NV30 benchmarks?

[SnakeEyes]

Actually bd, you're right about some things, wrong about others. What I was calling fanboyish has to do with what seems to be almost sniping on your part, constantly, against anything positive anyone says about the nV3x parts. Since you admit that we don't really know squat, and can't until it gets here, and since you also admit that means we're just making wild speculation, why do all the critiquing? It's all desktop jockeying.

I admit coming off too harshly when I included the word severe in that post too. I really don't think it's that severe, though as you also state just now, we don't know if it is something they'll overcome easily or not. However, my cheap shot at your ego is more because I was irritated with you for not choosing only that one sentence out of my entire post in order to try to make ridiculing statements about my logic and my evidence. Bother to read the rest of that post, instead of choosing to pretend nothing but that one sentence exists, and you can't help but see how asinine your post came off. That's why I made that cheap shot at your ego- it certainly sounds as if you're offended that I made one critical comment. However, I didn't mean for that one comment to sound as harsh as it was, so I corrected it once you were kind enough to point it out. Had you simply left out the comments about logic et al, I may not have felt the need to do anything beyond editing the post.

Edit: In an effort to end the bickering, and let this hijacked topic get back on course, I'll apologize for taking my cheap shot. I'm sorry for making statements about your ego bd. I would appreciate it in the future if you would consider my post as a whole before making inflammatory comments in reply though. (I've seen a few non-negative statements from you about nV3x recently, so I've had to revise my personal opinion on your replies. Sorry again. :( )

[PreservedSwine]

Originally posted by robert60446

Preservedswinie, wakeup man! Welcome to the real world…you should take a correct pill. Look: “…In 3DMark 2001 SE, the Radeon 9000 Pro finished in third place, behind the GeForce 4 Ti4200 and the Radeon 8500.”, “…Moving on to Comanche 4, again the GeForce 4 Ti4200 takes the expected spot in first place. The 9000 Pro again sits behind the 8500, but by a very small margin. This time though, the MX440 takes the lead in 1600X1200 resolution, stealing it away from the Radeon cards most likely due to driver differences…” and etc. “Driver differences…”Ati still is behind man! Better believe it!.

You are the one in need of the wake up call, my friend. I just posted that link so you can see how close the R8500 is to the faster Geforce4Ti. I wrongly assumed you would know the Geforce4Ti line blows the doors off the Geforce 3 line-up. I'm not saaying the R8500 is faster than the Geforce4, but is a better performer than the Geforce3. My only intention was to let you know how the R8500 has continued, through incredible driver support, to evolve into a demon of a card at a sub-$100 dollar price.(low 80's for cheap OEM's) I was attempting to compare it to Geforce3- but couldn't find any *recent* bechmarks comparing the two......

Who is talking about the R9000? It's an OEM card menat to compete w/ the crappy Gefroce4MX series (which is only directX7), in case you didn't know....

As far as drivers, how about your texture compression on that Geforce3? Oh didn't know about that, huh? They said it was going to be addrressed in a future driver release...guess they are still working on it...STILL BROKEN. What about Nvida promoting their own brand of N-patches (TTRUFROM on RADEON's), Oh, you didn't know it's been disabled because they couldn't get their promised fdeature to work?
Please? Geforce drivers perfect- give me a break:rolleyes:

[StealthHawk]

Originally posted by PreservedSwine
I wrongly assumed you would know the Geforce4Ti line blows the doors off the Geforce 3 line-up.

yes, the GF4ti4200(which you used to compare to the R8500) really blows the doors off the gf3ti500 :rolleyes: yes, the 4400 and 4600 blow the doors off the GF3 line.


As far as drivers, how about your texture compression on that Geforce3? Oh didn't know about that, huh? They said it was going to be addrressed in a future driver release...guess they are still working on it...STILL BROKEN. What about Nvida promoting their own brand of N-patches (TTRUFROM on RADEON's), Oh, you didn't know it's been disabled because they couldn't get their promised fdeature to work?
Please? Geforce drivers perfect- give me a break:rolleyes:

we've already been over the texture compression issues here several times. AFAWK all drivers are bugged and have their reasons for looking better or worse. in any case, you are wrong. it has been addressed in a driver release, ever hear of the DXT3 fix?

[PreservedSwine]

Originally posted by StealthHawk


yes, the GF4ti4200(which you used to compare to the R8500) really blows the doors off the gf3ti500 :rolleyes:




In fact, this is exactly what I said:Funny you mention Geforce 3 det. to R8500--look at them now- the R8500 is signigigantly faster than ALL Geforc3's, with the excpetion of the Ti500. The Ti500 can hang pretty close, but the R8500 is still the better performer.

