R350 Spring, R400 Summer

[druga runda]

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=6557



Its Chief Operating Officer (COO), Dave Orton, is the chap that sure made a difference in ATI from the time he joined two a half years ago when his company ArtX was bought by the Canadian graphics firm.

We spoke about financial results of ATI since by its financial logic it started its Q1 2003 on the first December and some things needed to be concluded.

What we heard from Dave Orton is that ATI is very optimistic after the staffers saw NV30 at Comdex and of course he uses every possible weasel language finesse to avoid the words banned by ATI – the Lexmarked Geforce and Nvidia.

We know that ATI is working on a new, upcoming refresh that should come soon enough to compete with NV30 -- its R350 part with a hint that this card will be on market in the Spring.

As for the R350, ATI said that it is playing with the Radeon 9700 PRO with DDR II memory so we can expect this kind of memory on R350 parts while GDER 3 is new graphics RAM that ATI preaches will find its place in some of the future products introduced by ATI in next year.

We assume that R350 will stick with DDR II for now and if the firm decides to use 256 bit memory interface we could have some seriously broad bandwidth with these cards.

As for R400 – the completely new core -- ATI promised us that we will see this card as soon as June/July giving Nvidia one more trouble to bear as the R400 could bring some interesting new stuff in computer graphics while Nvidia is struggling to ship its NV30 by February or even later, we now understand.

Still, ATI needs to face a process problem, how to make a successful 0.13µ (micron) graphics processor unit (GPU) – that Nvidia managed with the NV30.

If ATI continues its trend to keep its promises, Nvidia might have a very serious competitor.

By January, things should be much clearer, never mind when Sumer is i-cumin in. µ





Huh... so here we have it, R350 a 15um GPU with DDRII (perhaps a bit higher clock frequency I would have thought), and no new features in Spring.

R400 a 13 um processor and some new tech, coming with it.... perhaps GDER 3 type of memory.

they say June/July... so I guess it will be August the earliest :D... still sounds quite soon and promising for a rumour. ;)

[thcdru2k]

that means the geforce fx only has a lifespan of 5 months at the most. ouch

[StealthHawk]

and the r9700Pro, ATI's most expensive card in a long while, has less than a year of life. R350 will have 4-5 months of life :p

[The Baron]

You assume the R400 won't get pushed back a la NV30...

[Bigus Dickus]

Originally posted by =SSC=The Baron
You assume the R400 won't get pushed back a la NV30... In the face of contradictory information, that's the default assumption. Same for the NV30, and every other card. You assume roadmaps are correct, until you learn otherwise.

[Nv40]

mmmm. it too early to make predictions .
but i think Nvidia have an advantage over ATi in the long run ,
because Nvidia already have the best technology ,,
like .13 process and DDR2 memory ,and ati will need to jump
sooner or later ,to .13 too and DDR2 too.

i will not be surprised if the R350 is an overclocked radeon9700pro with ddr2 memory. with ~30GB/s physical bandwitdh and a HUGE FAN with heat sink, even greater
than the one in the Nv30. hehe...

however more physical bandwidth -does not necessarily equal- more performance. if that were true ,then there is no way the
Nv30 could defeat the radeon9700pro. and we saw Nvidia
numbers ,that if the numbers are correct means and overall 15%-30% increase over the R300.

so my prediction with the Nv30 and r350 is that there will be
very few games .. where we will be able to see greater diferences beyond 15%-25% in AA+AF . because both cards will have enough bandwidth ,to be on par in todays games ..

only Fillrate and higher core clocks its going to
make the biggest diference and here is where Nvidia have
an edge , because the Nv30 .13 core allow more higher frecuencies ...

its a shame that there will be no DIrectx9 games to benchamrk
for a very Long time ,and here is where i really think the Nv30 will really Shine ,with its very faster pixels shaders engine.

but again its too early to say .everything turns about how much
faster the NV30 will be against the radeon9700pro ..

