powerfull GPU's on the market todate


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## sneekypeet (Feb 25, 2010)

They were in another thread that already got closed down, please dont bring any flaming or trolling into the news section too.


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## shevanel (Feb 25, 2010)

this cannot be true... 

if the 470 was like a 5870 and the 480 fell between a 5870 and a 5970 then it would a but make more sense.. but as it stands the price/performance (which is speculated) is just plain ruh-tarded...

@ $699 msrp this means they'll probbaly sell for 749+ if the supply suffers as ati's did at launch


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## troyrae360 (Feb 25, 2010)

shevanel said:


> this cannot be true...
> 
> if the 470 was like a 5870 and the 480 fell between a 5870 and a 5970 then it would a but make more sense.. but as it stands the price/performance (which is speculated) is just plain ruh-tarded...
> 
> @ $699 msrp this means they'll probbaly sell for 749+ if the supply suffers as ati's did at launch



I personally think NV have always charged more for there product than what its worth price/performance wise, ATI/AMD ahve always been the better Bang for your Buck, I beleave it will stay that way, NV will always overcharge and people will still buy there stuff becouse they are commited to that brand


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## Easy Rhino (Feb 25, 2010)

none of these rumors make sense and they all seem self contradictory. let's say for the sake of argument that fermi is a big bag of fail. nvidia would simply sell them FOR LESS than the ATI cards. so if they are less poweful than what ATI has out NVIDIA's strategy would be to low ball and steal ATIs money maker of midrange cards. all the while NVIDIA would be working on a completely new series of cards done right that wont hit the market for another 15 months. fan boys often forget that money is what these companies try and get the most of, not the approval of tech geeks and hardware nerds.


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## johnnyfiive (Feb 25, 2010)

Just wait for the real benchmarks people...all this damn speculation talk. Who cares? Wait til we see Wizz's review and the rest of the reviews.


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## shevanel (Feb 25, 2010)

^ +1 of course

but.. coming so late in the game when the competition has already spread through the market like a virus and availibility is now + the price is great why come out into game slinging a hot hot hot power hungry $700.00 card?

hmm maybe they just know people are going to buy them regardless then the entry level mainstream dx11 cards arrive later... LOL NV is smart!


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## Benetanegia (Feb 25, 2010)

shevanel said:


> @ $699 msrp this means they'll probbaly sell for 749+ if the supply suffers as ati's did at launch



It's not MSRP, it's the (probably fake) pre-order price on one etailer. If anything, that hints to a $550 MSRP according to your logic. But it's fake, I'm sure, they are listed as 2GB cards and both 479 and 480 have 512 SPs. Not to mention that most relieable sources are saying that most partners didn't even got their samples yet, how come an etailer knows the price?

TBH I can't believe that so many people are taking that number so seriously. But every rumor about Fermi is being taken seriously isn't it? That's something I can't understand and has never happened before tbh.


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## shevanel (Feb 25, 2010)

well when your only given so much info about something your imagination is the only thing that will fuel the topic of discussion which apparently is something people want to talk about

im sure around april we will all be truly informed... this is all just hype before the big show.. just like before the ATi stuff was released then the "5800 series below expecatations" thread was birthed


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## Easo (Feb 25, 2010)

Need benchmarks of course, but imho my side of upgrade will be ATI, i simply cant believe Fermi's will be at the ATI price range.


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## Bundy (Feb 25, 2010)

troyrae360 said:


> I personally think NV have always charged more for there product than what its worth price/performance wise, ATI/AMD ahve always been the better Bang for your Buck, I beleave it will stay that way, NV will always overcharge and people will still buy there stuff becouse they are commited to that brand



Given that Nvidia/ATI card designs differ from each other in many ways, I don't expect it will be so easy to compare them. There will probably be big variations in relative performance, depending on the benchmark/comparision used. Then there will probably be even bigger fanboi wars.

I do agree that the Nvidia card I use now was overpriced at the time compared to ATI in terms of say FPS. I have had heaps of fun from it though.


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## aj28 (Feb 25, 2010)

I think that nVidia will be price/performance competitive plus about a 10% premium. This will keep the green camp in line as well as general consumers thanks to the skew and overall illiquidity of retail sales prices. That said, much like last generation, they will bleed a lot of money until 6-12 months in when they produce a revamped GTS250.


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## Completely Bonkers (Feb 25, 2010)

ATI did a "surprise" on nV by under-speccing the cards prior to launch. Then boom! the cards had double the shaders people were expecting.

