Does the GPU market have a long life cycle?

[ndoogoo]

Do you think PC graphic hardware market will die off or shrink in a few years time, as people will be happy with what they have?

The PC games market seems to aim at the low end as a base level. I am still using my ATI 9700pro because it can still handle all games coming to market.

Even my old AMD 2400XP is still fast enough for to days games.

The x86 CPU is progressing slowly. Most PC games are hardly pushing the hardware. Piracy on the PC is very high. Video card prices are always going up. I could easy see the ATI R600 lasting me 5+ years.

 

[Frank]

I think it will all become much more general purpose, like CELL, and offer a whole lot of new opportunities for things we don't know yet.

But I don't think the current model will last very much longer as it is. With unified shaders and real flow control it will start to diverge, and photorealism is around the corner.

 

[_xxx_]

But the demands will get higher and higher. We will always have some hardware to drool over, be it gfx cards like now, or gfx/physics/cell/whatever combination of stuff that can be upgraded.

 

[Humus]

The market is still growing, so there's no catastrophy looming around the corner just yet. Not to mention that there's still a huge chinese market growing up as people there get rich enough to afford these toys. I'm counting on job security for while yet.

 

[epicstruggle]

The market is still growing, so there's no catastrophy looming around the corner just yet. Not to mention that there's still a huge chinese market growing up as people there get rich enough to afford these toys. I'm counting on job security for while yet.

Your alive!!! I was just wondering 2 or 3 days ago where you might have gotten off to since you hadnt weighted in with the whole console wars. Glad to see your ok.

epic