[Arun]

Please keep the financial discussions in the appropriate forum, which is 3D Graphics Companies, Industry, & Misc. For example, in this thread, especially so since I figure the article is arguably very related to the discussion...

[trinibwoy]

Originally Posted by nexus_alpha

The cheapest GTX I can find is $548 I really doubt the price would drop by more than a hundred dollars in such a short period of time.

Yeah that would be a big drop in a short time. I expect to see a bunch of rebate offers at first. This is an agressive (or is desperate?) move from AMD though - a GTX beater for $400? Sign me up!

But Nvidia has a lot of free high-end margin from the past few months to mitigate any hit from a future price drop. Can't wait to see their response, if they are able to respond that is.

[Bjorn]

Originally Posted by trinibwoy

Yeah that would be a big drop in a short time. I expect to see a bunch of rebate offers at first. This is an agressive (or is desperate?) move from AMD though - a GTX beater for $400? Sign me up!

I'm guessing desperate, if it's true that is. Why would they need to sell even a cutdown R600 for 400$ if it's got more features + performance then the 8800 GTX ?

But Nvidia has a lot of free high-end margin from the past few months to mitigate any hit from a future price drop. Can't wait to see their response, if they are able to respond that is.

The 8800 GTX has been on the market for quite some time now. The price is afaik pretty much the same as when it was released, at least in Sweden. So i'm guessing that they have huge margins on the GTX atm.

[trinibwoy]

Originally Posted by Bjorn

I'm guessing desperate. Why would they need to sell even a cutdown R600 for 400$ if it's got more features + performance then the 8800 GTX ?

To claw back market share ASAP? I guess that would fall into the desperate category. But they must believe that their cost structure is much better than Nvidia's for them to think that Nvidia wont just slash to match. And in the end they both lose. I guess dragging industry margins down in order to move product is something they are willing to do as someone pointed out with the AthlonXP. Same thing is happening now with the X2's I guess.

Although if they can cut prices and offer a more compelling product it could be a good move. Nvidia can cut prices to match but they can't do anything in the short-term about a lagging feature-set or performance.

[Silent_Buddha]

Originally Posted by _xxx_

Not really, since their expenses back then were a fraction of what they have now.

Also, the $400 XT in May/June won't be cheap by any means. The G80 GTX will also be much cheaper by then, there is simply no possible way to undercut nV on prices this way. nV simply have loads of pricing headroom already now, let alone in June.

Aye, their expenses are higher now but due to maintaining demand and marketshare due to cutting margins they also have significantly higher cash flow than they did back then. Demand would have to take a nosedive and their marketshare would have to fall by half before they found themselves back in a situation similar to what they were in back then. [speaking of the 586, K6, K6-2 days]

True, assuming that HD 2900 XT is similar to or faster than 8800 GTX, Nvidia won't have any choice but to drop prices to a similar level. However, I doubt they will undercut the 2900 by much if at all. Their cost to manufacture should be relatively similar between the two cards. 8 PCB layes vs 6 layers (?) for 8800. 512 mb vs 768 mb for 8800. 1 chip (ati) vs 2 chips (nv).

Also, Nvidia doesn't have a history of cutting into margins like AMD does. Even with their 5xxx series they weren't willing to cut margins to virtually nothing. AMD on the other hand is no stranger to doing this if it fits with their long term plans.

However, if both are the same price, Nvidia will still sell more hardware as there is just more NV fans than there are ATI fans.

-----

Myself, at this point the thought of 24x AA has me drooling at the possibilities.

-----

Considering HD 2900 XTX has been shipping to OEMs for a while now. I'm expecting a delay in the XTX, RV610 and RV630 being due to unexpectedly high demand from OEMs and AMD not being able to stock enough for retail availability while still meeting demand from OEMs.

What I'm wondering is, if OEM's will be required to hold sales of systems featuring HD 2900 XTX, RV610 and RV630 until such time as ATI releases them into the retail channel.

