XGPU pin compatible with GFFX5200Go??

[zurich]

The Go5600 is manufactured on the 0.13-micron process, while the Go5200 is made on the 0.15-micron process, which makes it more compatible with gaming consoles. Sources say the Go5200 is the most likely candidate to replace the GeForce4 chips currently in Microsoft's (Quote, Company Info) Xbox because it is pin compatible and inexpensive. Both chips are made by Taiwanese foundry Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (define).

As tempting as it sounds to buy one of the faster chips and replace the GPU yourself, NVIDIA warned that without the proper F5-bios update, cracking open the Xbox for a hot-swap could prove disastrous.

"Technically it is possible to re-solder the pins, but we strongly advise against it," Lau said. "It is pin for pin compatible, but system bios updates affects so many systems, such as notebook lid cover suspend/resume and hotkeys. If you don't update your system it could go dark and will never work

http://siliconvalley.internet.com/news/article.php/2109331

That's certainly a twist. The NV34M is only 40 million transistors, compared to XGPU's ~70 million or so. It'd definitely help MS cut costs, but at the same time one has to wonder how backwards compatible it could be with XGPU..

nv34m also has all the tv encoding and whatnot packaged onto the chip directly, so there's some more $$ shaved off.

Anyhow, food for thought. Perhaps some of the developers here could shed some light on how nv34m could theoretically be used in an Xbox via the wonder that is DirectX... (ie: writing backwards compatible shaders/HAL or whatever)

for ref:

XGPU - 4x2 design, 2 vertex shaders, 233mhz clock, DX8
nv34m - 4x1 design, 4 vertex shaders, 300 mhz clock (.13 micron), DX9+

 

[BoddoZerg]

But is a NV34 actually faster than a XGPU? The XGPU (NV2A) is based on the GeForce4Ti4200, and the NV34 performs worse than GF4Ti4200 in non-AA/AF situations.

If Xbox games actually used antialiasing and anisotropic filtering, a NV34 might give a respectable performance boost. As it is, I bet the NV34 would perform slower than the NV2A.

 

[crypto1300]

I'm sure the NV34 has no northbridge functionality for the PIII bus the XBox uses.