What happens in Gainward, stays in Palit. Barely a week after Gainward showed off its GeForce GTX 460 graphics card with 2 GB of memory, its brand owner Palit has its own model of the same kind, called the Palit GTX 460 2 GB Sonic. This non-reference design graphics card has Palit's own design PCB and cooler, has 2 GB of memory across a 256-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface, and factory-overclocked speeds of 700 MHz core, 1400 MHz CUDA cores, and 900 MHz (3600 MHz effective) memory. Display connectivity includes two DVI, and one each of HDMI and DisplayPort. The is said to be priced around 240 EUR.

Zotac is yet another AIC up with a GeForce GTX 460 based graphics card that features double the memory size, with its new 2 GB GDDR5 model. Zotac's new card uses a non-reference design PCB, and makes use of a slightly modified Accelero TwinTurbo Pro VGA cooler from Arctic. Featuring the same configuration as the 1 GB model, the card places 16 GDDR5 memory chips across a 256-bit wide memory interface to achieve that capacity.

The cooler makes use of a dense aluminum fin array to which heat is conveyed by four 6 mm copper heat pipes. Air is circulated by two 92 mm fans. Zotac used four display outputs (of which two can be used simultaneously), which includes two DVI, and one each of HDMI (full-sized) and DisplayPort. Like every other GTX 460, the GPU has 336 CUDA cores to work with, a 256-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface, and DirectX 11 support. There's no word on the availability or pricing.

GIGABYTE Technology Co. LTD., a leading manufacturer of motherboards and graphics cards, is pleased to launch the latest overclocked GeForce GTX 460 series: GV-N460OC-1GI and GV-N460OC-768I. With extraordinary overclocking ability, GIGABYTE overclocked GTX 460 series deliver ultimate gaming experience. Featuring GIGABYTE Ultra Durable VGA quality components, GTX 460 further enhances overclocking capability and system stability. GV-N460OC-1GI and GV-N460OC-768I are equipped with GIGABYTE's latest in-house cooling design WINDFORCE 2X, which provides better cooling than reference fan sink by 11%. Also, GV-N460OC-1GI and GV-N460OC-768I feature a wide range of the latest graphics technologies, including DirectX 11, NVIDIA CUDA, 3D Vision Surround, and PhysX technologies.

Global renowned graphics card and mainboard manufacturer, MSI officially launched today the N460GTX Cyclone series graphics cards, including the N460GTX Cyclone 768D5 and N460GTX Cyclone 1GD5. Equipped with the latest NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 GPU and top Military Class components, N460GTX Cyclone series releases the overclocking potential up to 30% through MSI Afterburner Over voltage function of GPU.

Moreover, adopting MSI exclusive Cyclone thermal design with 9cm PWM fan, dual heat pipes and nickel-plated copper base which effectively decrease temperature, MSI N460GTX Cyclone series generates 15.7% lower noise than reference cooler at full speed to create a quiet environment for users.

ZOTAC International, a leading innovator and the world's largest channel manufacturer of graphics cards, mini-PCs and small form factor platforms, today unleashes two new affordable GeForce GTX 400 series graphics cards - the new ZOTAC GeForce GTX 460 1GB and GeForce GTX 460 Synergy Edition. The new ZOTAC GeForce GTX 460 series deliver class-leading features and technology to gamers, enthusiasts and all PC users looking for a thrilling visual experience.

Stunning visuals are made possible with the powerful NVIDIA Fermi architecture that delivers superior graphics processing power and Microsoft DirectX 11 technology that powers the ZOTAC GeForce GTX 460 series. Hardware tessellation takes 3D games to the next level of visual realism with the ZOTAC GeForce GTX 460 series by enabling increased visual details in every object and environment in the latest games DirectX 11 powered games for a cinematic gaming experience that rivals the latest CGI-animated Hollywood masterpieces.

NVIDIA today announced the latest addition to its Fermi-class of graphics processing units (GPUs), the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 460 -- which delivers a great DX11 gaming experience and is priced right at the market's $199 sweet spot.

Built from the ground up for DirectX 11 tessellation, GeForce GTX 460 GPUs deliver monster tessellation performance with up to 4x tessellation performance over competing GPUs. The GTX 460 brings the ultimate next-generation DX11 gaming experience to a new price segment, enabling more gamers than ever to experience incredibly detailed characters, terrain and game environments with blazing fast performance and awesome visuals.

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.