This strategy worked well for ATI. Perhaps nV actually scrapped their whole design in 2009 and have something new up their sleeve and hence the protracted delay.

Let's hope something exciting is launched in May and those 300W figures are bogus.


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## eidairaman1 (Feb 25, 2010)

Bundy said:


> Given that Nvidia/ATI card designs differ from each other in many ways, I don't expect it will be so easy to compare them. There will probably be big variations in relative performance, depending on the benchmark/comparision used. Then there will probably be even bigger fanboi wars.
> 
> I do agree that the Nvidia card I use now was overpriced at the time compared to ATI in terms of say FPS. I have had heaps of fun from it though.



that 8800 Ultra is a stronger chip than the G92 in the 8800 range- reliability atleast. It took Nv a revision of the G92 to get it reliable.


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## Swansen (Feb 25, 2010)

FreedomEclipse said:


> http://i160.photobucket.com/albums/t166/Spinningfox/Internet Fads/OVER 9000/9000cat.jpg



LOL! ....but seriously though.. this stuff is getting ridiculous.. (power consumption)


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## TheMailMan78 (Feb 25, 2010)

I guess I shouldnt post in this thread as everything I say seems to piss SOMEONE off. Anyway remember ATI had thier 2900 before its 3xxx series. It looks as if Nvidia is just laying the ground work for something much better in the next two years.

Anyway as a GPU fan I cannot wait to see what this thing can do. Its fun to make fun of Nvidia but who knows how this puppy will do. It could be epic for all we know.


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## aCid888* (Feb 25, 2010)

If the specs and performance are to be believed then I think the old saying 'You snooze, you lose' comes to mind. :shadedshu


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## TheLaughingMan (Feb 26, 2010)

mdm-adph said:


> Well, that's the way it goes.  Nvidia enjoyed their time on the top, and now the crown's passed to ATI/AMD.
> 
> 3-4 years from now, the GTX 600 series will come out, and will take it back.
> 
> Now do you see why a lack of competition is bad?  Nvidia's cards were the fastest for so long, that they apparently skimped on R&D and got left behind.



Failure of proper R&D is not a result of lack of competition.  Strangely high prices, skewed price/performance ratio, lack of advertisement, all definately.  Lack of R&D is just them being cheap dicks.  

ATI was not exactly non-existent and has taken the performance crown from them before on several occasions in the past few years.  This is just a failure on Nvidia's part through and through.


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## eidairaman1 (Feb 26, 2010)

fact of failing chips in the G92, Rebagging of the 8800 series, failure of the Mobility parts, and now the longest delay of Nvs G100 is all cause of NV to have big migraines.


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## ucanmandaa (Feb 26, 2010)

I think fermi will earn its place in history alongside FX 5800 Ultra and R600 (2900xt) as a hot, power hungry and  pricy (price/performance wise) card... I could even mention Voodoo5 6000 but it was never released officially.
Also all the cards mentioned above were released  after delays... except Voodoo ofcourse


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## TheLaughingMan (Feb 26, 2010)

Sad.  The card has not even been released yet, and we are all going, "Sorry Green Team, maybe next time."  I find it quite funny actually.

Bad Nvidia, bad.


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## ..'Ant'.. (Feb 26, 2010)

Well if does turn out to be that bad then im going to get another GTX 285 to SLI then.


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## [I.R.A]_FBi (Feb 26, 2010)

DanishDevil said:


> Guess the enthusiasts will be waiting for the GTX495 then.



on two separate cards?


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## aj28 (Feb 26, 2010)

[I.R.A]_FBi said:


> on two separate cards?



Funny because it's true. Of course, they won't need to if it's able to best the 5970, but I think it's a well-accepted fact that AMD has more than enough room to drop prices on the entire HD5000 series without exception and beat nVidia into the ground. Question is, why would they? Must the same reason Intel doesn't want to do the same to AMD. It's not about anti-trust so much as it is keeping a healthy buffer space so everyone makes money. We'll see some good price cuts over the summer I think, but it's not going to be 50%.


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## mooch37 (Feb 26, 2010)

I love how some people say $700 for the Fermi is way too expensive (and it is) but then they say it's so much cheaper to go with a 5970.  They're practically the same price.  Maybe a $50 difference, but that's about it.


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## eidairaman1 (Feb 26, 2010)

could care less, Im going with 2 5890s when they arrive


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## qwerty_lesh (Feb 26, 2010)

can someone post a tl;dr version of all the comments pl0x
say summarized in bullets or the likes

tyvm kthxbye.


