Interview with Eoin Leyden of Creative Graphics

[Ante P]

If I mean US I wouldn't have said Sweden now would I?

 

[LittlePenny]

Nvidia is going to be pushing their NV30 architecture aggressively, pushing down the price point of their DirectX 9 capable card to about $100 in early 2003.

 

[RussSchultz]

Nvidia is going to be pushing their NV30 architecture aggressively, pushing down the price point of their DirectX 9 capable card to about $100 in early 2003.

Zoinks! And there I was about to buy a 9500 pro. Nothing like the promise of something cheaper around the corner to keep you from buying.

 

[Joe DeFuria]

Zoinks! And there I was about to buy a 9500 pro. Nothing like the promise of something cheaper around the corner to keep you from buying.

I hope you're willing to wait until April to save the $80 on a part that might not perform as well as a 9500 Pro.

No, I have no idea how the "budget" DX9 card from nVidia will actually perform, but it should be scheduled for a March / April release date if they are on their normal "Spring" schedule for those chips.

In any case, if you do wait, you'll likely be able to choose from both nVidia and ATI $100 DX9 (RV-350) offerings.

 

[RussSchultz]

Since I'm all about impulse buys, I still went to CompUSA today. Room on the shelf for 9500 pro, no stock though.

 

[megadrive0088]

sorry if this has already been said (have not read the whole thread) the GeForce3 (NV20) when launched in early 2001 was going to cost $600, I believe. They ended up only being $400-$450, did they not?

If Nvidia has more than one speed grade of GeForce FX, I'll bet the top end version (the Ultra) ends up being only $399 or at most $449. we'll see. Nvidia is almost sure to lower prices as it faces R350 and other versions of R300.

 

[BenSkywalker]

the GeForce3 (NV20) when launched in early 2001 was going to cost $600, I believe. They ended up only being $400-$450, did they not?

I never saw a single thing outside of rumors posted by people indicating that the NV20 was going to cost $600(although there were a lot of those). It was available at $357 street at launch( http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.html?i=1465&p=4 ). If the NV30 follows suit with the previous core revision in terms of pricing rumors v reality ratio the NV30 would have a street price of $297.50 at launch.

 

[hughJ]

"I never saw a single thing outside of rumors posted by people indicating that the NV20 was going to cost $600(although there were a lot of those)"

the many "rumors" probably started when Steve Jobs said it in plain english at the gef3 launch? i remember seeing the slideshow show the MSRP of "$600"

 

[Teasy]

"Clearly GeForceFX is a very expensive card. NVIDIA in the US say with will be $499 that’s means it will have a street price in the UK of £449-£499 … that’s a lot of money!"

Well I'm glad to see that this guy can convert Dollars to Pounds properly

I certainly hope Nvidia don't think they can sell a graphics card here for £500 ($800). If so they're kidding themselves, they'll fail big time, which is what they'd deserve.

£400 is the limit for a graphics card IMO, even that is very excessive. Personally I wouldn't even pay more then £200, but plenty of people would of course. But I can't see anyone paying £500, appart from the odd lunatic.

 

[Novdid]

In any case, if you do wait, you'll likely be able to choose from both nVidia and ATI $100 DX9 (RV-350) offerings.

It's almost never worth waiting for anything in this industry, there's always something better around the corner. Although I don't deny that there are some extreme cases where it's worth waiting!

 

[Hellbinder]

There are only a Coupple things that I want to comment on from his comments.

1. There is no .13 R300.. Its .15

2. R3350 simply does not need to be 500mhz to beat the Nv30. Hell 450Mhz Oc R300 are already turning in numbers very similar to what Nvidia has said the Nv30 *Ultra* will do. R350 has more going for it than a simple Core clock increase..

 

[BenSkywalker]

the many "rumors" probably started when Steve Jobs said it in plain english at the gef3 launch? i remember seeing the slideshow show the MSRP of "$600"

The price the board would cost for Macs from Apple, how does that relate to the price of PC boards? Right now(I have Apple's site open) the base G4 tower ships with a GF4MX, upgrading to a Radeon9000(64MB) costs $100 with an upgrade to a GF4Ti board running $350. You can get a Radeon 9000Pro 64MB board off of PW for $81, a GF4Ti4600 for $210. A simple upgrade from Apple cost you 23% and 67% more then buying a board straight out just for an upgrade. Trying to base how much a board is going to cost around how badly Steve Jobs wants to screw Mac users amounts to a rumor IMO. With what they charge for the Ti, it wouldn't surprise me to see them get $500 or more for the R9700Pro.

 

[Sage]

2. R3350 simply does not need to be 500mhz to beat the Nv30. Hell 450Mhz Oc R300 are already turning in numbers very similar to what Nvidia has said the Nv30 *Ultra* will do. R350 has more going for it than a simple Core clock increase..

youre forgetting that nVidia has a large number of NV30s in their lab running 600MHz+. Also, NV35 has taped out already so I imagine the R350 will have a lot more to contend with than the little ol' GeForceFX Ultra.

 

[WaltC]

Nvidia is going to be pushing their NV30 architecture aggressively, pushing down the price point of their DirectX 9 capable card to about $100 in early 2003.

Zoinks! And there I was about to buy a 9500 pro. Nothing like the promise of something cheaper around the corner to keep you from buying.

*chuckle* Using that formula you'd never buy anything as there's always something better and cheaper "around the corner"...

 

[RussSchultz]

Certainly, but if you've got no reason to buy it anyways...