[Bigus Dickus]

Originally posted by Nv40
mmmm. it too early to make predictions .
but i think Nvidia have an advantage over ATi in the long run ,
because Nvidia already have the best technology ,,
like .13 process and DDR2 memory ,and ati will need to jump
sooner or later ,to .13 too and DDR2 too.Well, they certainly have a lead on the .13u manufacturing, though I doubt that ATi is more than a few months (half a year probably) behind on this. Remember, it's not like they had to wait until the R300 was launched to start working on .13u. Concurrent design teams means that they have been working on a .13u product for quite some time now, and there's no reason to think that they aren't on schedule for a fall release of a .13u R400. Perhaps they will encounter problems, just as nVidia did, but that is just wild speculation at this point.

And about DDR-II... I believe ATi demonstrated in public a card running with DDR-II memory before nVidia did. I don't think they are "behind" in that respect at all. If there was a reason, they could probably start shipping DDR-II equipped R300's in a matter of weeks.

however more physical bandwidth -does not necessarily equal- more performance.Of course it does, as long as you are comparing identical architectures. More precisely, R300 + more bandwidth = faster than R300. That's the way it works, at least for AA/AF situations. Now, there certainly isn't any guarantee that card A's more bandwidth than card B = card A faster than card B. There are many factors that determine that, and bandwidth is just one. However, if card A increases its bandwidth, it will also increase its speed.

so my prediction with the Nv30 and r350 is that there will be
very few games .. where we will be able to see greater diferences beyond 15%-25% in AA+AF . because both cards will have enough bandwidth ,to be on par in todays games .."Enough bandwidth to be on par" ??? What is that supposed to mean? Are you suggesting that once you have "enough bandwidth" then adding more won't increase AA/AF performance? That's ridiculous, since AA/AF is bandwidth limited (MSAA anyway). With DDR-II, the R350 could DOUBLE the NV30's raw bandwidth, though I doubt ATi will feel the need to push things that far. And though I disagree with "on par" I agree with 25% difference... a figure I hardly feel is "on par."

only Fillrate and higher core clocks its going to
make the biggest diference and here is where Nvidia have
an edge , because the Nv30 .13 core allow more higher frecuencies ...Fillrate and core clock don't do anything for AA/AF, which is the "here" you were referring to. You can stop babbling now.]

[sbp]

ATI currently has the advantage. Nvidia is playing catchup. I expect that to continue for the forseeable future.

If true, R350 Spring, R400 Summer=BIG trouble for Nvidia
Better get that NV35 ready for fall. http://sbp777.homestead.com/files/icon10happy.gif

"that means the geforce fx only has a lifespan of 5 months at the most. ouch" Just like original GeForce no?

[nutball]

Originally posted by thcdru2k
that means the geforce fx only has a lifespan of 5 months at the most. ouch

NV30 has a lifepsan of 5 months as NVIDIAs flag-ship product.

It, and it's siblings (NV31, NV34, NV3x) have a much longer lifetime in the market.

You can still buy GF3s don't forget. Then there's nForce 4 FX... etc.

That's where the R&D gets re-couped. Not from the few no-brains who pay $400 for a graphics card.

[nutball]

Originally posted by sbp
ATI currently has the advantage. Nvidia is playing catchup. I expect that to continue for the forseeable future.

If true, R350 Spring, R400 Summer=BIG trouble for Nvidia
Better get that NV35 ready for fall. http://sbp777.homestead.com/files/icon10happy.gif


Goody!!! Competition at last. Now that ATi have some supposedly decent Linux drivers, it's competition that's relevant to me too!!!

:)

[LORD-eX-Bu]

Can't wait to get my hands on a R350.:D

[druga runda]

Heh...

Imagine how will Doom III play on one of those... Next Christmas will be the time to upgrade, if I manage to wait for so long, cheap DX9 tech... 50£ for R9500pro :D

ANd top of the range NV40 and R400

:cool:

Now that will be advanced hardware.

It seems JC is starting to be too slow for gfx card comanies. ;)

[nutball]

Originally posted by druga runda
Heh...

Imagine how will Doom III play on one of those... Next Christmas will be the time to upgrade, if I manage to wait for so long, cheap DX9 tech... 50£ for R9500pro :D


Nah. March-ish next year is the time to upgrade, then March-ish the year after ;)

(But only if you're writing your own software!!!).