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## TheLaughingMan (Feb 26, 2010)

mooch37 said:


> I love how some people say $700 for the Fermi is way too expensive (and it is) but then they say it's so much cheaper to go with a 5970.  They're practically the same price.  Maybe a $50 difference, but that's about it.



If the 470 is expected to fall between the 5850 and 5870, then it is safe to assume the 480 will be above the 5870, but may not reach 5970's performance.  If it does not at least match it, $50 is a big deal to pay for a brand name and less performance.

Now lets say the performance is only 5 to 10% better than a 5870, then your gap is more like $225.  That is huge for so little a boost.


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## HossHuge (Feb 26, 2010)

the54thvoid said:


> Remember how good the 4870 was and then NV went 'BAM!!' GTX 280.  All they do is punch with a bigger glove.



How could that be when the GTX280 came out a week before the 4870?


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## Wile E (Feb 26, 2010)

Man, I hope those wattage claims aren't true. This thing will be a heat monster if that's the case.


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## LAN_deRf_HA (Feb 26, 2010)

I don't see why anyone would be surprised. It's very common for the new flagship card to trade blows with the dual gpu card of last round, not completely surpass it.


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## eidairaman1 (Feb 26, 2010)

LAN_deRf_HA said:


> I don't see why anyone would be surprised. It's very common for the new flagship card to trade blows with the dual gpu card of last round, not completely surpass it.



zzzzzz


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## shevanel (Feb 26, 2010)

I DONT MISS THE GTX 275! What im trying to say is I will never own another HOT HOT card .. I hate sweating.


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## a_ump (Feb 26, 2010)

Ok so it was stated the GTX 470 is to have 300watt tdp and performance between HD 5850 and HD 5870. So how in the hell is the GTX 480, with the full 512 CUDA cores, likely higher clocks, going to be within PCIe TDP specifications? and how is it going to soar up to HD 5970 performance when the GTX 470 only slightly crippled, is between the HD 5850 and HD 5870. For the GTX 480 to compete with the HD 5970 it'd have to be a lil more than double the performance of the GTX 470...which obviously isn't possible. The only way it'd be possible is with much higher clocks, but with the GTX 470 at 300TDP already, there's no room for significant clock increases.

EDIT: someone above said no waving of victory flags yet, but how can you not? Nvidia can't take the crown, can't beat ATI in wattage, and MOST of all can't beat them in price as ATI can definitely drop price more than nvidia can. Nvidia is going to beat in all aspects if you truly think about it as i've laid it out. Only way for fermi to be relevant in the gaming arena is for them to sell the GTX 4XX at ridiculously low prices and take the hit, and by low prices i mean low.


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## buggalugs (Feb 26, 2010)

Im soory but im gonna LOLs at people who waited for fermi. ATI already learnt the wide memory bus with GDDR5 doesnt work well. Nvidia are like 3 years behind where ATI are now and they are making the same mistakes as ati did with RV600.


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## dogchainx (Feb 26, 2010)

I'm going to LOL at people who start bashing each other because of their purchases and loyalty to a corporation.


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## Wile E (Feb 26, 2010)

buggalugs said:


> Im soory but im gonna LOLs at people who waited for fermi. ATI already learnt the wide memory bus with GDDR5 doesnt work well. Nvidia are like 3 years behind where ATI are now and they are making the same mistakes as ati did with RV600.



Your statement about wide memory buses makes no sense whatsoever. GDDR5 works no different with wide buses than it does on narrow ones. More bus width just adds bandwidth. More bandwidth does not hurt. It may not be needed, but it certainly doesn't hurt anything.

Even with these rumors abound, I'm still waiting until fermi releases to see what happens in the market. 

I LOL at people that make decisions based on rumors.


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## _33 (Feb 26, 2010)

http://www.techreport.com/discussions.x/18525



> We now know that Nvidia will officially announce its GeForce GTX 480 and 470 graphics cards on March 26. Only some of Nvidia's card partners may be at the party, however. DigiTimes has learned from anonymous sources that most of Nvidia's second-tier partners still haven't received "complete reference board designs."
> 
> Nvidia reportedly intends to prioritize "first-tier makers or makers that only produce Nvidia cards." As DigiTimes points out, XFX and PNY versions of the upcoming GF100 cards have already shown up for pre-order in the United States, so those partners will presumably be among those receiving preferential treatment. Cards from tier-two manufacturers may not start shipping until April.
> 
> ...