Basically, I'm a very impulse buy type shopper. If the mood strikes me, I'll buy, but occasionally the little angel on my shoulder wins and says "no! no! don't spend more money!" and the 'cheaper around the corner' argument works out ok.

Unless that damn devil is there saying "you suck at tribes because your video card stinks! Buy! Buy Buy!"...

 

[WaltC]

Hi,


Eoin Leyden doesn't know how the performance of the .13 R300 will "come out", but makes a guess, using a 500Mhz R300 as an example, that will come close, if not better the NV30.

Perhaps he is talking about a part that outperforms the current Radeon 9700 Pro by around a third, from his experience.

It's always a mistake to judge competing architectures by MHz, whether it's cpu, vpus, or gpus. The statement says to me that he knows little to nothing about either product--else he would not make it on the mere basis of MHz. We should remember that we have yet to see even a public demo sample of nv30 running at 500MHz, so there is much uncertainty remaining in the picture. I think nVidia will hit its MHz target--however it is unknown what architectural sacrifices they may have to make to do so. With ATI the picture is crystal clear. All that remains in question is what improvements over the existing R300 ATI will be able to add to the .13 micron R400.

nVIDIA by really pushing "Cinematic" graphics with the Dawn and Ogre demos, are making the GeForce FX brand as recognisable and consumable as they can, scoring a fillip in the industry.

(ATi gave us a nice car demo with purportedly I8NV30 number plates )

Actually, I have Five (5) very nice DX9 demos from ATI that were released a few days ago with the DX9 Catalysts. I also have three (3) very cool screen savers that are sort of DX9 "mini-demos" in themselves. The car paint demo is just one of them. I was not impressed with the dancing Ogre or the rusting truck or the space ship "field of focus" demo (that one *really* smacked of 3dfx and the V5)--Dawn I would class as "OK"--but I still have yet to see them a little more clearly, so it's really hard to tell. Right now I would definitely give the nod to ATI on the demo front.

The word "Cinematic" was used by 3dfx heavily back in '99 and on to the end. It's almost become a cliche' as a result. Overall, less than original and therefore less than impressive. ATI's approach, however, strikes me as far less stale and much more original.

From what I've seen of ATi, there's a little bit of silicon envy, but probably because nVIDIA P.R and silicon are just a notch above theirs.

But I could be completely off the mark.

*chuckle* Now, in comparing a DX9/Ogl 2.0 product that is *so far* vaporware to one that has been shipping for months and has been purchased by literally millions of people (yes, I can provide a link, I just don't feel like looking it up right now), it doesn't strike me as if ATI would be the logical candidate to be suffering "silicon envy" right about now. And I genuinely feel sorry for nVidia's PR--they are in exactly the same position nVidia put 3dfx in back in the latter '90's--that of having to say "But we don't need that feature, and we'll use it when *we* think there's a need"--referring here to nVidia's comments on ATI's 256-bit bus contrasted with nVidia's lack of it--to which there really is no good reply. That's never any fun for PR people. (I would imagine Brian Burke, if he is still with nVidia, is having some truly awful deja vu right about now....)

OTOH, I am personally very impressed with the way ATI's staff and people have comported themselves since the launch of the 9700 Pro. All in all it has been a masterful job and has really created an impression that nVidia is "sitting still" (much like nVidia created around 3dfx way back when.)

What I'm curious about is how soon the mainstream NV30 derivatives come along after the NV30 release (with performance along side the 9700 Pro, but features beyond), and how cheap current ATi DX9 products become.

Features or price anyone?

Cheers.

Well, nVidia will be some months behind ATI in everything--including bargain-priced DX9 products--and so we won't have an apple-apple comparison probably in until around March '03, when I estimate nVidia might be shipping some other, lower-priced DX9 products comparable to what ATI is doing now with 9500 (or maybe 9100) and up products.

This whole thing is so ironic--I can still recall reading an interview back in the 3dfx days when a nVidia employee said when questioned about how he "felt" about 3dfx (or some similar moronic question): "It's really tough for a company to miss an entire product cycle. Really tough."

Yep, it is....nVidia. Ah, who can fail to sniff the sweet bouquet of this delicious irony?....

Edit: typos

 

[WaltC]

Certainly, but if you've got no reason to buy it anyways...

Basically, I'm a very impulse buy type shopper. If the mood strikes me, I'll buy, but occasionally the little angel on my shoulder wins and says "no! no! don't spend more money!" and the 'cheaper around the corner' argument works out ok.

Unless that damn devil is there saying "you suck at tribes because your video card stinks! Buy! Buy Buy!"...

You're not the only one...I walked into the store back in September intending to "look for software" and vowing to myself that if there was a 9700 Pro on the shelf I wasn't going to buy it (to keep the vow I made years ago when I swore off ATi after I returned a Rage Fury because it was so buggy), and when I saw there were a few on the shelf my arm reflexively jacknifed upwards, my hand opened and closed, and before I could think about what I was doing I looked down and saw my fingers tightly gripping the 9700 Pro box. The next thought I had was, "Well, I'll just sit here a minute and look at the box." My next memory is of leaving the store, the 9700P in a bag along with its receipt. At that point I said to myself, "Well, I have 30 days to return it in case this is another Rage Fury fiasco, so everything's OK--nothing irrational is being done here." That was back in September. I have really enjoyed this card since then--haven't had this much fun since the V5... (I know objectively that my former 3D card for my system at home, a GF4 Ti4600 by VisionTek, now resides inside of my wife's system, but I moved it over there so fast I can hardly remember doing it and have never been tempted to reverse the process--not even once.)

I kind of think I know what you mean....