Nitice how I singled out the performance of the Ti500? I think the two are very comparable, although over-all the R8500 is a SLIGHTLY faster card, and seems to have better overall IQ.

Do you not agree?

All I'm saying is the The R8500 was meant to compete w/ the Geforce3 line-up, and it did so extremely well, although not at first. With continued support, the R8500 is now only about 5-10% slower than a Geforce4Ti4200, but $50 cheaper. Not to mention the R8500 beats the Ti4200 hands down when aniso is applied....
Granted the Ti4200 lays the samck on in FSAA situations.

Again...my point is more about the maturity of the R8500 drivvers, and continued support and frequent releases.

ATI has had MORE driver releases in the last 12 months than Nvidia- just thought I'd bring it up, since so many people are under the false impression that Nvidia driver quality and support are somehow superior to ATI's. While I will not argue that ATI didn't a poor driver reputation in past years, but in the last 24 months- they've come a LONG way, and people have noticed. Hell, it's hard not to notice:)

[Nv40]

Originally posted by Bigus Dickus
Perhaps they just used NVIDIA's trends over the past two or so years to make a guess.

It's taken roughly a year between new core architectures (NV10-N15, NV15-NV20, etc.), and nearly two years between DX versions (NV10, NV20, NV30).

If the NV30 shows up around the new year (plus or minus a few weeks) and assuming that the NV30's delay will translate into somewhat shortened timeframes between it and the next revision, then you're looking at early summer for the NV30 Ti equivalent, and possibly late fall or next holiday season for the NV35. NV40 would show up Fall of '04... assuming NVIDIA suffers no further delays. That is, unless they ditch their current release philosophy.

And, they might very well do that, because ATi looks to be track for a R350 late spring or summer, and a R400 late next year or early '04. At the two companies current release schedules (current meaning over the past two years or so) ATi's "half generation" advantage will cultivate into a full generation advantage in about another year.

I think NVIDIA will do something... I'm just not sure when.


yep i agree here in almost all ,,, Nvida six month cicle is not set
in stone , They delivered Geforce4 in 3-4 months of Geforce3 ti500..
ouch! i bought my Ti500 in december then later saw the Geforce4
launched in February.. ..WTF?? that whas i told... :(
and we have now the example of NV30 originally scheduled for August/setpember with Directx9 release,and now is delayed 3-4 months of its original release ,the interesting note here to remember is Nvidia next products Nv30+/Nv35 will have shortened timeframes between it and the next revision .Thats is the good thing about
Competition.. :)

However i disagree here when you say .."ATi's "half generation" advantage will cultivate into a full generation advantage in about another year." not necesarily ...

in Fact i think the advantage (technology advantage i mean)is in the side of Nvidia ,because they will be the First to release
a (.13) product. :)
so that leads Nvidia (in the technology side) at least 3-4 months
until ATI release its .13 product... (ATi CEO told First half2003)
so that means more like a summer realease.. May/Jun/..
SO again it will be interesting to see Things in the Other way
Nvidia with a 3-4 month lead in technology .
Nvidia will have by January/Febuary a full Production ,while Ati will be in Tapeout process.. :) same scenario but in the other way..

a total advantage for ATI will be if Nvidia Nv30 were .15 product delay plus being slower that radeon9700 when released..
RADeon2 anyone :) That advantage cost no less than 1 year!!
to ATI without releasing a real competitive product in the
desktop pc market ..

Like i said the ATI lead ,;)will be very relative in the next year2003 they will be behind Nvidia in the .13 process then later in the .09 process .
(that is true Only if Nvidia next products
(Nv35,Nv35 ti have none big delays in 2003).
it would be interesting if ATi can keep Nvidia original
6month cycle ,i expect an Nv35 ultra by the end of 2003 too.. ;)

[StealthHawk]

the problem i had was with this Funny you mention Geforce 3 det. to R8500--look at them now- the R8500 is signigigantly faster than ALL Geforc3's, with the excpetion of the Ti500. The Ti500 can hang pretty close, but the R8500 is still the better performer.

there is a big gap between "significantly faster" and "slightly faster." since you simply described it as a "better performer" i simply assumed you were aiming for a less reserved description.

now that you say this, i guess we had yet another misunderstanding :D
Originally posted by PreservedSwine


In fact, this is exactly what I said:

Nitice how I singled out the performance of the Ti500? I think the two are very comparable, although over-all the R8500 is a SLIGHTLY faster card, and seems to have better overall IQ.

Do you not agree?

Again...my point is more about the maturity of the R8500 drivvers, and continued support and frequent releases.

