geforce 6800 non ultra will be 12 pipes

[lokeshray]

saw this one at anandtech


The 16x1 GeForce 6800 Ultra will be clocked at 400/550 (core/mem) and priced at $499, while its 12x1 little brother the GeForce 6800 non-ultra will be priced at $299 (clock speeds to be determined).


you can read the entire article by clicking RIGHT HERE (http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=2023&p=9)

dont feel so good about 12 pipes.

[ragejg]

w00t??

TWELVE??

[nutball]

Why? It's [£$€]200 cheaper, and looks like it will be going up against the 12-pipe version of the R42x (or maybe the 8-pipe version depending on a clock-speed and a whole slew of other things, including the phase of the Moon).

[£$€]200 is not to be sniffed at! Sounds like a card that's going to sell by the warehouseful to me!

[Paul]

I wasn't expecting the 6800NU to be 12 pipes, but at $299 it will be excellent value. I expect that will be up against the 8 pipe R420 version at that price, rather than the 12 or 16.

Good stuff.

[Dazz]

I just noticed that myself 12 just like the Radeon X800PRO.

[Geforce4ti4200]

I found it supprising too. everyone thought itll be 16 pipes, not even rumors mentioned of nvidia ever having a 12 pipe verson. 3/4 the number of pipes at 3/5 the price, sounds like a good deal. 128mb ram but thats plenty. clocks might be a bit lower, perhaps 375/900. nvidia could win two ways, if pipe(s) are bad, it becomes the non ultra or if it cant do 400MHz, then disable 4 pipes(even if good) and clock it as non ultra. ati does that too.

[LiquidX]

For $200 less who cares? Not me. If this thing keeps up with its big brother or much less the 9800XT I may get one. This may be the Ti serious all over again.:)

[Cota]

The bad thing is that it seems that the core is different from the ultra version
and has fewer transistors.

so no 6800 to ultra mods.

[Dazz]

I belive it will run something like this


GeForce 6800
400MHz (12x1 / 24x0) 4800MP/sec
128MB 800 ~ 900MHz DDR-1 (25.6 ~ 28.8GB/sec)

GeForce 6800Ultra
400MHz (16x1 / 32x0) 6400MP/sec
256MB 1100MHz DDR-3 (35.2GB/sec)

It's a shame really as i want an 6800 but want 256MB ram :rolleyes:

The 5900 could have 256MB but few ever came out and where way too expensive :( So if history repeats no 256MB 6800 cards :(

Also i want the MSI card with it's Twinflow II cooling :)

I guess the budget cards will now become 8x1 :D

[GlowStick]

Then the guy at Pentastar systems was correct.

I do agree with him now and i feel this will be whats happening.

the 6800 Ultra is IBM made and 16pipe, while the 6800 is 12pipe and TMSC made.

That really suprized me!

[Bopple]

This could have been predicted, when 220mil vs 175mil rumors surfaced.
But people blinded themselves while defending or attacking one another...
Anyway, I am waiting for 6800nu, personally :D

[nutball]

The bad thing is that it seems that the core is different from the ultra version
and has fewer transistors.

so no 6800 to ultra mods.

Speculation elsewhere is that the non-Ultras will be Ultras which have one of the four bundles of 4 pipelines disabled because they have artefacts and don't work (like some of the R3xx's were?). So they would be 222M transistors, but (222-175)M would be disabled. This NVIDIA get to use some of the chips that they'd otherwise have to throw away as non-functional Ultras.

But that is just speculation.

[Geforce4ti4200]

The bad thing is that it seems that the core is different from the ultra version
and has fewer transistors.

so no 6800 to ultra mods.



could that have been the "old" nv40 that supposedly was cancelled cause it wasnt competitive enough? Thats the 175m transistors they musta talked about. will it still support ps 3.0?

[Blacklash]

If the non ultra is around the 9800XT with the massive ps 2.0 improvements, Ps3.0, video features etc, I think it will be a good deal.

[Geforce4ti4200]

I still believe the nonultra is faster than the xt. were talking about 12 pipes here

[Dazz]

I agree it will be around the same speed and faster.

[Cota]

right now there are 2 possibilities

1.- that the 6800nu will have the same core as the ultra but with 4 pipelines disabled.

2.- its the rumored 175mil trans core.

If its the second, then probably it could reach higher clockspeeds because of the smaller core.

[Geforce4ti4200]

would make alot more sense to be option 1, that way nvidia saves a ton of cores like ati are right now

[ragejg]

nv has openly stated the scalability of the new series, so I'm gonna go with option #1... :)

[GlowStick]

I am gonna disagree with everyone and say that the Non-Ultra is a diffrent chip!?!?!

WHy?

Mainly becuse nvidia got the idea of makeing a diffrent chip for every pricerange. Just like the NV3x had 3 chips, i suspect the same will happen with NV4x

[ragejg]

Yeh, nv will prolly have 3 or 4 grades... 16, 12, 8, and 4 pipes... dang it, theres an article on this somewhere, I cant find it atm, but it states nv's intent to use the same core albeit with different pipeline configs to fit the needs of different consumers.

[Bopple]

Probably option 1.

[Dazz]

Yes the 6800 is scalable which means THEY can pick the pipelines use as Rage has said this is to cut down on R&D for multiple cards :)

[Geforce4ti4200]

so the non ultra is the same as the ultra minus 4 pipes, not a new core

[Viral]

Imagine if the low-end card was 4x1 and was just an NV40 with 12 pipes disabled :D

"I softmodded my 6200U into a 6800U!!! woooot!!!! this is the greatest day of my life!!! ;D

O_o

I guess they might go as low as 8, but i don't think they will have that amount of faulty chips to satisfy the mainstream market with semi-faulty NV40 chips. I think they will have a different core for every family. As in, high-end, midrange, low-end. I'm hoping to see high end 16x1/12x1, mid 8x1, low 4x1.