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These recent cards confuse the heck out of me. It used to be easy: 1000s is the generation, 100s is the tier, 10s is the negligible tweak, ABC is the sub tier. What is it now?

Consumer/Integrated = GTX 1xx. Midrange->Highend = 2xx. So far, higher numbers are better.

Beyond that, they appear arbitrary.

Mr. T asked about this not long ago. Answered++. Akb25, for you too.

DX11 WILL be the biggest step of the decade for graphics, AMD's Rick Bergman told the INQUIRER recently.

Bergman, AMD's SVP for platforms told the INQ one would have to go back to DX9 to see a comparable jump in terms of wow factor for engineers and game developers, which is part of the reason the firm is pushing so hard to be first to market with DX11-ready hardware.

Bergman rejected the INQ's claim that only a minimal amount of game titles this year would take advantage of DX11, saying he knew of four to five ISVs working "eagerly" to churn out games and remarking he'd seen "great progress."

"We want to supply hardware to Microsoft and software developers so they can make DX11 games on our hardware first," Bergman told us, adding that it would put his firm in a good position for the future.

Being first would also put AMD ahead of Nvidia, something Daamit has wanted ever since the Goblin pipped it to the post with the DX10 API. "We were kind of fighting from behind, but with DX11 it feels like we're ahead this round," Bergman told us.

It certainly is interesting to see AMD putting most of its energy into DX11 leadership while Nvidia focuses maniacally on GP-GPU with its C for Cuda and Open CL. So even though NV will likely be behind ATI in DX11, ATI lags behind NV in the GP-GPU battle, which is not insignificant in the slightest.

The lines have been drawn and now it is left to the customer to ultimately decide who's approach is right.

Game on then! µ

DX11 is AMD's weapon

Just hope they bring back the 10.1 perks that some games saw. I remember there was one I had awhile back that before it was patched for nVidia, it performed better under the ATI 10.1 boards. If it wasn't for nVidia raising a stink, it wouldn't have been patched .

Bat wrote:

Every second or third day seems to bring another rebadging to give peeps the idea they're actually releasing genuinely new product, like the GTS line. I remember GTS 250 is the GTX... no, I forget now. I remembered yesterday. But, I guess that's the plan. More trouble than it's worth. Confuse-a-cat Ltd.

The 8800 GT became the 9800 GT.  Then a slightly faster 8800 GT became the new 8800 GTS not to be confused with the older/slower 8800 GTS.  The 8800 GTS then became the 9800 GTX.  The 9800 GTX was then die shrunk, to become the 9800 GTX+.  Finally, the 9800GTX+ became the GTS 250.

So in other words, the GTS 250 is basically a die shrunk 8800 GT.

When we ran the TSMC yield story, we were left owing you an explanation. Time to clear that up too… why does TSMC have to smurf up yields? Because the chip "some say doesn't exist" has disastrous yields. We refuse to be drawn into the speculation about whether the GT300 exists or not, since we have enough data on hand that would send nVidia Legal our way - but that was in the past, green guys have learned better ;-)

According to our sources close to the [silicon] heart of the matter, the problem is that nVidia has yields in the 20 percentage range. You've guessed, that is waaay [insert several "a"] too low for launch volume production. Even when TSMC improves the leakage issues [the company claims that the leakage issues are now the thing of the past], nVidia will probably send a new revision of silicon - the yields have to be get high enough to earn a little bit of money.

The current situation is that three faulty chips are made in the process to yield one working one and that is much too much, since those faulty chips aren't exactly "GTX 360" or "slower Quadro FX" grade material. Some faulty parts might work under forced cooling, but the high leakage is already an issue with the current graphics card layout. We won't go into the whole instability, does not work etc situation. As we all know, the graphics chips are at the worst possible position, facing down [unless you put them in testbed/desktop case]. With high leakage parts, the thermal shockwave is sent through the organic packaging to the PCB [Printed Circuit Board] and can cause extensive failure, like nVidia learned with their $200 million mistake called "bad bumps" or simply "bumpgate".

We have the exact percentage, but in order to protect the parties involved, we are going to refrain from posting the exact yield figure on first batch of chips. All we can say is - not yet ready for production.

nVidia GT300 - GeForce GTX 380 yields are sub-30%

A few details, contradiction on the timeframe. Nothing really meaty on that yet, tho.

AFTER MUCH sniffing about, the INQ can finally reveal the names of AMD's much anticipated 40nm DX11-based Evergreen products.

A product launch is thought to be imminent (think late September), and AMD reckons these products will fundamentally change the graphics industry and give it an advantage over arch rival Nvidia.

The highest-end enthusiast offerings are purportedly called Cypress, with performance offerings dubbed Juniper, mainstream offerings called Redwood and Cedar, and low level offerings named after the poisionous shrubbery, Hemlock. [bwing me a shwubbery!]

We've heard AMD have already received a wafer back from TSMC and that it's alive, healthy and pretty much ready for ramping production. So the 40nm fully DX11-compliant chips will be ready for launch by the end of September, even slightly ahead of Windows 7.

