Simple questions about the NV30...

[apax999]

Hi.

Can someone straighten this out for me...NVidia is making three new cards code-named, NV18, NV28 and NV30? When is it thought these new NVidia cards will be out? How much do you think they'll cost? I'm thinking of buying a new gaming computer...is it worth waiting for these?

Thanks!

-apax999@yahoo.com

 

[gkar1]

Simple to the point answer:

NV18: Same rip-off as Geforce4MX only with added AGP8x support avoid at all costs
NV28: Same card a Geforce4 Ti series only with AGP 8x support. Nothing new.
NV30: Fanatics and f@nboys have labeled it the holy grail of 3d cards. Do not listen to the hype. The product is late because of a very likely redesing and production problems based on an immature .13 processand various alte tape outs. Translation: The chips are going to be very expensive due to low yields and will most likely have lots of driver bugs since it is a brand new architecture.

So in summary, NV30 may be the only thing worth the wait if it is cheap enough to compete with Radeon 9700 3 months down the road, but then Radeon 9500 is looming very near and it looks like a geforce4 ti with agp8x killer as well with full dx9.0 support and full floating point pipelines. The geforce4 ti's are only 8.0 not even 8.1

IF you still harbor brand loyalty, then by all means wait for Nvidia. But not too long because you never know when they might implode under their own weight.

 

[BRiT]

The NV18 is nothing but their ultra-low-end GF4-MX cards with AGP 8x included. The NV28 is nothing but a GF4-Ti4200 with AGP 8x. They will be announced on the 25th or 26th.

The NV30 is late and it's anyone's guess when it will be available in any sort of wide-availability. Some say it will be available for the Christmas season, others say it wont be available until January/February timeframe.

My take on building a new gaming computer is to grab an ATI-9700 that is available now, or wait for the ATI-9500 mid-end product or even the Nvidia-NV30. The ATI-9700 and NV30 will offer the best gaming performance in today's and tomorrow's games.

--|BRiT|

 

[apax999]

Hey guys,

Thanks for the quick replies. Now I know to steer clear of the Nv-18 and 28. The NV30 still seems like something to wait it out for. I was playing some demo's on an Alienware they have out at the Best Buy, it was running a Radeon 9700. It was very nice. Will the Radeon 9700 and NV30 be a lot different in terms of overall power/performance? I want a card I could get that will still last down the road for...lets say...Doom III...PLanetside..games that have yet to come out.

Thanks again.

 

[DemoCoder]

gkar1, you know it's possible to write a response to that original question without being inflammatory about it.

NewBie: Hey, can someone tell me some info about the R300? When's it out, what does it cost?
FBoy: It's ATI's crappy .15 micron, power hungry, overheating chip, with buggy drivers, and soon to be beaten by an uber-chip by NVidia.

vs

RationalBoy: R300 contains these fine features. See reviews here, here, and here. There are 2 models. They cost X and Y.


The original poster didn't really ask to hear about crackpot speculation about last minute NVidia redesigns, hyper expensive chips, or yield problems. He just asked if there was any information on availability and price.

 

[BRiT]

Will the Radeon 9700 and NV30 be a lot different in terms of overall power/performance? I want a card I could get that will still last down the road for...lets say...Doom III...PLanetside..games that have yet to come out.

They will both be DX9 compliant in terms of PixelShaders 2.0 and Vertex Shaders 2.0. We know with the exception of minor feature differences, they are fairly close for features. They will both offer great features that the games a year from now will barely be using.

The first showing of Doom-III running was on an ATI-9700. It runs the game rather well. Perhaps not as well as the spring-refresh parts will or even next-fall-refresh parts, but still definitely better than the Ti4600 or ATI-8500.

Some say the NV30 will shatter the 9700, but at this point, it's pure speculation as the NV30 does not physically exist. I think the 9700 and NV30 will be close (enough) in terms of performance.

--|BRiT|

 

[Brent]

the simple answer to this question is: nobody knows

the things haven't been announced yet, full specs are not available to the consumer yet, and nothing about price and availability has been announced yet either...

so right now since there is nothing official on it, it's a big WHO KNOWS

right now the best thing you can get is a Radeon 9700 Pro, them is teh facts

 

[stevem]

The NV18 is nothing but their ultra-low-end GF4-MX cards with AGP 8x included. The NV28 is nothing but a GF4-Ti4200 with AGP 8x.

NV18 comes in 3 versions: 420, 440, & 440SE. There are some extras such as integrated 2nd RAMDAC & DVI. NV28 comes in 2 versions: 4200 & 4600. Not sure whether NV28 gets VPE as per NV17/18, though. They will be useful products, given their price points.