Sources in the hardware industry leaked some interesting pictures of a new, supposedly reference-design NVIDIA GF100 GPU graphics card PCB, watermarked by board partner Little Tiger. The pictures reveal a PCB that's similar to that of the GeForce GTX 480, but with a stronger VRM that makes use of better high-C surface-mount capacitors (completely doing away with cylindrical capacitors), and draws power from two 8-pin PCI-Express power inputs. The design can deliver up to 375W of power (that's not the board power we're talking about).

This also opens up speculation about what NVIDIA would do with this design. The most talked about theory as of now points to a new high-end SKU by NVIDIA based on the GF100, that enables all streaming multiprocessors (SMs) physically present on the GF100, taking the CUDA core count up to 512, and ROP count to 64. The most likely marketing name for this SKU is GeForce GTX 485. Apart from higher CUDA core and ROP count than that of the GTX 480, slightly higher clock-speeds for the GPU are also on the cards. The memory subsystem remains untouched, at 1536 MB of GDDR5 memory clocked at 924 MHz (effective 3.7 GHz), over a 384-bit wide memory interface. NVIDIA could release this SKU this fall.

One of the first pictures of NVIDIA's upcoming GF104 graphics processor has come to light, with a Chinese source picturing a GF104 qualification sample. The sample is based on the A1 silicon. The GPU package is similar to that of the GF100, it makes use of an integrated heat-spreader (IHS) to disperse heat from the die underneath it. The package is rectangular rather than square (probably a move to reduce board footprint, translating into more compact boards) The GPU is built on TSMC's 40 nm process, and is said to have significantly lower TDP compared to the GF100. One of the first SKUs built around it is the GeForce GTX 460.

Contrary to older reports, Expreview's report suggests that the GeForce GTX 460 will have 336 CUDA cores (instead of 256), and 768 MB of memory across a 192-bit GDDR5 memory interface. Its TDP is expected to be around the 150W mark, similar to that of a GeForce GTS 250. It will target price-point slightly above the $200 mark, while other SKUs carved out of this silicon will be lesser.

NVIDIA today released GeForce 257.21 WHQL driver suite for GeForce series graphics cards and NVIDIA ION platforms, this is the first WHQL-signed driver in its 256 series of drivers, which archives two main goals as far as driver packaging goes: unifying desktop and mobile GeForce drivers; and unifying GeForce 400 series drivers with that which supports GeForce 6 thru GeForce 300 series into one package (NVIDIA initially had a separate package for GeForce 400 series). GeForce 257.21 also packs a boatload of changes, including a large number of game-specific performance increments, new technologies, updates key extra components, and fixes bugs.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 257.21 WHQL for Windows 7/Vista 64-bit, Windows 7/Vista 32-bit, Windows XP 32-bit, Windows XP 64-bit
A complete list of changes follows.

While every NVIDIA GPU since GeForce 8 series, with over 256 MB of memory supports the CUDA GPU compute technology, and with it PhysX GPU acceleration, the prospect of dedicated GPUs for computing PhysX interests many, especially enthusiasts, after NVIDIA stopped production of the PhysX processor from erstwhile Ageia. EVGA first devised a graphics card that has a high-end GPU processing graphics, and a mainstream GPU dedicated to PhysX processing, with its GeForce GTX 275 Co-op. Building on the same principle, Galaxy designed an enthusiast-grade graphics card that uses an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 480 for DirectX 11 compliant graphics processing, while its sidekick on board is a 40 nm GeForce GT 240 GPU.

The GeForce GTX 480 sticks to specifications, complete with 1536 MB of GDDR5 memory across a 384-bit wide, while the GT 240 has its own 512 MB of GDDR5 memory across a 128-bit wide interface. Both GPUs share the system bus over an NVIDIA nForce 200 bridge chip, which gives both GPUs a PCI-Express 2.0 x16 link. The GTX 480 GPU packs 480 CUDA cores, and features the latest GPU technologies, including 3D Vision surround. Since it is independent from the GT 240, the GTX 480 can pair with three more of its kind for 4-way SLI, without affecting the functionality of the GT 240 in any way.

