ChaitanyaWill be waiting to see how much power consumption is improved over predecessor.

the54thvoidGive us 4070ti level performance for $400 and it's a win.

ARFIt's very important to be factory power optimised, with emphasis on undervolting, not severe overvolting which results in 50% higher than normal power consumption, but miserable 5% performance increase.
It must strictly stay in its sweet power-efficiency curve.

From the leaked images, I see that they will keep the stupid fins orientation which overheats the neighbouring PC components - the CPU, M.2 drives, etc.

So, no hopes... :banghead:

ChaitanyaWill be waiting to see how much power consumption is improved over predecessor.

DavenBlackwell - Nvidia has all the resources in the world to release whatever they want whenever they want regardless of AI/Data center prioritization rumors. Therefore, the delay is most likely external. I think Nvidia needs TSMC 3 nm in order to produce Blackwell. I don't think 4 nm will yield the number of units and power consumption levels that will allow them to go above the 4090. Blackwell for the client might be delayed until 2025H2 since 3NP and 3NX are not ready until later this year or the middle of next depending on which node version is needed. With rumors suggesting that neither Intel or AMD will reach or exceed the 4090, there is just no rush for Nvidia to push out high end Blackwell.

DavenBattlemage - Intel still has resources but they are dwindling fast. It is still possible that they may discontinue their entire GPU division for both data center and client. Rumors indicate that the GPU is still coming and Intel has a variety of choices when it comes to process node. But their financial situation is dire and there has been very little information regarding their next gen data center GPU which would get higher priority than the client.

DavenRDNA4 - AMD has the least resources of all three companies so they probably do need to prioritize product releases based on the most important markets. As some have pointed out, AMD is focusing on the data center so any delays to RDNA4 would most likely be caused by data center GPU product schedules. The process node is not a problem as AMD might be leaving the top end GPU market for a while and they have yet to utilize 4 nm.

ymdhisThe rx6600 and rx7600 are currently the most power efficient gpus in idle, they use something like 2-4W. I'm hoping for a 8600 that follows suit.

ARFIt's very important to be factory power optimised, with emphasis on undervolting, not severe overvolting which results in 50% higher than normal power consumption, but miserable 5% performance increase.
It must strictly stay in its sweet power-efficiency curve.

From the leaked images, I see that they will keep the stupid fins orientation which overheats the neighbouring PC components - the CPU, M.2 drives, etc.

So, no hopes... :banghead:

TomorrowBlackwell will not be 3nm

ChaitanyaCurrently MSI(on few 4070 models), Sapphire, PowerColor and XFX offer handful of GPUs with fins oriented in parallel to GPU but otherwise almost every single SKU uses that fin orientation to dump heat into motherboard(while idling it does help with some airflow on M.2 slots but underload its makes things worse). Also all dumb board makers continue to add M.2 slots under primary x16 slot instead of just providing additional PCIe slot with bifurcation so users can add their own SSDs later doesnt help the situation either.

TomorrowBlackwell will not be 3nm for several reasons. Especially if it's releasing this year. People need to let go of this silly dream.
1. If Nvidia's AI Blackwell cards were N4P then there's very small change that gaming cards would have node advantage.
2. 3nm is no doubt more expensive than N4P. If this expense could not be justified for AI then how could it be justified for gaming?
3. Capacity. I doubt TSMC has enough capacity this year to ship enough 3nm wafers to satisfy Nvidia's demand either in AI or Gaming. Much less both.
4. Need. Like you said - since competitors are not really snapping on the heels there's little incentive for Nvidia to push the envelope in terms of node or other specs. It will likely be a repeat of RTX 20 series with segmentation and performance.

There has been little to no leaks about BM. I very much doubt it's coming this year. If it were we should have leaked performance leaks almost every week from OEM's.
And when it finally does launch it seems it maybe limited midrange card or cards. Possibly even smaller scope than RDNA4.

I would not say AMD has the least resources. They just bough a server company for billions of dollars and are constructing several new R&D centers.
As with Nvidia they too will likely use N4P that Zen 5 already uses. Not sure if it will launch within this year. There are performance leaks but im betting it will be announced at CES 2025 and launches in Q1 2025.

FiredropsAnyone know what's the rough Geekbench OpenCL score for a 7800XT clock limited to ~2.1 GHz? I see 139,953, presumably at stock ~2.4 GHz clocks. 7800 XT is 4x as fast as this? How sensitive is this benchmark to clock speeds?

DavenI think we are more in agreement and maybe my post wasn't worded correctly. I agree with you that any change in requirement to use 3 nm would delay ANY GPU, data center or client, well into 2025. Rumors indicate that all Blackwell chips have been delayed:

NVIDIA Blackwell AI Chips Reportedly Delayed By Several Months, Culprit Being A Design Flaw (wccftech.com)

Rumors are saying design flaw but that could include using 4 nm.