[StealthHawk]

Originally posted by nutball
You can still buy GF3s don't forget. Then there's nForce 4 FX... etc.

That's where the R&D gets re-couped. Not from the few no-brains who pay $400 for a graphics card.

gf3 tech was used only with the gf3. the tech essentially wasn't recouped, except with the Ti launch. in either case, gf3s are no longer manufactured, although yes, you can still buy them.

[nutball]

Originally posted by StealthHawk
gf3 tech was used only with the gf3. the tech essentially wasn't recouped, except with the Ti launch. in either case, gf3s are no longer manufactured, although yes, you can still buy them.

Right, but GF4 (NV25) was only a core-revision of GF3 (NV20), was it not??? Much simpler job than NV25 -> NV30.

And what's the core in nForce these days?

That's what I meant. My key point was that "whoa! whole architecure dead after 5 months!" is something is a mis-representation of reality.

[Mod]

LOL ! Seems nVNews will change it's name to ATInews, and at the long term, it will merge with rage3d ! :)

[Uttar]

Originally posted by Mod
LOL ! Seems nVNews will change it's name to ATInews, and at the long term, it will merge with rage3d ! :)

LOL, good one.

I'd be surprised if the R350 could beat the NV30 Ultra Version. After all, it seems the R350 is still on .15 ...
But in case the non-ultra version beats the Radeon 9700 Pro, then the R350 would surely beat the NV30 non-ultra.
I'd doubt a simple R300 refresh could kill the NV30.

The real problem here is the R400. *However*, the NV35 should be announced in August 2003 ( 1 year after what nVidia wanted to be the NV30 announcement... ) and be in stores about 2 or 3 months after that.

So, the R400 would only have a 4 months lifetime, maximum. Maybe only 3 months if ATI only got it in stores in end of August as the R300 and nVidia got no delays this time.
The real question here is: Will ATI be able to get yet some more market penetration with it in so little time? We can't be sure. Only time will tell that.

But then again, if the R400 beats the NV30, we can be sure that Rage3D and nV News will merge with Rage3D to create ATInews, as Mod said. Icky...


Uttar

[Gar]

Originally posted by Uttar

I'd be surprised if the R350 could beat the NV30 Ultra Version. After all, it seems the R350 is still on .15 ...

Get ready then.....you're gonna be pissed if you believe that Nvidia is going to hold onto the leading performer considering ATI is comming out with a tweaked (although refresh) R300 core right after it. Just remember how much more ATI out did NVidia this past fall when the R300 core came out (nvidia had to rework their design, we all pretty much know that now). I dont think ATI is going to release a newer core and have it be second best :).

Also, what makes you think .15 is going to hold back their performance? Considering the .13 NV30 at 500mhz is only 15 to 30 percent faster than the 200mhz lower clocked R300, not that impressive. What can we can conclude from this, its all about design, not raw mhz and core size.

[jbirney]

Originally posted by StealthHawk
and the r9700Pro, ATI's most expensive card in a long while, has less than a year of life. R350 will have 4-5 months of life :p

Keep in mind that if it was annoced in july it may not ship till early sept like the R300 did thus given the r350 another 1/2 months on the top of ATI's product line.

I also have many conflicting reports. It will be using DDR2. It wont be using DDR2. It will have some enhanced or new features. It will just be faster. Ect. Still way to early to tell.


I'd be surprised if the R350 could beat the NV30 Ultra Version.

What? why would you say this? Its unkown how much faster the NV30 is over the R300 (and no I dont take too much stock in NV supplied numbers on a custom NV made map with no info on how the test was ran, driver revs, ect). If the R350 is to be clocked faster and had more bandwidth then the r300 I think the safer bet is that we should be suprised if the nV30 ultra is faster than the R350 :)

[druga runda]

Originally posted by Uttar
LOL, good one.

But then again, if the R400 beats the NV30, we can be sure that Rage3D and nV News will merge with Rage3D to create ATInews, as Mod said. Icky...