ATI has had MORE driver releases in the last 12 months than Nvidia- just thought I'd bring it up, since so many people are under the false impression that Nvidia driver quality and support are somehow superior to ATI's. While I will not argue that ATI didn't a poor driver reputation in past years, but in the last 24 months- they've come a LONG way, and people have noticed. Hell, it's hard not to notice:)

yes, i agree. i have been pleasantly surprised with ATI's driver evolution. they have certainly come a long way in terms of both stability and performance. i can only hope this will encourage nvidia to lower their prices, or if ATI can hold on to the performance crown, i mgiht just switch over to the Dark Side.

[Nv40]

Originally posted by PreservedSwine


ATI has had MORE driver releases in the last 12 months than Nvidia- just thought I'd bring it up, since so many people are under the false impression that Nvidia driver quality and support are somehow superior to ATI's. While I will not argue that ATI didn't a poor driver reputation in past years, but in the last 24 months- they've come a LONG way, and people have noticed. Hell, it's hard not to notice:)





Off course Ati needs more drivers releases to adress
all the complaints of radeon2 users ;) ,
How more drivers equals better drivers ? Lol!
Too bad it took Ati near Full year to Get Geforce3 vanilla in performance in all games (look anantech first UT2003 benchs a couple months ago :),now they are in the ti500 performances . kudos to ATi
maybe in 2003 they will hit the Gefroce4ti200 line :)
however wait for incoming Detonators5 drivers ,they will
increase the perfromance again by 10-15% in all Nvidia cards,
expected to be released with Nv30 ,so dont be surprised
to see again RAdeon2 in Geforce3 vanilla levels ;)


Now it seems that Ati have learned how to do good drivers
no drivers problems reported in RAdeon9700 ,Good for them .
so now please stop talking of Last year products
,and continue with the main topic .. :)

those benchies from that site ,used the Nvidia
estimates of Nv30 performance posted in reactor critical..
the site say this , i found very interesting ,people here claiming Radeon9700 perfromance being same at that estimates... :)

i liked this one..

As for pixel-shading speed, it will be 4 times of the NV25

Anyone claiming those benchchies same as RAdeon9700
shoul be kidding .. hehe because that is a HUGE diference
here ..

http://www17.tomshardware.com/graphic/02q3/020819/radeon9700-16.html

look at ANY pixel shaders test at any resolution ..
and you will see that Nvidia estimates are no less than 2xtimes the RAdeon9700 performance yes a beautifull 200% more than
R300 in Chamaleon demo or Nature demo :)

not sure if the CineFX table pixel shaders NV30/R300 diference (160 vs 1024 per pass)? have something to do here..

but Those benchies may suggest that NV30 have 2xtimes more bandwidh that Radeon9700 (20Gb vs 40G )and that Nv30 can process 2x times faster more pixel shaders vs RAdeon9700 ,that would translate
in a BIG diference in future games Direcx9 performance
and even in Doom3 .. ;)

[PreservedSwine]

look at ANY pixel shaders test at any resolution ..

I did, and the R9700 is almost 3x as fast in the chamelion (made by Nvidia For Nvidia) benchmark- all this with 1st edition- non optimized drivers.........
The NV30 just won't have the 40GB of bandwidth- sorry, but that's what it would take to double the R9700, and that technology is at least 1 year away (1000mhz ram).......

[robert60446]

Originally posted by PreservedSwine


ATI has had MORE driver releases in the last 12 months than Nvidia- just thought I'd bring it up, since so many people are under the false impression that Nvidia driver quality and support are somehow superior to ATI's. While I will not argue that ATI didn't a poor driver reputation in past years, but in the last 24 months- they've come a LONG way, and people have noticed. Hell, it's hard not to notice:)

Read this (one of the reviews ati radeon9700)"...However, we did encounter a curious bug in the Battlefield 1942 demo. All the text in the menu screens was invisible. This anomaly didn't appear in any of the GeForce4-equipped systems. We didn't have much time to troubleshoot the problem, but it's clear that ATI still has a bit of clean-up work to perform on the drivers...". Preservedswine, It’s a very long way…and Ati still is far from the end of road.

[PreservedSwine]

Originally posted by robert60446


Read this (one of the reviews ati radeon9700)"...However, we did encounter a curious bug in the Battlefield 1942 demo. All the text in the menu screens was invisible. This anomaly didn't appear in any of the GeForce4-equipped systems. We didn't have much time to troubleshoot the problem, but it's clear that ATI still has a bit of clean-up work to perform on the drivers...". Preservedswine, It’s a very long way…and Ati still is far from the end of road. Far from the end of the road?? PLEASE! Get some perspective, man. Remember the Geforce3 lauch, or the Geforce2 lauch- in no way, shape, or form were those drivers better than ATI's lauch w/ the much more complicated features of the R9700.

