That cooler looks like the reference HD3870 cooler; I wonder how cool that will keep it...

-Indybird

WarEagleAUnot bad, though not a fan of the 128 bit bus width. Why not just use cheaper GDDR3 ?

It is odd that you made those two comments at the same time. The 128-bit bus is cheaper to manufacture than a 256-bit bus, and the GDDR5 makes it bus perform like a 256-bit GDDR3 bus.

I doubt this will be as good as a 4830. They would name it higher maybe like 4845 or if it was better than the 4850 then 4860 etc.

newtekie1It is odd that you made those two comments at the same time. The 128-bit bus is cheaper to manufacture than a 256-bit bus, and the GDDR5 makes it bus perform like a 256-bit GDDR3 bus.

IMO 256bit + GDDR3 is cheaper ATM, yet. But ATI has to follow their marketing strategy, after selling the GGDR5 idea so much and spending all that much, they have to take advantage of the fact that ATM GDDR5 sounds simply better than "xxx bits memory interface" for the average joe. 128, 256 is just a number, GDDR5 implies much more on the minds of people that don't understand about GPU internals. It means "two generations ahead" on top of "twice the megahertz" and that sells better.

DarkMatterIMO 256bit + GDDR3 is cheaper ATM, yet. But ATI has to follow their marketing strategy, after selling the GGDR5 idea so much and spending all that much, they have to take advantage of the fact that ATM GDDR5 sounds simply better than "xxx bits memory interface" for the average joe. 128, 256 is just a number, GDDR5 implies much more on the minds of people that don't understand about GPU internals. It means "two generations ahead" on top of "twice the megahertz" and that sells better.

Well, I would imagine market dynamics play into it too. You look at the big players in the memory market (and who produces the GDDR3/GDDR5 most commonly used by ATi) and it may make sense for them to really invest in the newer GDDR5 technology and put more of it on their cards. I doubt that it is marketing hype because most consumers don't actually seem to mind buying DDR2 versions of cards which, for all practical purposes, should have GDDR3 on them to get the designed level of performance out of their chips.

To me anyway, the only people it makes a difference to marketing-wise are the not-so-average Joe's out there (like us), who will feel that ATi is pushing innovation with newer equipment and technologies a lot harder than nVidia is, which... Well, is actually more truth than hype.

here is going to cost a lot :cry:

aj28Well, I would imagine market dynamics play into it too. You look at the big players in the memory market (and who produces the GDDR3/GDDR5 most commonly used by ATi) and it may make sense for them to really invest in the newer GDDR5 technology and put more of it on their cards. I doubt that it is marketing hype because most consumers don't actually seem to mind buying DDR2 versions of cards which, for all practical purposes, should have GDDR3 on them to get the designed level of performance out of their chips.

I didn't try to imply that was the only reason, but it is a big one. Just look at the second image in the OP. Ati is doing a lot of number trickery lately, GDDR5 (no mention to 128 bits...), GFLOPs (no mention to ROP power or texturing abilities??), performance/watt/$ given in GFLOPS/watt/$ (WTF!! Since when that means anything? :shadedshu).

Anyway my post was more to say that it's not the actual price the reason they went GDDR5, of course it's expected that GDDR5 prices will drop and then 128+GDDR5 will probably be cheaper, in just months. And by moving it to mainstream cards they will certainly make GDDR5 prices drop, which is good for their entire family. But IMO GDDR5 in this card is in no way to make it cheaper to produce.

To me anyway, the only people it makes a difference to marketing-wise are the not-so-average Joe's out there (like us), who will feel that ATi is pushing innovation with newer equipment and technologies a lot harder than nVidia is, which... Well, is actually more truth than hype.

That is very subjective. I couldn't care less about what the card has attached as long as it is fast, and let's get real Nvidia owns the performance crown in almost every segment (except low-end and low mainstream) at this moment. Apart from that, GPUs are for playing games the best way possible and in that respect Nvidia has been doing much more than Ati, i.e with PhysX. Now that is innovation and not a hardware feature that might or might not be an improvement (GDDR4?). At least IMO.

Anyway it's clear you've bought their marketing hype, because of how you think that more than-average Joe is only the one that can see Ati as innovation. I am an enthusiast and I don't see Ati innovating so much, except for the use of GDDR5 and a move to an smaller fab process, none of them are theirs and fab process is hardly innovation, it's just tweaking the fabrication of the chips.

Maybe I'm more immersed in the labyrinths of GPU architecture and that's why I see much more innovation in GT200 than I do in RV770. I'm not talking about what they have attached externally, I'm not talking about the jewelery. I'm talking about the efficient and powerful shaders, how thread management is resolved, cache hierarchy and its semi-coherency, architecture oriented at keeping a better balance of ILP (Instruction level parallelism) and TLP (Thread...), etc.

Both companies have a different take on what a future (GP)GPU must be, and thanks to both of them the industry keeps moving, by one copying the other and so on. It's not only Ati as the hype is trying to make believe (and TBH with high success, they could use Ati's campaign as example in marketing schools).

Can these be crossfired with the 48xx series?

BokteeloCan these be crossfired with the 48xx series?

Of course. I had my 4870 and 4830 in crossfire the other day before I shipped my 4830 out. It's pretty fast but I need the 1gb of ram :D

Enough of the 128bit memory interface rubbish already. I thought we had just seen the last of that garbage and here it is back again :banghead:

hmmm i too thought we were done with 128-bit unless its <$75. Though as stated by several i hope the GDDR5 does make up for the smaller bus. I'm very interested to see it's performance and the number of SP's it will have, i'd hope 480 or 560. i'm thinking it will beat the 9800GT, if so i might get it instead of a GTS 250, i'd like the xtra 30 bucks to put towards a P43/45

The memory bandwidth with GDDR5 * 128 bit will be the same as GDDR3 * 256. My only concern with the 128 bit memory interface is that in every HD4000 card until now (and Nvidia's too BTW) every 64bits are linked to 4 ROPs, so unless they changed something this card would have only 8 ROPs. Jugding by the benchmarks leaked, they probably made something, because it's peroforming well.

Good thing I didn't order the GPU for my i7 rig yet. Thank you Wile for telling me to wait! <3

Going to see how these perform... I have just about everything either on my alternate bed or currently in the process of shipping to my place, just missing the GPU.

i don't like 128 bit cards...

why don't they make 256 bit with ddr4 ?

ohhhh, that's make changes , with this prices and HAVOK technology i thing ATI sells go over 60% in world and they took the lead

Random Murdererodd, in the early reports, the 4750 seemed to be better than the 4850, so how is the 4770 worse?

They're the same card mate. HD4750 was never an official name, just a speculated name used in a preview for the sake of simplicity.

ShadowFoldGDDR5, 40nm, 99$ and an awesome looking cooler? Do want! :D

A synonym to "awesome looking cooler" is "horrible noise making cooler at any speed able to cool anything as a cooler is supposed to cool isn't it ?" :wtf: