GeForce 9600 GT: photos & specifications CES 2008 : nForce 790i New nForce 700i IGPs starting in April? Nvidia launches the Quadro FX 3700 AMD: Less R&D for the high end?

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GeForce 9600 GT: photos & specifications   Posted on 09/01/2008 at 16:54 by Nicolas

	Tom's Hardware TW has published photos of the GeForce 9600 GT which is expected out on February 14th. They indicate that it is equipped with a G94 engraved in 65nm and has 64 scalar processors and a 256 bit memory controller. GPU/shader core/memory frequencies are 650/1625/900 MHz. Just like the GeForce 8800 GT, the 512 MB version should have the center stage but 256 MB and 1 GB versions should also arrive. Naturally, it supports PCI-Express 2.0 and manages OpenGL 2.1. According to our sources, it still will not support DirectX 10.1 when this API will arrive in this quarter with the release of Windows Vista’s Service Pack 1.

CES 2008 : nForce 790i   Posted on 09/01/2008 at 12:48 by Nicolas - source: Fudzilla

	At the CES, EVGA has on display at its stand a motherboard equipped with an nForce 790i SLI chipset. Compared to the nForce 780i, it has native support on the SPP level of PCI-Express 2.0 as well as FSB1600 and DDR3 support. Other specifications are more standards: 2 Gigabit Ethernet ports, 6 SATA ports configurable in RAID 0, 1, 0+1 and 5, as well as 2 PATA ports. This should be the last Nvidia chipset that won’t have a graphic core and is therefore not Hybrid SLI compatible.

New nForce 700i IGPs starting in April?   Posted on 09/01/2008 at 12:07 by Nicolas

	According to information from motherboard manufacturers given to Digitimes, Nvidia should launch new IGPs under the name MCP7A in April to counter Intel’s G4x. They will set themselves apart from the GeForce 7xx0-nForce 6x0i launched at the end of September by memory management on two channels, DirectX 10 and Hybrid SLI support as well as by the presence of the PureVideo HD engine. Furthermore, we can logically expect PCI-Express 2.0 support. Note that in August the Californian firm should also offer an MCP7C which is limited to DDR2-800 memory and this on one channel.

Nvidia launches the Quadro FX 3700   Posted on 09/01/2008 at 11:27 by Nicolas

	Nvidia has just launched a new professional card the Quadro FX 3700 which will replace the ageing Quadro FX 3500 in the « High-End » segment. In practice, it’s a new version of the G92 and therefore supports the PCI-Express 2.0 interface. Just like the GeForce 8800 GT, the GPU has 112 scalar processors and communicates with 512 MB of memory via a 256 bit bus. This translates into a bandwidth of 51.2 GB/s and corresponds to a frequency of around 860 MHz. Of course, the card has specific drivers for pro 3D software which explains its announced price of 859€ taxes included. This figure however seems a bit low as overseas it’s at $1599. Finally, it will be integrated or distributed in Europe and the US through the usual partners of HP, Dell, IBM, Sun and PNY Technologies.

AMD: Less R&D for the high end?   Posted on 09/01/2008 at 01:08 by Nicolas - source: Business Standard

	While AMD’s share price continues to plummet (it lost another 33% in less than a month and is now at $6) its Chief Operating Officer, Dirk Meyer, clearly indicated his intention to review R&D financing in a keynote speech at the International VLSI Conference (very large-scale integration) which just ended in Hyderabad, India. To sum things up, research and development costs are currently growing faster than revenue and this necessarily has an impact on profits. He added that the industry should therefore concentrate on new business models, for example, to enable access to affordable PCs with a goal of half of the planet’s population in 2015. Amongst other topics, he insisted on the evolution of PCs as well as hand held devices (PDAs, laptops, portable players, etc.), the first tending to become a platform oriented to different types of media and the second becoming more for entertainment. He also said that even if AMD will continue to invest in the increase in the number of transistors per processor, the industry will need to be able to innovate easily to reduce R&D costs. Clearly, AMD seems especially eager to diversify its activities even more in order to get the most out of its R&D. This discourse sounds good but leaves some serious doubts about the firm’s real desire to continue to evolve in the high end. Some may remember before the arrival of the Athlon in 1999, that AMD CPUs could only rival Intel in terms of the performance/price ratio and the Santa Clara giant had almost a complete monopoly on the « Performance » segment. A little less than 10 years later, we may now find ourselves in a similar situation. In the end this would hurt consumers given the evolution of prices caused by competition between the two manufacturers.