Additionally, while I still think it's a LOW probability, I still can't shake the feeling that HD 2900 XTX - RETAIL is going to be 65 nm R650. While HD 2900 XTX - OEM is going to initially be 80nm R600 with a migration at 65 nm R650 sometime in the future.

After all, OEMs are not adverse to hot running parts requiring excessive cooling. Especially if they also come with a price break. Just look at the original 7900 Quad SLI system that Dell was offering. NOT suitable for Retail, but that didn't bother Dell very much.

Also, I would NOT be surprised if Dell had an order in for a rather large number of R600's. After all, they were the largest OEM purchasers of R420 I believe.

Apple might not ship nearly as many computers as Dell or HP, however, they generally tend to install one graphics companies cards from top to bottom and have a history of generally favoring ATI over Nvidia.

Regards,
SB

[Silent_Buddha]

One more rather important insight.

IF...IF...IF AMD actually is selling a large volume of R6xx products to OEMs.

That would mean they have lost virtually no money by delaying R600 [edit - from the Feb./March timeframe]. It would just mean that instead of making money in the retail channel they are currently making money from OEMs.

IF...IF...IF this is true. That would mean AMD knows how to run a business better than the majority of the forum readers here.

Regards,
Croaker

[Bjorn]

Originally Posted by trinibwoy

To claw back market share ASAP? I guess that would fall into the desperate category.

Is that really done in the 400$ price bracket ? Especially with much lower priced cards being released very soon.

But they must believe that their cost structure is much better than Nvidia's for them to think that Nvidia wont just slash to match. And in the end they both lose. I guess dragging industry margins down in order to move product is something they are willing to do as someone pointed out with the AthlonXP. Same thing is happening now with the X2's I guess.

Perhaps, but look at Nvidia and the NV30 series. They didn't lower the prices that much and they were late and had a bad product too.

The X2 is dropping in price but it's not necessarily priced that low compared to the performance. Definitely not if you consider the overclocking possibilities with the C2D. Imo, Intel doesn't need to lower it's prices even with AMD's latest price drops.

Although if they can cut prices and offer a more compelling product it could be a good move. Nvidia can cut prices to match but they can't do anything in the short-term about a lagging feature-set or performance.

True. I just don't see the reason why they would sell a great performing chip/card with loads of features for a much lower price then the competition. Especially not if you're in a somewhat more troublesome financial situation then the competition.

[trinibwoy]

Originally Posted by Silent_Buddha

IF...IF...IF this is true. That would mean AMD knows how to run a business better than the majority of the forum readers here.

Finance 101: $$$ six months ago is worth > $$$ today. Based on your logic, if they go out of business for a year and then get a year's worth of revenue a year from now that would be good business. Believe me, this is not the situation AMD would have chosen. And you are talking about OEM orders for mid-range parts - AFAIK they have never been the focus of any discussions on R600 delays.

[erick]

Originally Posted by Bjorn

Perhaps, but look at Nvidia and the NV30 series. They didn't lower the prices that much and they were late and had a bad product too.

I just don't see the reason why they would sell a great performing chip/card with loads of features for much lower price then the competition. Especially not if you're in a somewhat more troublesome financial situation then the competition.

This is part of the reason why the GeForce FX series is considered the greatest failure of all time. If they had cut down on prices, who knows? They might not have been the best, but at least they'd have been the most popular.

Which brings us to the current situation. I'm pretty sure the R600XT would meet a lukewarm reception at best, if it were to launch at $549. In marketing terms, it has less memory, it arrives 6 months late and it does not have a solid performance edge.
This is the card that would leave reviewers shrugging their shoulders.

Now consider the same card priced at $399. Suddenly all that was working against it turns in favour of it. Less memory doesn't matter, look at the bandwidth on this beast! Arriving later doesn't matter, it has much better Vista drivers and a lot more multimedia features! And just look at the price-performance ratio!

No reviewer will be left shrugging their shoulders in the face of such a deal. You can pretty much expect rave reviews all around. And the consumer will do as he always has - buying the best deal. And that is without a doubt a R600 XT at $399.