Gigabyte rolled out its first graphics card based on NVIDIA's newest GPU, the GeForce GTX 465. The card features Gigabyte's own design, which makes use of the Ultra Durable VGA construction, a combination of PCB with 2 oz thick copper layers, Japanese solid-state capacitors, grade 1 memory chips, ferrite-core chokes and low RDS on MOSFETs. The cooler uses a large aluminum fin block which is cooled by two 80 mm fans. Though geared for overclocking, the card comes with NVIDIA reference clock speeds of 607/1215/3206 MHz (core/shader/memory). The GTX 465 SKU is derived from the GF100 die, it features 352 CUDA cores, and 1 GB of GDDR5 memory across a 256-bit wide interface. It is priced at a standard $279.

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.

AMD today announced the appointment of Manju Hegde as corporate vice president, Fusion Experience Program. A renowned parallel and visual computing innovator, Hegde previously served as vice president of CUDA Technical Marketing at NVIDIA before joining AMD to lead the AMD Fusion Experience Program, an initiative focused on identifying innovative computing solutions and applications poised to take full advantage of the forthcoming AMD Fusion family of Accelerated Processing Units (APU). Hegde reports to Rick Bergman, senior vice president and general manager, AMD Products Group.

"We are thrilled to be able to attract an experienced industry leader like Manju Hegde to the AMD team, a sign of the quality of talent we are able to attract to AMD on the strength of our Fusion roadmap," said Bergman. "Manju brings prized expertise in developing the ecosystem for enabling breakthrough and heightened experiences on new architectures to AMD. As Manju and his team work with the ecosystem to usher in a new era of visual computing, we expect a wide range of industry leaders to embrace the future of accelerated computing through the combination of the GPU and CPU -- a combination only AMD can deliver with its AMD Fusion technology."

The latest Folding@Home GPU client core released by Pande Group adds support for NVIDIA's latest GeForce 400 Series GPUs, using the NVIDIA CUDA GPU compute technology. Dubbed GPU3 core, this beta release of the Folding@Home client core packs several optimizations to harness the new GPUs. Apart from GeForce 400 Series, the core supports the full range of GPUs, although the developers don't recommend using it with ATI GPUs, as the software doesn't offer any advantage, and could instead be buggy. They are, however, working on improving the software for ATI GPUs. The graphical and console clients using this core can be downloaded from here.

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.

Zotac is ready with one of the first non-reference design GeForce GTX 480 graphics card, the Zotac GTX 480 amp! Edition. At the center of its design is the Zalman VF3000 GPU cooler sitting atop an NVIDIA reference design PCB. Overclocked out of the box, the amp! Edition card has clock speeds of 750 MHz (core), 1512 MHz (shader), and 950 MHz / 3800 MHz effective (memory), against reference speeds of 700/1401/924(3700) MHz.

The gigantic VF3000 cooler makes the card require three expansion slots. As with every other GTX 480, the GTX 480 Amp! Edition packs 480 CUDA cores, is DirectX 11 compliant, and has 1536 MB of GDDR5 memory across a 384-bit wide interface. Zotac has not let out any more information, particularly pricing and availability.

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

NVIDIA's CUDA GPU compute API could be making its way to practically every PC, with an NVIDIA GPU in place, or not. A chinese freelance developer has coded a means to get CUDA work as a middleware on OpenCL. This move lets CUDA work on ATI Radeon GPUs that support OpenCL, as well as x86 CPUs, since OpenCL specs allow the API to run on CPUs for development purposes. The implications of these are many:

• Letting CUDA-accelerated software such as Badaboom make use of ATI GPUs
• Letting PhysX run on ATI GPUs as PhysX middleware uses CUDA for GPU acceleration
• Possibly better scaling of PhysX on multi-core CPUs (over OpenCL), as the regular PhysX CPU acceleration is infamous for bad multi-core scaling in performance

The software works as a translation layer, exchanging calls between CUDA and OpenCL or the CPU if OpenCL is not available. It comes in the form of a loader application that injects itself into the executing process. To get PhysX to run, one needs to install older versions of PhysX System Software (version 8.09.04 WHQL being the latest) from its standalone installer (installs PhysX libraries without looking for NVIDIA GPUs).

DOWNLOAD: CUDA Emulator Loader

Inno3D seems to be in a bit of a hurry to bag the title of "first to come out with a non-reference GeForce GTX 400 graphics card," and is working tirelessly to get there. The company is readying a new "non-reference" graphics card, put in quotes because for the most part it is in fact a reference design. Traditionally, NVIDIA disallows its board partners from designing their own non-reference graphics cards based on newly-launched high-end GPUs, with a few concessions made for designs with factory-fitted water-blocks, or minor cosmetic changes, apart from letting their own sticker design, box design, bundle, and to an extant, pricing.