Nvidia is still a way behind on DX11, and from what we're seeing, AMD seems confident - nay, cocky - that Evergreen will deliver a punch to the Goblin it may take a while to recover from.

Lets just hope NV doesn't get ever-green with envy. µ

AMD's Evergreen codenames revealed

Well, this is interesting.

For the past week and a half, we've been hearing rumors citing various dates for the launch of AMD's DirectX 11 graphics cards… ranging from GDC in China to newly invented delays that would push the launch window into November.

However, all of these rumors are false, given that AMD has firmed its "Cinema 3.0/DirectX 11" launch. As tradition goes, the North American launch will happen in seven weeks in San Francisco on a very special place indeed - but we're not at liberty to say where the event will take place. All we can say is that it will be someplace that neither Intel nor nVidia would even remember.

ATI will catapult not one, but rather a complete DirectX 11 lineup into orbit, ranging from $50 to the high end parts in their respective three-figure pricing brackets. Just like the Radeon 4000 series, consisting of the 4400, 4500, 4600, 4700 and 4800 parts, the new Radeon series will consist out of entry-level [Hemlock], mainstream [Cedar, Redwood], performance [Juniper] and high-end part [Cypress]. When it comes to codenames, you'll notice that all of these parts have codenames from plants, with some belonging into the same family [Cedar, Juniper, Redwood]. Note that not all of these parts will be launched on the same day. Some parts might have to wait until Holiday season to get them in OEM-level numbers, but all in all - this is the strongest lineup ATI's had in years. We might even dare to say the strongest lineup ever from any GPU manufacturer.

According to information we have at hand, initial rumors about the names and specs proved true - these parts bring DirectX 11 compliancy from top to the bottom, and if you want to play upcoming DirectX 11 games [so far, there are six confirmed DX11 titles launching this year] in a budget less than $500, you have no other choice but to go ATI.

Light polish on Theo's verbiage.  ATI to launch DirectX 11 GPUs in seven weeks

Last edited by Bat (2009-07-24 11:04 pm)

A Poisson distribution isn't a bell curve, silly reporter...

I doubt all G92s are actually bad; there are so many 8800GTs and 9800s out there that it would be common knowledge if true.

In some cases it goes as far back as the G42. Yeah, the better coolers of desktop units forestall failure longer, perhaps long enough that many cards are upgraded from and discarded before failure.

Sony admits to failing Nvidia chips 13 months late
How long is that warranty?

SONY HAS FINALLY confessed that it used defective graphics chips in 14 models in its Vaio laptop range. The defective chips, manufactured by Nvidia, can cause distorted video, graphics display artifacts, random characters and blank screens.

The problem first arose over a year ago and Nvidia finally admitted it in an SEC 8K filing in July 2008. Major PC manufacturers including Apple, Dell and HP have long since implemented free recall and repair programmes, paid for at least in part by Nvidia.

Nvidia's problem was caused by cracking in the underfill material of the graphics chips and worsened by high levels of heat generated in laptops, and it was diagnosed by the Inquirer in September 2008.

Some manufacturers initially attempted to cover up the chip problem by supplying system patches that continually activated cooling fans to prevent further damage and stave off expensive warranty repairs.
..

Is it coincidence that this announcement - which is buried deep in the Sony Vaio support website, and only accessible if you have your model number and serial number to hand - came exactly 13 months after Nvidia finally admitted its culpability?

We can only guess how many disgruntled Sony Vaio owners have scrapped an apparently dead 'out of warranty' laptop because of the faulty Nvidia graphics chips. µ

Here's the list of Sony Vaio models affected:

VGN-FZ11x, VGN-FZ18x, VGN-FZ21x, VGN-FZ31x, VGN-FZ38x,

VGN-AR11x, VGN-AR21x, VGN-AR31x,

VGN-C1Zx, VGN-C2Zx,

VGC-LM1xx, VGC-LM2xx,

VGC-LT1xx, VGC-LT2xx.

PC Pers also notes Evergreen is on display at Quakecon.

While we are still prepping for tomorrow's Hardware Workshop hosted by PC Perspective, we decided to get some news in for you as well by stopping by the AMD suite in the hotel.  Here they were showing off the upcoming Evergreen graphics chip, first shown at Computex this year.  This DX11 hardware is the first GPU to support the technology and should be able in late fall or early winter.

Inside this system is the Evergreen GPU reference card - though we weren't allowed to open up the case to actually SEE the card.  I did take a peek at the back though and it was a dual-slot cooled card with a pair of DisplayPort outputs and a single DVI output.  The rest of the system was basic AMD-system components on Windows 7 OS.

One of the two available systems, AMD was showing the new Wolfenstein game - though it was only running DX9 code this is an IMPORTANT thing to see as we can tell the GPU is in good working order with a fully functional game, not just SDK demos.

Lotsa images too.

(Oh, look- tesselation at work genning a bazillion triangles, plus a Sturner Tigger 0.5 after a Zumbie assault! Kewl).

Last edited by Bat (2009-08-15 12:33 am)

When profits more, it always pleases!