As the title suggests, not that it hasn't been covered before, but I can't recall seeing it anywhere. So will this be a problem? It would seem to me it would make more sense for a high end, high dollar, limited qty SKU (aka X1800XTs) should ALL be master cards to eliminate any further confusion. Especially considering the PWBs are identical and the compositing FPGA, some TMDS tranceivers, and some passives as no pops being the only differences. The dongle pack-in being the only additional out of the box addition as well.
If there is no functional reason they can't work, the added cost should be small. The dongle (like this molex 887-6853-00, but with male DVIs) should be only a few dollars in qty, the silicon image parts should also be cheap, with the compositing chip dominating the overall cost assuming it's an FPGA instead of an ASIC. As a side note, I am hopefully assuming one of the crossfire delay issues was an ASIC spin of the compositing engine. The point being aren't the margins on the highest end SKU enough to absorb all of this? Why do they (assuming they are) need to make YET ANOTHER SKU for Master cards on the top end?
My current worst case scenario is that come the first week of Oct. the r520 crossfire will be enticing enough to purchase over an SLI setup. However, there will be no 520s, slave cards mind you (err - assuming we are still allowed to use master/slave terminology in the US), for 3 weeks after that. THEN, in addition it'll be another 2-3 weeks till we see any master cards. On top of that, the qty will be so limited that it'll be nothing but ass raping preorder city again (yes I have an x800xt pe from it's launch
) with so much SKU confusion amongst the vendors that it will be damn near impossible to be certain you are even (pre)ordering a master card.
Can someone with more sense than I, please convince me the above situation will not occur? I have been sitting on this new PC budget for months and it appears the writting is on the wall for a complete mess for me come mid to later Nov. I have a feeling that the release 80 drivers from nv are going to put me on the fence as well, with this possibility of a delayed 520 purchasing nightmare not helping.
If there is no functional reason they can't work, the added cost should be small. The dongle (like this molex 887-6853-00, but with male DVIs) should be only a few dollars in qty, the silicon image parts should also be cheap, with the compositing chip dominating the overall cost assuming it's an FPGA instead of an ASIC. As a side note, I am hopefully assuming one of the crossfire delay issues was an ASIC spin of the compositing engine. The point being aren't the margins on the highest end SKU enough to absorb all of this? Why do they (assuming they are) need to make YET ANOTHER SKU for Master cards on the top end?
My current worst case scenario is that come the first week of Oct. the r520 crossfire will be enticing enough to purchase over an SLI setup. However, there will be no 520s, slave cards mind you (err - assuming we are still allowed to use master/slave terminology in the US), for 3 weeks after that. THEN, in addition it'll be another 2-3 weeks till we see any master cards. On top of that, the qty will be so limited that it'll be nothing but ass raping preorder city again (yes I have an x800xt pe from it's launch
) with so much SKU confusion amongst the vendors that it will be damn near impossible to be certain you are even (pre)ordering a master card.Can someone with more sense than I, please convince me the above situation will not occur? I have been sitting on this new PC budget for months and it appears the writting is on the wall for a complete mess for me come mid to later Nov. I have a feeling that the release 80 drivers from nv are going to put me on the fence as well, with this possibility of a delayed 520 purchasing nightmare not helping.