Inno3D's concession comes in the form of two things: 1. an NVIDIA reference-design PCB, which is now green instead of black, and 2. looking at the pictures, possibly a different cooler shroud design, although internally the cooling assembly remains reference design. Inno3D may roll out graphics cards with reference NVIDIA clock speeds, and also those with higher clock speeds. As with every other GTX 470 made so far, Inno3D's card is based on the GF100 GPU, it is DirectX 11 compliant, packs 448 CUDA cores, and 1.25 GB (1280 MB) of GDDR5 memory across a 320-bit wide interface. It supports 3-way SLI. At this point, there is no word on when exactly the card comes out, or pricing.

SPARKLE Computer Co., Ltd., the professional VGA card manufacturer and supplier, today proudly announced the SPARKLE GeForce GTX 480/470 Graphics Cards, which are the most powerful single chip graphics cards on the planet for gaming and beyond. Packing in 3 billion transistors, double the CUDA cores of previous generation GPUs, a high speed GDDR5 memory interface, and full DirectX 11 support, the SPARKLE GeForce GTX 480/470 Graphics Cards are designed for groundbreaking graphics performance. With a revolutionary new scalable geometry pipeline and enhanced anti-aliasing capabilities, the SPARKLE GeForce GTX 480/470 Graphics Cards are the world's most powerful single GPU graphics cards solution, delivering up to 3 times faster performance than previous GTX 285 single GPU solutions.

With the power of GF100 GPUs, the SPARKLE GeForce GTX 480/470 Graphics Cards bring ultimate DX11 HD gaming experience to high-end gamers. The SPARKLE GeForce GTX 480/470 Graphics Cards place gamers in the center of the action and experience true DirectX 11 gaming cinema in extreme HD (2560x1600) resolutions-all enabled by GF100's revolutionary compute architecture, NVIDIA 3-way SLI technology, and incredible performance in the latest DX11 games including Dirt 2, Stalker:OCP, Alien VS. Predator, Metro 2033 and so on. With 1.5~3 times more performance than prior generation GPUs, the SPARKLE GeForce GTX 480/470 Graphics Cards tear through complex DirectX 10 environments and cinematic effects at blazing frame rates in extreme HD resolutions.

ZOTAC International, the world's largest manufacturer of graphics cards, motherboards and mini-PCs in the channel, today unleashes the world's most powerful graphics cards capable of delivering a phenomenal gaming experience and unmatched processing power - the new ZOTAC GeForce GTX 480 and GeForce GTX 470 graphics cards. The ZOTAC GeForce GTX 480 and GeForce GTX 470 graphics cards take gaming to uncharted levels with new Microsoft DirectX 11, 32x anti-aliasing, NVIDIA 3D Vision Surround and HDMI 1.3a technologies.

The new ZOTAC GeForce GTX 480 and GeForce GTX 470 deliver exceptional performance and visuals with an enhanced unified architecture that features hundreds of programmable unified shaders ready to process all GPU needs for extreme high-definition 3D gaming and everyday tasks. The unified architecture combines with a large 1536MB frame buffer on the ZOTAC GeForce GTX 480 and 1280MB frame buffer on the ZOTAC GeForce GTX 470 to deliver high-quality details and breathtaking performance.

NVIDIA finally released the graphics cards it made many wait for: the DirectX 11 compliant GeForce GTX 480 and GeForce GTX 470. The two were unveiled at the PAX East gaming event, in the United States, as publications were allowed to post reviews right away. The two are based on the NVIDIA GF100 GPU, built on the 40 nm process. The higher-end GeForce GTX 480 packs 480 shader units (now referred to by NVIDIA as "CUDA cores"), branched geometry processing along with multiple tessellation units, and a 384-bit wide GDDR5 memory interface to connect to 1536 MB (1.5 GB) of memory.

The GeForce GTX 470 is the more affordable part, it packs 448 CUDA cores, and a 320-bit GDDR5 memory interface to connect to 1280 MB (1.25 GB) of memory. Both models support new features by NVIDIA, such as CUDA 3.0, faster PhysX acceleration, Stereoscopic 3D, 3D Vision surround multi display technology, as well as support for OpenCL and DirectCompute 5.0. While the GeForce GTX 480 has a suggested retail price of US $499, the GTX 470 is suggested to be priced at $349, although final pricing set by board partners could vary. NVIDIA is initially making tens of thousands of these cards, which should be available worldwide a little after April 12th.