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## wahdangun (Feb 26, 2010)

Wile E said:


> Man, I hope those wattage claims aren't true. This thing will be a heat monster if that's the case.



that's why, the chase must have fermi certification, that's have wind tunnel in it


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## buggalugs (Feb 26, 2010)

Wile E said:


> Your statement about wide memory buses makes no sense whatsoever. GDDR5 works no different with wide buses than it does on narrow ones. More bus width just adds bandwidth. More bandwidth does not hurt. It may not be needed, but it certainly doesn't hurt anything.
> 
> .



Yes it does. I remember reading about it. Something about diminishing returns and high power draw required to keep it fed.

 Thats why after the R600 debacle(with 512bit bus)  ATI moved back to 256bit bus with 3870/4870 and now the very powerful 5870 still has a 256bit memory bus.

 If it were that easy or worthwhile ATI would have made the 4870 or the upgraded 4890 with a wider memory bus. They already tried it and it wasnt worth it. Nvidia has been using GDDR3 which benefits from a wider memory bus. On GDDR 5 theres already plenty of bandwidth on a 256 bit bus.

As an analogy its like having 4 X 5970's in a computer. After 2 of them theres not much performance increase if any. So you have a hot and power hungry setup that is inefficient. Just like RV600 was.

I'm not surprised the power draw is as high as they say.


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## Imsochobo (Feb 26, 2010)

ucanmandaa said:


> I think fermi will earn its place in history alongside FX 5800 Ultra and R600 (2900xt) as a hot, power hungry and  pricy (price/performance wise) card... I could even mention Voodoo5 6000 but it was never released officially.
> Also all the cards mentioned above were released  after delays... except Voodoo ofcourse



2900 XT was something, FX series so wasnt.

But your mostly right, 2900 series was nothing for the average performance oriented consumer, but it did beat EVERYthing when watercooled! 
The clocks it achieved was so staggering  talking by experience, sole reason why i bought it.

anyhow, this card might end up like the X1800/1900 series, except being hot aswell, ati had expensive parts, but faster.

Nvidia enjoyed those times, but this time it might be the other way around, i so not doubt that fermi will be fast.
but they aint gonna blow ati away with the fermi, far from, may just stay in the game, and maybe prove themself next time.


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## Wile E (Feb 26, 2010)

buggalugs said:


> Yes it does. I remember reading about it. Something about diminishing returns and high power draw required to keep it fed.
> 
> Thats why after the R600 debacle(with 512bit bus)  ATI moved back to 256bit bus with 3870/4870 and now the very powerful 5870 still has a 256bit memory bus.
> 
> ...


No, ATI moved back to 256 because 512 was too pricey to build. 

And test have shown that current 58xx cards benefit from more memory bandwidth when OCing, suggesting that the 256bit bus is indeed a bottleneck. That can be achieved either thru higher memory clocks, or a wider bus if they wanted to stamp out a new core. Both add heat and power, so the point is moot.

And btw, the 2900 outperformed the 3870 when OCing, and part of that reason was the wider bus. That's why all of the top ATI scores were still done with 2900 at that time, and not the 3870.

2900 was power inefficient mostly because of the package size, and it's high current leakage, not because of bus width.


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## shevanel (Feb 26, 2010)

what is a good test to know if you actually NEED to overclock memory in real world gaming use?


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## Wile E (Feb 26, 2010)

shevanel said:


> what is a good test to know if you actually NEED to overclock memory in real world gaming use?



If overclocking memory gives a performance boost.


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## shevanel (Feb 26, 2010)

so anything  that can be given a performance boost means it was a bottleneck?


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## Wile E (Feb 26, 2010)

shevanel said:


> so anything  that can be given a performance boost means it was a bottleneck?



Technically speaking? Yes. If it isn't a bottleneck, ocing doesn't help, especially when talking about video card memory.


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## shevanel (Feb 26, 2010)

I see. Good point.

my cpu is my bottleneck imo... i miss the i7 920 @ 4ghz


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## Imsochobo (Feb 26, 2010)

shevanel said:


> I see. Good point.
> 
> my cpu is my bottleneck imo... i miss the i7 920 @ 4ghz



for high fps, yes.
For over 50 fps, nada...

I feel no lagg or stuff like that with a PH II 940 @ stock hoho...