That is the first glitch I've heard of, do you have a link? Are you sure this was from a REview and not one of the PREviews? I would like to see that review- I'f it turns out to be true, send a report to the ATI catalyst team through their driver feedback program. They even gave away an R9700 to one of the folks who helped them track down an earlier catalyst glitch. Just to show you how serious they are about customer support, giving away hardeware to report driver issues is quite impressive.
As far as the 1st release on a brand new generation of hardeware, ATI's drivers are quite impressive. Just compare them to the latest set matrox parhenia drivers- the Matrox card *still* won't even run may games or benchmarks at all, but no one claims matrox drivers are crap, do they?

[robert60446]

Originally posted by PreservedSwine
Far from the end of the road?? PLEASE! Get some perspective, man. Remember the Geforce3 lauch, or the Geforce2 lauch- in no way, shape, or form were those drivers better than ATI's lauch w/ the much more complicated features of the R9700.

That is the first glitch I've heard of, do you have a link? Are you sure this was from a REview and not one of the PREviews? I would like to see that review- I'f it turns out to be true, send a report to the ATI catalyst team through their driver feedback program. They even gave away an R9700 to one of the folks who helped them track down an earlier catalyst glitch. Just to show you how serious they are about customer support, giving away hardeware to report driver issues is quite impressive.
As far as the 1st release on a brand new generation of hardeware, ATI's drivers are quite impressive. Just compare them to the latest set matrox parhenia drivers- the Matrox card *still* won't even run may games or benchmarks at all, but no one claims matrox drivers are crap, do they?

Comparing Matrox to Ati, is like comparing KIA to Mercedes…Matrox lost the battle…they are done dude. Any way, here is the link: http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,3973,475977,00.asp

One more thing, I’m supporting as much as I can Nvidia today, because Ati with Radeon9700 is for sure number#1 (today). Honestly, we need to have at least two good companies. Ati is today with 9700 on the top, because of Nvidia! Believed or not…and Vice versa…

[PreservedSwine]

Originally posted by robert60446


Comparing Matrox to Ati, is like comparing KIA to Mercedes…Matrox lost the battle…they are done dude. Any way, here is the link: http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,3973,475977,00.asp

One more thing, I’m supporting as much as I can Nvidia today, because Ati with Radeon9700 is for sure number#1 (today). Honestly, we need to have at least two good companies. Ati is today with 9700 on the top, because of Nvidia! Believed or not…and Vice versa…

I wouldn't be too concerned about Nvidia going out of business- WAY too premature to even consider it. They are very strong in other segements. Their Geforce4Ti line really has no viable competiton at the moment, and thir Geforce3 line-up is priced estrmemley well. Only card I really wonder "Why" about is the Geforce4MX- it never should have been given the green light- what an overpriced POS!

Absolutley- we need as many companies as possible competing w/ eachother for our hard earned $$. I'm not loyal to any billion dollar company, I just want good products. It's true I like to root for the underdog, and have been wanting ATI to muster a serious challenge for Nvidia. Now that they've done it, there are still a few folks who are clinging to the notion that Nvidia is the end-all of all video card companies, and just won't see logic that clealy points to other conclusions.

Also, it's nice to see that the only glithes thus far seen in the new R9700 drivers don't affect gameplay in the least- VERY IMPRESSIVE, don't you think:)

[Bigus Dickus]

Originally posted by Nv40
those benchies from that site ,used the Nvidia
estimates of Nv30 performance posted in reactor critical..
*cough* NVIDIA estimates... lol. Whatever.
As for pixel-shading speed, it will be 4 times of the NV25Based on.... oh yeah, some numbers with absolutely no hardware to back them up. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't.
look at ANY pixel shaders test at any resolution ..
and you will see that Nvidia estimates are no less than 2xtimes the RAdeon9700 performance yes a beautifull 200% more than
R300 in Chamaleon demo or Nature demo :)Guess what? My hyper super duper Bigus Dickus Supreme card has 490X the shader performance of the NV40. :rolleyes: Speculation based on shady paper specs is just that.... speculation.
not sure if the CineFX table pixel shaders NV30/R300 diference (160 vs 1024 per pass)? have something to do here..Most of the "CineFX vs. R300" tables are wrong. For one, it's already been stated by NVIDIA that some of the NV3x numbers aren't necessarily NV30 specs (e.g., only 256 instructions instead of the stated 1024 like you quote), and for another many of the R300's specs were simply wrong (e.g., swizzling support, temp register numbers, max pixel shader instructions, flow control, etc.).