Uttar

ROTF

:D

Well if even if this was TridentNews :D and the site was kept as it is I would still be here ;)....

Anyway... it seems at the moment that 2003 will be even more frantic than 2002 in the graphics arena, between the big two - if we can say that thre will be two big companies. Still I think it will take quite a long time of ATI being ahead to actually capture market share away from Nvidia, as Nvidia still has good and reliable products and Geforce is a stronger brand than Radeon.

Just the other day I had a friend of mine that is not into PC's buy an OEM P4, so he asked me which one to go for. A 2.8 ghz P4 with GF4MX440 and more expensive or a 2.53 P4 with Radeon 9000 and cheaper. all other thing equal (Ok... I think smaller HDD too). Of course I told him 2.53 P4. More functionality in the gfx and lower price with 300 mhz slower clock and smaller HDD that he will never notice anyway.

He was interested which GFX card is better and he asked the salesman anyway, and the salesman told him Geforce :D... told him that explosions are better on it :lol:

Huh... so it will take some time for ATI to trully take over, Nvidia has a lot of positive marketing push to keep it no 1 for a while.

However the small players will most likely die, or move from what they produce, apart from SIS who has other product lines to support the graphic cards if neccessary.

[[N]ebuchadnezza]

EDIT: I never said anything, you don't know me. Period.
I don't want to be the ATi 'Alexsok'.

[poursoul]

Originally posted by [N]ebuchadnezza
You people have no idea what R400 will be. There is absolutley no chance that NV35 or anything next year will be on paar with it...


What are you saying?

If there is no way to tell, how can you say that the NV35 (or higher) couldn't beat it.

[Uttar]

Originally posted by [N]ebuchadnezza
You people have no idea what R400 will be. There is absolutley no chance that NV35 or anything next year will be on paar with it...




We might be seeing next year a www.n-ragenews.com :D

Indeed. ATI bought the VSA-100 warehouses and the R400 got about 50 VSA-100 on one chip.
And they added about 200 Sages/chip. They got those from drug dealers.
As for Higher-Order primitives... They decided to make their card round instead of the boring rectangular thing you generally put in your case.
Oh! Oh! And as for Gamma Correction, they decided to include a free monitor with it. It's black&white without greys, so Gamma will always be correct :) It also fixes the whole 128BPP color problem.
Wanna bet how they resolved the fact it probably wouldn't have DX9 compliancy? They create a new API and called it "Directly Xing 9".

As for the card name... It'll be called "Recycling Power Forever" ( Or anyway, until ATI files for bankrupty because they can't sell a single R400 )


More seriously and objectively, for the R350...
Yes, the R350 will probably use DDR2. But it's not a new architecture. It isn't able to use DDR2 features ( 4 prefetches, ... ) as effectively as the NV30. So, yes, raw bandwidth is going to be huge. And nVidia better get their LMA 3 thingy real efficient!

But only time will tell if the R350 will really be the monster ATI wants to insinuate it is.


Uttar

[volt]

Originally posted by [N]ebuchadnezza
You people have no idea what R400 will be.

Oh and you have ?

Just by how much do you think R350 can be pushed on a .15u process?
Not much on the core. 256 bit bus will be pushed up a notch which will give more bandwidth (no big deal overall, increase in AA precision and what else) but I don't expect ~650MHz core (unless they have some killer cooling system). On the other hand NV35 (or whatever refresh is to compete with R350, mabe NV30 ultra) could be clocked much higher than the upcoming NV30 (the rumor is still floating around that their labs are testing the chip at 600-700MHz). Whether it is or not, we could see those speeds easily on the NV30 refresh. Add 256 bit bus to it (by April this should be implemented) and ATI has a problem. Unless Nvidia decides to delay their NV35, ATI could win the battle.

[jbirney]

Originally posted by volt
Whether it is or not, we could see those speeds easily on the NV30 refresh. Add 256 bit bus to it (by April this should be implemented) and ATI has a problem. Unless Nvidia decides to delay their NV35, ATI could win the battle.

I highly doubt you will see the nV30 refresh before the end of the summer.