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## TAViX (Feb 26, 2010)

Wile E said:


> And test have shown that current 58xx cards benefit from more memory bandwidth when OCing, suggesting that the 256bit bus is indeed a bottleneck. That can be achieved either through higher memory clocks, or a wider bus if they wanted to stamp out a new core. Both add heat and power, so the point is moot.
> 
> And btw, the 2900 outperformed the 3870 when OCing, and part of that reason was the wider bus. That's why all of the top ATI scores were still done with 2900 at that time, and not the 3870.



Do you have any proof of what you've wrote there?? 

All the o.c. forums are saying that o.c. the RAM of current 57xx and 58xx is useless, since it provides very little performance gain, even when using liquid cooling or sub-zero custom H2/ He/N2/etc cooling. The main performer is only the GPU, so where did you got your informations, mind if I ask??:shadedshu


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## shevanel (Feb 26, 2010)

i guess you havent seen the vantage thread with all the 5850 oc's and scores? unless vanatage is misleading and is not reflective towards real-world gaming?


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## Bjorn_Of_Iceland (Feb 26, 2010)

there goes the news thread 

in anycase, waiting is always the hardest part


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## $ReaPeR$ (Feb 26, 2010)

i totaly agree on the waiting part,i would very much like to see the performance of this gpu, debating on speculations is a bit pointless imo , funny, but pointless.


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## HalfAHertz (Feb 26, 2010)

Nvidia are arrogant, not stupid - they will not release a 300W single gpu card, you can quote me on that! I call this article total bs, I don't even know why it deserves to be in the news section...


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## X-TeNDeR (Feb 26, 2010)

Very interesting.. ofcourse this can be a ploy by NVIDIA to dazzle us untill the real deal is here, shocking the gaming community (as AMD did with the "400 shaders" HD4xxx)

If this info is true - they should Ship these cards with Doom 5


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## GSquadron (Feb 26, 2010)

I dont really think the new fermi will end up with such low performance. They must be better, cuz the chip is even bigger than the previous and it is supposed to be less bigger cuz it is 40 nm. They will use in GTX400 series the GDDR5 version and i hope that this will help a bit nvidia. But if they want to price it that high, i say to nvidia: Go home you little boy, your mummy is waiting for you


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## Wshlist (Feb 26, 2010)

No graphics card draws 300Watt for itself, and it can't be they 'advise a 300W PSU' either since that is too low for a system this day an age, so in short I think it's all nonsense.


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## ucanmandaa (Feb 26, 2010)

yeah i was talking about stock cards... watercooling + overclocking and modding were not included


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## kaneda (Feb 26, 2010)

The one thing, in my opinion which is keeping nVidia afloat in the eyes of enthusiasts (besides fanboyism) is CUDA. ATi stream is far from a rival. AMD/ATi need to sort that out before it takes the last of what nVidia has to offer. in pure gaming price/performance they're dominating, its just in GPGPU they're flopping, and not in a good way. What use is power if there's no way of accessing it?

From a 3d modellers perspective, i want some nice open ATi powered renderer , make use of that raw power.

Though, im still stuck, due to monetary reasons, on my old X1950Pro.


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## GSquadron (Feb 26, 2010)

Is your X1950 pro better than my 7600GS?


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## [I.R.A]_FBi (Feb 26, 2010)

yes it is


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## Frick (Feb 26, 2010)

Aleksander Dishnica said:


> Is your X1950 pro better than my 7600GS?



x1950 pro is on par with 7900gs and 7900gto.


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## kaneda (Feb 26, 2010)

I love how my gpu got to be the topic of conversation not the point I made XD.

the card I have isn't horrid, can still play quite a few games relatively well, older games obviously but still.


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## Bjorn_Of_Iceland (Feb 27, 2010)

Aleksander Dishnica said:


> Is your X1950 pro better than my 7600GS?





Frick said:


> x1950 pro is on par with 7900gs and 7900gto.


you didnt get the meaning he is trying to say


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## TheLaughingMan (Feb 27, 2010)

Wshlist said:


> No graphics card draws 300Watt for itself, and it can't be they 'advise a 300W PSU' either since that is too low for a system this day an age, so in short I think it's all nonsense.



Yes, yes they do, at peek power usage.  That is not even close to unrealistic.  Granted it will most likely never reach that high, but it is capable of it is the point.


