NVIDIA's Last Minute Effort - 6850

[Atomahawk]

Its a sound business tactic. Been employed many times in the past by many companies other than nVida. Get over it.

If R420 really is as good as its meant to be it won't make any difference anyway.

Besides I thought you guys were telling me that the enthusiast market these cards are aimed were smart and read reviews/previews to make informed decisions. Doe the release of a competitors card somehow impair that smartness?

Sound business tactic? to send out new drivers a few days prior and announce a new product the day your competition shows it's latest and greatest. Then get review sights to actually bench useing these leaked moded drivers.

I come from a very competative market at manufacturers level, this would not be a tactical business move, this is what we call a petty and a pathetic attempt to steal what they can from the market. And yes most of my customers would see through this tactic, just like the smart ones here will see through it also. No smart person would defend this kind of reaction from a company, that's for sure.

 

[Joe DeFuria]

Personally, I don't see the big deal in releasing/announcing information about a new product to stifle your competitions happy-party. I mean, what's wrong with wanting to show that you have a better product than your competition? They are competition for Christ's sakes, there is no reason to play nice (and no, I'm not saying its okay to cheat). Firingsquad's play on this, however.. was pure shit - no arguments there.

I agree.

I don't really "fault" nVidia for doing this. It's just that I don't see it as necessary and it smacks of desparation....It makes them look worse, imo. But hey, they're welcome to try it.

My main gripe is with FS, and how they're handling the whole thing.

I will say that the "reason" for nvidia putting out the GT and Extreme today isn't actually because the XT's were launched today. It's because you can actually buy the pro today.

Had this been a paper launch (with the pro made available in say 30 days), nVidia would likely not release the GT/Extreme until the Pro was closer to shipping.

ATI actually shipping the card changes everything.

 

[Richard]

2) I also would not have touched the 61.11s. How many reviewers are going to continue falling for this, year after year? If you don't have time to give a new driver drop from a competitor a fair analysis because you're crunched for time due to an NDA's expiration, you might not want to touch the driver. . .especially if you don't know whether or not said driver is ever going to be made available to the public. This is common sense, folks, not rocket science.

Agreed but what gets me the most is that some of these sites using the 61.11 drivers are the same ones that during normal periods reviewing refresh cards or from new vendors fail to use drivers that have been publicaly available for more than two weeks. It's this kind of paradox that gets me.

For the 6800 GT, he HAD to use the 61.11's...because support for this card is not included in the 60.72 Forcewares.

Yet another reason NOT to include the new cards in the r420 p/review. Thank goodness for B3D.

 

[Sandwich]

n.

 

[Bjorn]

Yet another reason NOT to include the new cards in the r420 p/review. Thank goodness for B3D.

Agreed.

 

[Nick Spolec]

So basically, Nvidia sent out overclocked 6800 Ultra's, calling them new cards, the day ATI releases their product? And this is not a desperate move?

I can almost smell the NV cheats coming.... *sniffs*

Smells like teen spirit.

 

[Bjorn]

Personally, I don't see the big deal in releasing/announcing information about a new product to stifle your competitions happy-party. I mean, what's wrong with wanting to show that you have a better product than your competition? They are competition for Christ's sakes, there is no reason to play nice (and no, I'm not saying its okay to cheat). Firingsquad's play on this, however.. was pure shit - no arguments there.

I agree. Especially about the Firingsquad thing. Ok, using beta drivers is one thing, after all, aren't all current drivers for these cards beta ?

But naming the article "NVIDIA's GeForce 6800 Ultra Extreme and 6800 GT" at the launch of the X800 and just include those cards in the benchmarks ? Well, i don't really know what to say.

 

[Caftain]

After what nVidia have pulled the last years who is surprised.

They sure are desperate. Kind of ironic ATI still can tease nVidia with refreshes of their old R300 when nVidia go head over tail to release the best video card out there...

But really they have 2000 NV40:s that run well in overclocked settings and thus they will sell for 100$ more... How many do you think will get them??

 

[Bjorn]

So basically, Nvidia sent out overclocked 6800 Ultra's, calling them new cards, the day ATI releases their product? And this is not a desperate move?

I can almost smell the NV cheats coming.... *sniffs*

Smells like teen spirit.

I guess you haven't heard of the expression "you shouldn't paint satan on the wall" ? (only remotely fun if you're swedish )

 

[pino]

2) I also would not have touched the 61.11s. How many reviewers are going to continue falling for this, year after year? If you don't have time to give a new driver drop from a competitor a fair analysis because you're crunched for time due to an NDA's expiration, you might not want to touch the driver. . .especially if you don't know whether or not said driver is ever going to be made available to the public. This is common sense, folks, not rocket science.

60.72 and 61.11 are both beta drivers released only to press and developers. 60.72 are NOT the official and NOT bug free in any way also.
Only difference i can think of is the 3mark2k3 approve thingy on 60.72.

 

[dr3amz]

Personally, I don't see the big deal in releasing/announcing information about a new product to stifle your competitions happy-party. I mean, what's wrong with wanting to show that you have a better product than your competition? They are competition for Christ's sakes, there is no reason to play nice (and no, I'm not saying its okay to cheat). Firingsquad's play on this, however.. was pure shit - no arguments there.

I agree. Especially about the Firingsquad thing. Ok, using beta drivers is one thing, after all, aren't all current drivers for these cards beta ?

But naming the article "NVIDIA's GeForce 6800 Ultra Extreme and 6800 GT" at the launch of the X800 and just include those cards in the benchmarks ? Well, i don't really know what to say.

not sure tbh - perhaps he thought that including the x800 benchies in there would be ok if he could get the x800 review out shortly after.

hasn't happened like that though, and the more i read it/comments the more and more im inclined to agree.

you can't get away from the fact that what he's done so far just comes across as complete nvidiotcy

 

[dr3amz]

Personally, I don't see the big deal in releasing/announcing information about a new product to stifle your competitions happy-party. I mean, what's wrong with wanting to show that you have a better product than your competition? They are competition for Christ's sakes, there is no reason to play nice (and no, I'm not saying its okay to cheat). Firingsquad's play on this, however.. was pure shit - no arguments there.

I agree. Especially about the Firingsquad thing. Ok, using beta drivers is one thing, after all, aren't all current drivers for these cards beta ?

But naming the article "NVIDIA's GeForce 6800 Ultra Extreme and 6800 GT" at the launch of the X800 and just include those cards in the benchmarks ? Well, i don't really know what to say.

not sure tbh - perhaps he thought that including the x800 benchies in there would be ok if he could get the x800 review out shortly after.

hasn't happened like that though, and the more i read it/comments the more and more im inclined to agree.

you can't get away from the fact that what he's done so far just comes across as complete nvidiotcy

to cover a news update in detail regarding a cheap last minute trick by nvidia, and basically snubbing a major card review/release to do so, is just well... I hope ATI consider dropping them and supplying to a more deserving site.

 

[jimmyjames123]

Bjorn, I agree with you, they slipped up a bit there. Probably what would have been more appropriate is to first bench the 6800UE and 6800GT against the 6800U and current gen cards...release the 6800UE/GT article...and then release an X800XT/Pro article including all the graphs together.

Ultimately, we are splitting hairs here though. One way or another, we will see a formal "Radeon X800" review posted at Firingsquad very soon. I don't think FS was intentionally trying to show ATI in a behind the scenes fashion. What they seem to be doing is devoting one article to the 6800UE/GT, and one article to the X800XT/Pro.

 

[thop]

FarCry Benchmarks with a renamed FarCry.exe (-> FartCry.exe :?) over at chip.de with 61.11, the one at the top is the FartCry.exe one.

 

[DarN]

I guess you haven't heard of the expression "you shouldn't paint satan on the wall" ? (only remotely fun if you're swedish )

Or norwegian...

 

[Nick Spolec]

...........Ha.

I wonder what the optimizations are?

 

[Bjorn]

I guess you haven't heard of the expression "you shouldn't paint satan on the wall" ? (only remotely fun if you're swedish )

Or norwegian...

Let's just say Scandinavian to cover all possibilities

 

[digitalwanderer]

Merriam-Webster definition of invidious: tending to cause discontent, animosity, or envy.

Oooh, that's me new word for the day....I like it!

Thanks Joe!

 

[digitalwanderer]

FarCry Benchmarks with a renamed FarCry.exe (-> FartCry.exe :?) over at chip.de with 61.11, the one at the top is the FartCry.exe one.

Oh lords, here we go....

 

[Stryyder]

FarCry Benchmarks with a renamed FarCry.exe (-> FartCry.exe :?) over at chip.de with 61.11, the one at the top is the FartCry.exe one.

Wow something smells rotten in Denmark