 

[hughJ]

the most interesting thing, imo, in playing the 'wait & see' game here, will be how the pricing of the 9700 is by the time the nv30 is released.. there isn't much nvidia can do for extra features/performance that will warrant paying a premium for over a by-then-likely solid/proven/capable 9700..

kinda giving me deja vu.. lots of parallels with the geforce launch/napalm delays of several years ago, let's hope that the nv30 won't be nearly as "late"

 

[Dave Baumann]

NV18 comes in 3 versions: 420, 440, & 440SE. There are some extras such as integrated 2nd RAMDAC & DVI.

AFAIK NV17 had those integrated as well.

 

[Sage]

i believe that the NV30 will be able to beat the R300, but by how much is unknown. it certainly has an advantage of core speed being produced on a .13 mircon process. However, not too far into the year ATi should release the R350 which will certainly be able to beat the NV30... and then after that we have the NV35 which is the actualy "holy grail" and not the NV30. We wont be really seeing the power of DX9 until R350 and NV35, whereas the current DX8 parts are very mature and any of them should do quite well for DoomIII etc. I personally never like to buy the first version of any generation, i waited for the GeForce4 and im damn glad i did. My suggestion would be to go with a Ti4200 or similar (Trident, anyone?) because they will definitely give you plenty of power until we get really powerful DX9 parts... oh and if you get a Radeon 9700 you'd better have a good PSU because that bitch sucks up power like a mofo... and puts out the heat too!

 

[sancheuz]

the simple answer to this question is: nobody knows

Exactly!!!!
Nobody knows, everybody here comparing the nv30 to r300 is based on complete speculation from their part. As far as we know, the nv30 could be 300x better then the r300 or 300x worse. People under that claim to be under nvidia nda and have previewed the nv30 say it will be better, but we cant completely trust them until we can benchmark the card with our own hands. So my advice, if you are power hungry now, then go with the 9700, if you can wait, then wait and compare the two.

 

[antlers]

I don't think anyone has previewed the NV30, in the sense of seeing a card built on it actually working. They may be NDA'd and filled in on the (projected) specs, though.

 

[Son Goku]

There's also one more thing with these cards and that's a matter of drivers. Right now I would be leaning more towards an NV30 (which might as far as we know now, be out when the AMD Hammer or x86-64 which I'm thinking of upgrading too, is out, we really don't know). Part of this is also based on ATI's driver track record, and of late I've turned rather cool to Microsoft. It's because of:

First: WPA in winXP (which I got through MSDN subscription) and Office XP which I never bought, and given product activation really do not want to buy. Office 2k can suffice given that...

Second: The WMP patch and inclusion of the new supplemental liscence agreement which said in part:

http://www.theregus.com/content/archive/25435.html

You agree that in order to protect the integrity of content and software protected by digital rights management ('Secure Content'), Microsoft may provide security related updates to the OS Components that will be automatically downloaded onto your computer. These security related updates may disable your ability to copy and/or play Secure Content and use other software on your computer...

Umm, one of the main reasons to use Windows is software compatibility, but how much good is that if the company now through a suplemental EULA reserves the right to disable one's ability to run software they decide people shouldn't run, through an automated update, which (though one might be able to firewall them if they know what to firewall) they aren't supposed to have any control over?

Third: This gets bundled into SP1 for winXP and SP3 for win2k...

Fourth: Palladium and the push towards TCPA hardware

Quite frankly if that is the path Microsoft is taking, I don't really care to hand my money over to them to purchase new software that contains this sort of thing...let along agree to it.

True for many apps and games Windows is still needed, and a dual boot with Linux would be more realistic then toasting Windows for now. But with the drivers comes an important part for one who doesn't want to be locked down the Windows upgrade path (given Palladium and all), Linux driver support...

 

[stevem]

AFAIK NV17 had those integrated as well.

Yep. Dual 350MHz DACs & TMDS. IIRC they were enabled on 460s only. 420/440 could drive TV as 2nd output via nView.

 

[noko]

Some people are pushing over 400mhz with the R300 core right now with a easy volt mod. The speculation of NV30 performance is really just pure speculation with little facts. Plus ATI has proven it can due a high quality anisotropic filtering with low performance hit while Nvidia hasn't done that yet, in addition ATI has proven to be able to do the same with FSAA, high quality low performance hit. Nvidia has alot to catch up to for performance and IQ, ATI leaped froged their previous card and Nvidia's current best card.