mainstream Fermi in July?

[josiahsuarez]

http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/17290/1/
Nvidia's mainstream Fermi is not delayed
Written by Fuad Abazovic
Tuesday, 19 January 2010 09:36

Give it a few months

We've learned that the six-month delay of Geforce version of GF100 Fermi chips and cards won't actually hinder the introduction of other, slower version of Fermi card.


The whole point of making the insanely big Fermi is to win the hearts of journalists and enthusiasts and to bring this architecture to performance, mainstream and finally entry-level markets.

Entry-level is where the money is, even though you need to send millions of these cards to make a decent profit. Mainstream Fermi is a project that Nvidia is pushing side-by-side with high-end Fermi and we've learned that mainstream Fermi should be on time.

You should roughly expect it one quarter after the first Fermi, and if all goes well June should be a good month to launch. Since Nvidia changed quite a lot of plans in the last few months, don’t be surprised if it launches a bit later.

I think Fuad is bitter about being misled by "COMING IN 2009!!1" promises :D

[Slytat]

Delete me, misread the article.

[josiahsuarez]

I messed up too, should be June in the title not July.

[Viral]

As expected really. At least with being so late they will be forced to up the mainstream performance a bit to compete. I guess it all depends on how fermi scales in performance and power use. ATI could have pushed mainstream performance a bit more this gen IMO.

[shadow001]

Honestly,i don't buy it for a really practical reason....Suppose the following:


The high end version of fermi is a large chip,needing a lot of power and yeilds would be a issue of course,and it pushes the limit on what can be built at 40nm...We've all heard the stories right?


So since the mainstream versions are obviously much smaller chips,using less transistors,less power and yeild issues wouldn't be as severe as the high end version,why release it after the high end version,knowing that it'll be the mainstream versions that pay the bills,especially since they sell a lot more in terms of volume.


ATi released the HD5870 first,knowing it would sell more of those given it's retail price,compared to the HD5970 cards,which only showed up 2 months later on the market.

[LydianKnight]

As expected really. At least with being so late they will be forced to up the mainstream performance a bit to compete. I guess it all depends on how fermi scales in performance and power use. ATI could have pushed mainstream performance a bit more this gen IMO.

And they could have (at least) made the 5850 be able to be used on a single-slot cooler, or to be honest, haven't seen one here in Spain

[frenchy2k1]

So since the mainstream versions are obviously much smaller chips,using less transistors,less power and yeild issues wouldn't be as severe as the high end version,why release it after the high end version,knowing that it'll be the mainstream versions that pay the bills,especially since they sell a lot more in terms of volume.
That is AMD strategy, not NV. The reason GF100 is the first out the door and the one that gets delayed is because it is the original design. the other chips will be derivatives of this one and they were pushed back accordingly, as you do not develop derivative chips out of a chip that does not work.

AMd chose to design a bit lower than NV and derive from there, both up (dual) and down. Both strategies are valid altough lately, AMD seems to lead.

[Vardant]

Don't forget the halo effect. Having the best card helps to sell the derivatives, even in the cases, where the competition has a good product.

[shadow001]

That is AMD strategy, not NV. The reason GF100 is the first out the door and the one that gets delayed is because it is the original design. the other chips will be derivatives of this one and they were pushed back accordingly, as you do not develop derivative chips out of a chip that does not work.

AMd chose to design a bit lower than NV and derive from there, both up (dual) and down. Both strategies are valid altough lately, AMD seems to lead.


I'm fully aware of that it's been their way of doing things for a long time,but given that ATI only has the lowest end Cedar based chips yet to release,which it seems it'll be out by mid february btw,it means their entire lineup of cards,from 70~80$ budget ones,all the way to 600$+ enthusiast ones,will be DX11 certified,before Nvidia even releases their high end version,which obviously caters to a much smaller enthusiast market,willing to pay the high prices.


Basically ATI is going to be making a killing,especially with OEM's thru this entire year,at least until Nvidia gets to the same situation with their graphics cards,so in that environment,since the mainstream and lower end DX11 GPU's based on fermi are obviously much easier to design,and a much larger market potential,delaying their introduction because they're having trouble with the highest end version of Fermi,which has a much smaller market appeal, doesn't make much economic sense.



Seems more like Nvidia wants to release the high end version mostly out of pride at this point,rather than economics.

Don't forget the halo effect. Having the best card helps to sell the derivatives, even in the cases, where the competition has a good product.


Where are the DX11 derivatives,that's the question,since the competition has a full DX11 lineup to choose from.

[wishiknew]

Since ATI announced entire line already, just which Dx11 derivative/market should Nvidia aim for second. Is there a specific pricing that Nvidia is more worst off at the moment that should be addressed after GF100?

[Viral]

Don't forget the halo effect. Having the best card helps to sell the derivatives, even in the cases, where the competition has a good product.

That's an unfortunate truth. Maybe that's part of nVidia's strategy with sticking with large monolithing GPU's. If someone see's the GTX380 as the best card out, when they go to spend their $100-200, they buy nV without researching the GPU's they can actually afford.

[Muppet]

Seems more like Nvidia wants to release the high end version mostly out of pride at this point,rather than economics.






I think you will find that Nvidia pretty much always release there high end cards before the mainstream ones. They have done that for as long as I can remember. I think only once in the past that they have changed this.

[shadow001]

I think you will find that Nvidia pretty much always release there high end cards before the mainstream ones. They have done that for as long as I can remember. I think only once in the past that they have changed this.


