What potential for the NV31 and NV34?

[LeStoffer]

Yes, NV34 is definitely coming out. That's their low cost, mass consumer part with both desktop and mobile derivatives. NV36 as far as I know is an NV35 derivative and is still some time away.

Most (if not all) of the Z and color compression HW is still present in NV31. NV34 has a lot of these features removed for cost reduction though. From what I know of the architectures, I expect RV350 to outperform NV31 in most situations, especially with AA+AF dialed up.

CMKRNL, what is the reaction to all this within nVidia? Are people a bit worried or are can't they really be bothered will all the heat they are taking after the launch?

 

[CMKRNL]

Sorry, I have no idea. MuFu might know?

 

[MuFu]

I really doubt anybody is overly concerned - the company is easily strong enough to release a couple of "stinkers" and recover later on. It's not as if ATi have made massive inroads in terms of market share yet. With NV30 it's simply been a matter of cringing and making a few uncomfortable decisions to get performance up over that of the R300 - I think upon conception they probably banked a little too much on low-K fab and R300 not being such a strong performer. NV35 and NV36 should be decent products and I'm sure nVidia will rule the roost for a short time until ATi release the R400 (personally I don't think R400 will be out before NV35). NV35 with a 256-bit memory bus, clocked at about 600-650MHz will be pretty formidable.

The forthcoming lineup will shine with dev support. Developers want financial incentive to embrace Cg and *gulp* code specifically for nV products. I can't see a sudden turn of conscience at Santa Clara getting in the way of that - they know full well that a handful of "favourably" developed titles could potentially make the NV3x fly off the shelves. nVidia have traditionally been an extremely aggressive company and it would be totally in character to pursue such a eventuality.

How does NV33 fit into all of this, CMKRNL?

MuFu.

 

[MuFu]

P.S. NV36 is a while off, yeah. AFAIK, the design was only drafted a month or so ago so I doubt it's taped out despite involving only reletively minor changes.

 

[THe_KELRaTH]

Sounds like a repeat about how wonderful the NV30 Ultra was meant to be over the 9700Pro.