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## eidairaman1 (Feb 27, 2010)

kaneda said:


> The one thing, in my opinion which is keeping nVidia afloat in the eyes of enthusiasts (besides fanboyism) is CUDA. ATi stream is far from a rival. AMD/ATi need to sort that out before it takes the last of what nVidia has to offer. in pure gaming price/performance they're dominating, its just in GPGPU they're flopping, and not in a good way. What use is power if there's no way of accessing it?
> 
> From a 3d modellers perspective, i want some nice open ATi powered renderer , make use of that raw power.
> 
> Though, im still stuck, due to monetary reasons, on my old X1950Pro.



at least you are feeding that card properly. Id have to upgrade to do that.


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## a_ump (Feb 27, 2010)

hey i'm still kicking a 5 yr old 7800GTX. 1280x768 isn't too pretty on my 21.5in screen thou :/.

Nvidia will poop fermi and it'll either be the shit or be diarrhea that just runs down the drain.


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## Frick (Feb 27, 2010)

Bjorn_Of_Iceland said:


> you didnt get the meaning he is trying to say



No, I didn't even read his post. ^^


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## kaneda (Feb 27, 2010)

Frick said:


> No, I didn't even read his post. ^^



pfft, cheers XD


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## kaneda (Feb 27, 2010)

eidairaman1 said:


> at least you are feeding that card properly. Id have to upgrade to do that.



feeding it properly? if you mean raping every last penny out of it, sure XD cost £117 when i got it.


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## eidairaman1 (Feb 28, 2010)

kaneda said:


> feeding it properly? if you mean raping every last penny out of it, sure XD cost £117 when i got it.



No I'm saying the CPU is feeding it, I'd have to overclock my CPU to get any benefit out of it. Atleast drivers are still there for both versions.


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## Wile E (Feb 28, 2010)

TAViX said:


> Do you have any proof of what you've wrote there??
> 
> All the o.c. forums are saying that o.c. the RAM of current 57xx and 58xx is useless, since it provides very little performance gain, even when using liquid cooling or sub-zero custom H2/ He/N2/etc cooling. The main performer is only the GPU, so where did you got your informations, mind if I ask??:shadedshu



Look around in some of the benchmark threads.

Or how about the firing squad review?  http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/ati_radeon_5870_overclocking/

Not only does OCing the memory provide a small increase at stock gpu speeds, but it provides an even bigger increase when you OC the core speeds. As the core speeds increase, so does the need for bandwidth.

As far as the 2900 vs the 3870, I switched back to the 2900 from a 3870 because the 2900 was a better performer under water cooling with a highly OCed gpu. For anything else you want to know, you'll have to dig around in the forums for posts from around that time. There were actually a few of them.


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## TheMailMan78 (Feb 28, 2010)

Wile E said:


> Look around in some of the benchmark threads.
> 
> Or how about the firing squad review?  http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/ati_radeon_5870_overclocking/
> 
> ...



I had a 2900. That thing was a tank!


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## Lionheart (Feb 28, 2010)

The HD2900XT had some type of memory bit interface, something called a ringbus or something, wat was that?


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## Wile E (Feb 28, 2010)

CHAOS_KILLA said:


> The HD2900XT had some type of memory bit interface, something called a ringbus or something, wat was that?



I thought the ring bus was on X1800-X1950 cards?


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## TheMailMan78 (Feb 28, 2010)

Wile E said:


> I thought the ring bus was on X1800-X1950 cards?



I think hes right. The 2900 I believe did have a ringbus.


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## eidairaman1 (Feb 28, 2010)

Wile E said:


> I thought the ring bus was on X1800-X1950 cards?



THe X1800,1900, 2900 Utilized a Ring Memory Bus, just on the 2900 it was inefficient vs the previous boards.


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## Lionheart (Feb 28, 2010)

Oh I see, thanx for clearing that up for me, wat was it exactly?


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## eidairaman1 (Feb 28, 2010)

http://techreport.com/articles.x/8864/2

http://techreport.com/articles.x/12458/4

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/print/radeon-hd5870.html

memory buses


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## shevanel (Feb 28, 2010)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEieu-OKVvs&feature=related

i thought this was cool... one thing about nvidia theyre always doing/showing stuff that i think people would like to see implemented into gaming

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CkVLs6uIZkk&feature=related  <-- MUST SEE


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## Lionheart (Feb 28, 2010)

shevanel said:


> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEieu-OKVvs&feature=related
> 
> i thought this was cool... one thing about nvidia theyre always doing/showing stuff that i think people would like to see implemented into gaming
> 
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CkVLs6uIZkk&feature=related  <-- MUST SEE



Thats wat I call explosive performance


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