[Bjorn]

Originally Posted by erick

This is part of the reason why the GeForce FX series is considered the greatest failure of all time. If they had cut down on prices, who knows? They might not have been the best, but at least they'd have been the most popular.

More popular to some extent. But you also loose mindshare. A Skoda is cheaper then a Audi. But for a good reason. The other problem is that you assume that Ati wouldn't have lowered their prices to compete. That would perhaps have made really Nvidia popular (wouldn't have been good financially though)

Which brings us to the current situation. I'm pretty sure the R600XT would meet a lukewarm reception at best, if it were to launch at $549. In marketing terms, it has less memory, it arrives 6 months late and it does not have a solid performance edge.
This is the card that would leave reviewers shrugging their shoulders.

549$ is to much. Especially if it has 512 Mb of RAM. But the assumption is that it also got an edge on features.

Now consider the same card priced at $399. Suddenly all that was working against it turns in favour of it. Less memory doesn't matter, look at the bandwidth on this beast! Arriving later doesn't matter, it has much better Vista drivers and a lot more multimedia features! And just look at the price-performance ratio!

That's a lot of assumptions. And less memory definitely matters. Just look at the 320 Mb 8800 GTS.

[erick]

Originally Posted by Bjorn

That's a lot of assumptions. And less memory definitely matters. Just look at the 320 Mb 8800 GTS.

I was just trying to predict the reaction of the reviewers

But on the other hand, I do not believe that 8800 GTX will have an upper hand based on the extra 256MB memory. For that to happen, you would have to find a game that uses more video memory than 512MB. I don't think we are at this point yet. I think Hellgate: London or Crysis may change this, but at the same time I'm pretty confident that these games have been developed with the assumption that you have separate settings for 256MB, 512MB and 1024MB. I am highly doubtful that anyone would create a separate quality level for a 768MB card.

[Arun]

Developers will optimize their texture size with usual resolutions in mind. Not extreme ones. So for example, a 2560x1600 framebuffer with 8x MSAA (or 16xQ CSAA, for that matter) and FP16 HDR would require 384MB of memory (2560x1600x8x(8+4)/1024/1000)...

A 4096x4096 shadowmap would take 64MiB, too, for example. (note: I am correctly using MB and MiB here! Neither is a typo! 16:10 ftl?)

It remains to be seen if this does any difference though, but I'm sure we'll know for sure soon enough.

[Bjorn]

Originally Posted by erick

but at the same time I'm pretty confident that these games have been developed with the assumption that you have separate settings for 256MB, 512MB and 1024MB. I am highly doubtful that anyone would create a separate quality level for a 768MB card.

I would guess that the game developers target the cards that are on the market. And at this moment, there's a lot more 768 Mb cards then 1 Gb cards...

[_xxx_]

Originally Posted by Bjorn

Perhaps, but look at Nvidia and the NV30 series. They didn't lower the prices that much and they were late and had a bad product too.

But they could still milk the innovator/market leader image they had back then after the 3dfx demise. Also, they replaced it with the NV35 just a few months later, so it wasn't quite a comparable situation at all. ATI on the other hand has has only problems and delay consistently over the last two years or so, so they're nowhere near the "safe" king-of-the-hill position nV had back then, rather the opposite.

[Bjorn]

Originally Posted by _xxx_

Also, they replaced it with the NV35 just a few months later, so it wasn't quite a comparable situation at all.

I was taking the NV35 into consideration also. Was it faster, had a better featureset then the competition ?

ATI on the other hand has has only problems and delay consistently over the last two years or so, so they're nowhere near the "safe" king-of-the-hill position nV had back then, rather the opposite.

I would argue that there's no safe king-of-the-hill position in the GPU business.

[Kaotik]

Originally Posted by Bjorn

That's a lot of assumptions. And less memory definitely matters. Just look at the 320 Mb 8800 GTS.