DavenThe scores in the leak should not be considered for anything. Most likely an early production version.

AMD Radeon RX 8000 RDNA4 graphics card with 56 CUs and 16GB memory appears on Geekbench - VideoCardz.com

ARFThat means Blackwell will be a rebrand of Ada Lovelace with small to negligible performance improvements, hence it gets cancelled because the market doesn't demand such products..

DavenThat could be a 'stop-gap' solution until 3 nm is ready. Nvidia has used a progressively smaller process node going all the way back to the 28 nm days for each generation. I just don't see Blackwell proper working on the 4 nm node when Ada Lovelace already seemed to max it out.

ARFIt makes no sense to not be. What will be offered? A new chip at the reticle limit?

DavenThere actually has been some talk from Intel about Battlemage.
Intel Arc "Battlemage" Graphics Card with 12GB of 19 Gbps GDDR6 Memory Surfaces | TechPowerUp
Intel Lunar Lake Technical Deep Dive - So many Revolutions in One Chip - Battlemage Xe2 Graphics | TechPowerUp
Intel Arc Battlemage "Xe2" GPUs Heading For Launch In 2024, Bring Big Performance Improvements (wccftech.com)

ARFThat means Blackwell will be a rebrand of Ada Lovelace with small to negligible performance improvements, hence it gets cancelled because the market doesn't demand such products..

DavenThat could be a 'stop-gap' solution until 3 nm is ready. Nvidia has used a progressively smaller process node going all the way back to the 28 nm days for each generation. I just don't see Blackwell proper working on the 4 nm node when Ada Lovelace already seemed to max it out.

TomorrowIt makes perfect sense for it to be N4P. It makes very little sense for it to be 3nm and thus far i have not seen convincing arguments as to why 3nm makes more sense.
As for the reticle limit - yes. Nvidia pretty much always maxes this out for their 102 die, but gamers, even 4090 buyers always get roughly 10% cut die.

Ada is 5nm. N4P would still be a smaller node. We can see from Zen 4, 5nm to Zen 5, N4P that there are meaningful efficiency gains even from this small node change.

TomorrowPossibly even smaller scope than RDNA4.

TomorrowBlackwell will not be 3nm for several reasons. Especially if it's releasing this year. People need to let go of this silly dream.
1. If Nvidia's AI Blackwell cards were N4P then there's very small change that gaming cards would have node advantage.
2. 3nm is no doubt more expensive than N4P. If this expense could not be justified for AI then how could it be justified for gaming?
3. Capacity. I doubt TSMC has enough capacity this year to ship enough 3nm wafers to satisfy Nvidia's demand either in AI or Gaming. Much less both.
4. Need. Like you said - since competitors are not really snapping on the heels there's little incentive for Nvidia to push the envelope in terms of node or other specs. It will likely be a repeat of RTX 20 series with segmentation and performance.

ARFThat means Blackwell will be a rebrand of Ada Lovelace with small to negligible performance improvements, hence it gets cancelled because the market doesn't demand such products..

TomorrowAda is 5nm.

TomorrowWhy? It will be a repeat of RTX 20 series like i said before. There's precedent for this from 2018 already. Only 2080 Ti moved the performance forward over 1080 Ti and even that was at massive price increase from 700 to 1200 despite them claiming a fake 999 that never materialized. That was a move from 16nm to 12nm.
As for the reticle limit - yes. Nvidia pretty much always maxes this out for their 102 die, but gamers, even 4090 buyers always get roughly 10% cut die.

DavenThere is no need for a 3 nm argument as it is not something inherently different than printing transistors closer together. If Nvidia can use 3 nm (and eventually everyone will) then they will. The reticle limit and runaway power are very real concerns. Otherwise, why doesn't Nvidia use 28 nm for Blackwell. That's real cheap with tons of capacity available. :)

Ada Lovelace already uses the N4 process which is an enhanced version of N5. It is not apparent whether or not the N4P node (another enhanced version of N5) will be enough over N4 found in Ada to meet Nvidia's performance goals. I'm guessing that it is not.

evernessinceYou missed the most important reason: Yields

Both Samsung and TSMC are struggling with 3nm yields, TSMC reportedly being below 50% and Samsung below 30%. Particularly important when you are talking large GPU dies where a single defect can cost Nvidia the entire die.

I don't see 3nm being suitable for their larger dies, they would have to massively increases price to compensate for all the wafers they'd be throwing in the trash.

ARFWrong. It is 4 nm..

ARFRTX 2 was on Samsung process. Which was cheaper. There is a very significant difference this time..

• TSMC 4N process (5 nm custom designed for Nvidia)[1] – not to be confused with N4