ELSA hints GT206 and GT212

[Silent_Buddha]

It all depends on the application; GTA4 is an extreme sample, but in benchmarks made by iirc quite reputable site (which name i can't recall atm, but i think it was some german site) HD38-series card with 1GB mem actually was faster than HD48-series card with 512MB mem when the textures were set to high(est) quality

In that case, Nvidia is expecting whatever this is to be as fast or faster than HD 46xx. And looking at those. Yeah I guess they do come in 512 meg and 1 gig sizes. Interesting, I hadn't looked at that market segment in a while.

Amazing that we have old HD 3870 level of performance in the 50 USD price range.

Regards,
SB

 

[CJ]

GT214/215(supposed to be 128SPs).

Last I heard about GT215 was four clusters of 24, so 96 SPs and 32 textures.

 

[Vincent]

Last I heard about GT215 was four clusters of 24, so 96 SPs and 32 textures.

Is there any upcoming GT21X as the 10 clusters of 24

 

[Vincent]

Everybody noticed long ago and we all bitched about it back then too.

24 SP's = uninspired GT200 clones? Meh.

Performance wise, it seems questionable to me.

 

[Jawed]

So are NVidia's next GPUs really going to be D3D10.1? Is this because 10.1 is the "baseline" for W7, with any missing hardware capabilities either emulated (seemingly in Warp?) or a fall-back used (hurting performance?).

Jawed

 

[Novum]

Windows 7 can take advantage from D3D10.1 when rendering Aero, but it will only improve performance.

There will be no WARP emulation of features. WARP is only used if you explicitly create a software device.

 

[Jawed]

Ah, I was under the impression that software rendering would kick in where the hardware is lacking.

Maybe that's only for Aero, but in this case the use of 10.1 is so limited (tracking hotspot on the taskbar, anything else?) that no-one will notice?

Jawed

 

[Blazkowicz]

no way they are 10.1, those are G80 derivatives again.
If I believe a few rumors and my opinion, I'd say the cards are 1x32 SP, 2x32 SP and 4x32 SP

 

[DegustatoR]

no way they are 10.1, those are G80 derivatives again.

10.1 is a somewhat simple update. NV can easily implement 10.1 support in G8x derrivative.

If I believe a few rumors and my opinion, I'd say the cards are 1x32 SP, 2x32 SP and 4x32 SP

Yeah, well, that doesn't mean that one of four multiprocessors in each TPC won't be used for redunduncy on TSMCs 40G for the time being...

 

[Lukfi]

10.1 is a somewhat simple update. NV can easily implement 10.1 support in G8x derrivative.

If it really were that simple, why didn't nVidia implement DX10.1 in GT200, huh? :smile:

 

[CJ]

If it really were that simple, why didn't nVidia implement DX10.1 in GT200, huh? :smile:

Supposedly they have to change some stuff in the texture units to support a DX10.1 feature like Gather4/Fetch4. ATI already supported that ever since R580/RV530. So for ATI it was a small step to support DX10.1 while for NV it most likely is a bigger step.

 

[DegustatoR]

If it really were that simple, why didn't nVidia implement DX10.1 in GT200, huh? :smile:

Probably because 10.1 specs were published when GT200 design was already complete (10.1 was introduced in Autumn of 2007 with RV670; and GT200 was supposed to be launched at the end of 2007 or at the beginning of 2008). Implementing 10.1 support at this stage would push GT200 to the end of 2008 or even in 2009. For such an unimportant functionality update this wasn't an option. But it looks like for GT21x which went through the design stage after 10.1 specs were finalised it was.

Supposedly they have to change some stuff in the texture units to support a DX10.1 feature like Fetch4. ATI already supported that ever since R580/RV530. So for ATI it was a small step to support DX10.1 while for NV it most likely is a bigger step.

I'd say that most of changes for 10.1 support are needed in G8x ROPs. NVs TUs have supported something like Fetch4 since NV30. But per-MRT blending modes and programmable MSAA patterns never was a part of NVs ROPs.
Come to think of it, they well may implement 10.1 via shader ALUs in some parts. This way they'll have the checkbox and undermine 10.1 performance to the point were everyone will simply use 10.0 (and 11.0?) and don't even bother with 10.1 anywhere.

 

[Jawed]

http://222.73.168.146/en/NEWS/news_detail.aspx?id=20

February 2008 S3 had D3D10.1.

Jawed

 

[Lukfi]

And ATI had D3D10.1 in 2007, meaning the specs must have been available for some time then, at least to the GPU guys. Doesn't change anything on the fact that it's probably not so easy for nVidia, so they let go with GT200 and they will most probably let go with GT21x.

 

[AlexV]

Supposedly they have to change some stuff in the texture units to support a DX10.1 feature like Fetch4. ATI already supported that ever since R580/RV530. So for ATI it was a small step to support DX10.1 while for NV it most likely is a bigger step.

The ROPs is where it's at.

 

[willardjuice]

The ROPs is where it's at.

And the feature in question I believe has been supported since the 9700 for ATi (someone might have to verify that).

 

[rjc]

Forgot to post this, found via vr-zone last week:

http://www.4gamer.net/games/086/G008634/20090605058/
Pictures of various laptops containing the new chips, including a info from the nvidia control panel on the GT240 model:

Driver Version: 185.95
Stream Processors: 48
Graphics Clock: 550Mhz
Memory Clock: 790Mhz(1580 Mhz)
Memory interface : 128bit
Dedicated video memory: 1024Mb

From the same event in english:
http://news.driversdown.com/News/200906/05-11271_4.html

However, the GPUs themselves aren't any different and will continue be using the G92 graphics architecture and not the GT200 architecture that's seen in the high-end desktop graphics cards of the GeForce GTX 285 and the likes. While this wasn't totally unexpected since the old G92 is plenty adequate in both performance and features, the new 40nm based mobile GPUs will take on newer but confusing naming scheme such as the GTX 260M and GTS 210M - and that something we dreaded since it wasn't even using the newer GT200 architecture to begin with. In any case here's a variety of notebooks you can expect in the next few months to sport this new graphics engine.

Hopefully someone at event bothered to double check all the high end models labelled GTX2xx were G92 based and there was no GT214/215 present.

 

[Tchock]

http://www.semiaccurate.com/2009/06/14/nvidia-launches-5-40nm-mobile-parts-monday

English and full of vitriol.

 

[DegustatoR]

and that something we dreaded since it wasn't even using the newer GT200 architecture to begin with

That's weak. They should try harder next time.

 

[neliz]

put me down with a not surprised checkbox.