Of course memory matters - but where's the point atm where it doesn't matter anymore? Is anything over 512MB "wasted"? Over 768MB? 1GB?
We know that 512MB makes a difference, but how much over it you need to go when it doesn't anymore?

[_xxx_]

Originally Posted by Bjorn

I was taking the NV35 into consideration also. Was it faster, had a better featureset then the competition ?

Of course not, but it was way better than the NV30 and dirt cheap compared to Radeons while being more or less competitive speed-wise, so it was ok from the marketing POV. Hell, I even played Doom3 on my old NV35 when it was freshly released.

I would argue that there's no safe king-of-the-hill position in the GPU business.

Well not permanently, but temporarely at least. They had a good run since the original TNT until then, so the people expected the next Big Thing from them kinda automatically. And noone expected anything useful from ATI prior to R300.

[INKster]

Originally Posted by erick

I was just trying to predict the reaction of the reviewers

But on the other hand, I do not believe that 8800 GTX will have an upper hand based on the extra 256MB memory. For that to happen, you would have to find a game that uses more video memory than 512MB. I don't think we are at this point yet. I think Hellgate: London or Crysis may change this, but at the same time I'm pretty confident that these games have been developed with the assumption that you have separate settings for 256MB, 512MB and 1024MB. I am highly doubtful that anyone would create a separate quality level for a 768MB card.

Speaking of Crysis...
If they are indeed rebuilding the engine and adding new assets, ensuring higher quality shader effects and large resolution textures should be their top priority.


edit
Hey, i'm now in the 1K post club.

[Geo]

Originally Posted by trinibwoy

To claw back market share ASAP? I guess that would fall into the desperate category. But they must believe that their cost structure is much better than Nvidia's for them to think that Nvidia wont just slash to match.

Well, AMD will have the inherent advantage of that 256MB of memory that won't be on the board. I still think that was a major consideration in switching to "XT first" (apparently).

[Geo]

Originally Posted by INKster

Hey, i'm now in the 1K post club.

Well, there goes the neighborhood!

Congrats. . . new super powers should unlock in the next 24 hrs. . .

[Jawed]

Originally Posted by trinibwoy

Nvidia can cut prices to match but they can't do anything in the short-term about a lagging feature-set or performance.

Or their reputation for Vista.

Jawed

[trinibwoy]

Considering Vista's short life to date and the relatively few people who are actually using it I doubt Nvidia will have any trouble shaking off their Vista foibles if they can deliver solid drivers before R600 launch - people seem to change their opinion on that every two days when another beta leaks And of course, all that is dependent on the state of AMD's driver offerings.

[Jawed]

Originally Posted by trinibwoy

Considering Vista's short life to date and the relatively few people who are actually using it I doubt Nvidia will have any trouble shaking off their Vista foibles if they can deliver solid drivers before R600 launch - people seem to change their opinion on that every two days when another beta leaks And of course, all that is dependent on the state of AMD's driver offerings.

Hmm, do you think the OEMs think like that?

Jawed

[Kaotik]

nvm.

[INKster]

Originally Posted by trinibwoy

Considering Vista's short life to date and the relatively few people who are actually using it I doubt Nvidia will have any trouble shaking off their Vista foibles if they can deliver solid drivers before R600 launch - people seem to change their opinion on that every two days when another beta leaks And of course, all that is dependent on the state of AMD's driver offerings.

But you have to admit it.
Placing the thousands of buyers of a 6 month old (and quite expensive) family of graphics cards in second place in driver development, just to hand priority to software houses who should have had the hardware long before that is a bit hard to swallow. Don't you agree ?

This latest statement from NV appears to basically regurgitate the words of another official just a few weeks ago, but there's still no sign of a real improvement.
Many of the same bugs are still there, the performance is still lacking, the control panel is still confusing and illogical, the new driver releases are still very far apart and lack anything other than Beta status/non-WHQL, etc, etc.


It's especially baffling to previous longtime buyers of Nvidia hardware, because their drivers used to mean top-notch reliability, and now...