I know that,but i think this time it's really hurting their bottom line,since i'd have a hard time believing that the lower end versions based on the fermi architecture are suffering the delays that the high end version is,so release those first,start making money with new DX11 parts that are much cheaper and therefore,have a wider market appeal and sell in higher volumes than the high end parts.


It might not be the all conquering high end version,but it helps pays the bills basically,and leaving the midrange/low end DX11 market exclusively to ATI until june is a mistake and i'm sure ATI will capitalise greatly on that.


Renaming current DX10 or DX10.1 parts yet again,isn't going to work anymore when your competitor has a full DX11 lineup,covering all price ranges.

[jolle]

Renaming current DX10 or DX10.1 parts yet again,isn't going to work anymore when your competitor has a full DX11 lineup,covering all price ranges.
I think a large percentage of customers in the low end segment dont really know what that means.
Which is why renaming old GPUs and re-launching them works, and why they keep doing it.

It´s not for us, people who know about it, its for the people going "Oh, 1024mb, thats pretty fast"..

[shadow001]

I think a large percentage of customers in the low end segment dont really know what that means.
Which is why renaming old GPUs and re-launching them works, and why they keep doing it.

It´s not for us, people who know about it, its for the people going "Oh, 1024mb, thats pretty fast"..


I'm fully aware of that unfortunately,but what about OEM's...They can't be fooled(Dell's,HP's,etc..),and those customers buy in large quantities.

[Vardant]

They don't care about DX9/10/11, there's no reason. There are different things to look at, much more important than that.

[LydianKnight]

Exactly, major players like HP & Dell have their major league sales on the office/business/server segment, the home user one is profitable, but not as much as the others.

So for them, not having DirectX 11 in their hardware offerings can't really hurt them

[shadow001]

They don't care about DX9/10/11, there's no reason. There are different things to look at, much more important than that.

Exactly, major players like HP & Dell have their major league sales on the office/business/server segment, the home user one is profitable, but not as much as the others.

So for them, not having DirectX 11 in their hardware offerings can't really hurt them



Let's say Dell sticks with Nvidia and their DX10/DX10.1 products and HP offeres ATI's DX11 cards in their lineup,and both systems are about the same price...Which of the 2 companies has the edge when trying to sell these systems to the end consumer,and especially in the middle of a recession like we currently are?


Profit is profit,no matter which segment of the overall market we're talking about here...

[LydianKnight]

Let's say Dell sticks with Nvidia and their DX10/DX10.1 products and HP offeres ATI's DX11 cards in their lineup,and both systems are about the same price...Which of the 2 companies has the edge when trying to sell these systems to the end consumer,and especially in the middle of a recession like we currently are?


Profit is profit,no matter which segment of the overall market we're talking about here...

That would be completely right if not for something 'particular'... the big companies like HP and Dell not only looks for profit by hardware sales, but service contracts, so even if your point is very good (and I agree with it), it's more or less naive, because no matter the better hardware company X has for the same price as company Y, because company Y gives you some added benefits rather than the hardware itself.

A real-life example:

In one of my first jobs as programmer, the company I worked for had a service & hardware contract with Compaq (before they joined HP), HP had better prices, so had Dell, but the kind of service Compaq gave couldn't be rivaled by the others... if you had a single read failure in the HDD, those guys came in more or less... less than 1 hour, maximum 2, and replace the WHOLE computer, just to be sure you have a working computer with no problems, backup included.

That's what I mean... the price could be a valid point, but there's some other factors to take into account which (more or less) balance the equation :P

[shadow001]

That would be completely right if not for something 'particular'... the big companies like HP and Dell not only looks for profit by hardware sales, but service contracts, so even if your point is very good (and I agree with it), it's more or less naive, because no matter the better hardware company X has for the same price as company Y, because company Y gives you some added benefits rather than the hardware itself.

A real-life example:

In one of my first jobs as programmer, the company I worked for had a service & hardware contract with Compaq (before they joined HP), HP had better prices, so had Dell, but the kind of service Compaq gave couldn't be rivaled by the others... if you had a single read failure in the HDD, those guys came in more or less... less than 1 hour, maximum 2, and replace the WHOLE computer, just to be sure you have a working computer with no problems, backup included.

That's what I mean... the price could be a valid point, but there's some other factors to take into account which (more or less) balance the equation :P


In enterprise environments,i also completely agree with that as well,but i was implying home users in my last post,so only the software that's included with the system or the lenght of the warranty can change things there.


I doubt you'll have support staff rushing to one's house in 2 hours,giving the user a new computer while the one that isn't working is taken back to the company for analysis...

[josiahsuarez]

guru3D posted something on the derivative Fermi parts

http://www.guru3d.com/article/nvidia-geforce-470-480/
Financial Quarters in the industry however end one month later than you and I assume, Q2 for NVIDIA means the start of May 2010.

Here's what we think is going to happen, during March we'll definitely see the launch of GeForce 470 and 480, though with low allocation and volume available until Q2. Once we hit Q2 expect a lot, seriously a lot of derivative DX11 class products for the midrange, entry-level and low-end spectrum as well. Why ? Well NVIDIA is late to the market, real late .. roughly six months ago GeForce 480 and 470 should have been released and the other planned products overlap that timeframe. The summer is going to be busy for NVIDIA, either that or they will be re-scheduling their product releases.

So that's my vision of what is going to happen in the next three months.

he also trashes Charlie a lot at the beginning of the article (popcorn)