It was PR, nothing more.
but Those benchies may suggest that NV30 have 2xtimes more bandwidh that Radeon9700 (20Gb vs 40G )Sorry, 40GB of actual bandwidth is simply impossible on a 256-bit bus anytime in the near future. That would require ~1300MHz ram, and it's still not certain that Samsung can deliver 1000MHz ram in time for the NV30 launch (which would translate into about 32GB actual bandwidth).

[PreservedSwine]

nVidia has stated publicly that NV30 will be roughly 2-2.5X the performance of GeForce 4 Ti. But as our data have shown, Radeon 9700 is often ahead of the GeForce 4 Ti by that margin, which leads us to consider that Radeon 9700 and NV30 may be more evenly matched than previous top-end offerings from both chipmakers. Add to the mix that ATI has several "kicker" products based on the Radeon 9700 core brewing, and that R9700 has support for DDR-II memory and is still running on 0.15-micron process technology, and you can see that NV30 will have its work cut out for it when it arrives. It begs the question: if NV30 is only 10-15% faster than Radeon 9700, is it worth waiting for?

Bigus, in reference to the Cg specs vs R9700 specs- have you seen this

nVidia has noted that CineFX is a superset of DirectX 9 and dropped not-so-subtle hints that the NV30's architecture is somehow superior due to this added capability. In fact, the Radeon 9700's architecture is also a superset, and can also support up to 65,536 instructions in vertex shader programs. ATI's pixel shaders do appear slightly less flexible, and need more than one pass to execute pixel shader programs in excess of 160 instructions. Add in the fact that Microsoft is already specifying a version 3.0 shader specification, which goes well beyond either architecture. So it's clear that both companies will be building additional capability in future products

Good read, from here
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,3973,476134,00.asp

[SurfMonkey]

The performance estimates that were knocking around probably came from the emulated version of the NV3x, which by any measure will run slower than the real thing, and so the figures were probably calculated roughly as emulation speed x estimated increase when in hardware. In the end it may be faster or it may be slower, depends how good their maths are when it comes to that kind of thing.

The 48Gb\sec bandwidth is the effective bandwidth, taking in account HSR and Z buffer compression. If you use nVidias number for depth complexity (from their LMA docs) which is 2.5 you end up with a memory speed of 600MHz; (48exp9/2.5)/32=600Mhz. If they were running at 1Ghz, and if the efficiency of LMA hasn't changed, you would come out with an effective bandwidth of 80Gb\sec. In the same vein you can say that the R300 has an effective bandwidth of ~60Gb\sec.

It's all very relative. Though if nVidia have gone for the 8x2 architecture they'll need the bandwidth to keep the pipes fed.

[StealthHawk]

Originally posted by PreservedSwine


I did, and the R9700 is almost 3x as fast in the chamelion (made by Nvidia For Nvidia) benchmark- all this with 1st edition- non optimized drivers.........
The NV30 just won't have the 40GB of bandwidth- sorry, but that's what it would take to double the R9700, and that technology is at least 1 year away (1000mhz ram).......

i was under the impression they were producing it before the end of the year

[Nv40]

Originally posted by PreservedSwine


I wouldn't be too concerned about Nvidia going out of business- WAY too premature to even consider it. They are very strong in other segements. Their Geforce4Ti line really has no viable competiton at the moment, and thir Geforce3 line-up is priced estrmemley well. Only card I really wonder "Why" about is the Geforce4MX- it never should have been given the green light- what an overpriced POS!

Absolutley- we need as many companies as possible competing w/ eachother for our hard earned $$. I'm not loyal to any billion dollar company, I just want good products. It's true I like to root for the underdog, and have been wanting ATI to muster a serious challenge for Nvidia. Now that they've done it, there are still a few folks who are clinging to the notion that Nvidia is the end-all of all video card companies, and just won't see logic that clealy points to other conclusions.

Also, it's nice to see that the only glithes thus far seen in the new R9700 drivers don't affect gameplay in the least- VERY IMPRESSIVE, don't you think:)



I wouldn't be too concerned about INTEL going out of business too :rolleyes: - WAY too premature to even consider it. hehe..
because now AMD is the new King in performance with its Atlon 2600+.. :)
we can play this game ,dude ,I never though ATi was out of business last year (remember RADeon1 and RADeon2 was totally Smoked
by Nvidia) even took their market dominion in just 3years a record :), We may think its is not easy to survive for 3 years beeing
the second ot Third place in the shadows of Nvdia ..
is not that easy dude to Nvdida get out of business ,look MAtrox ,
they are still On ,even 2 years without releasing a product before
it new parnelia card ,Because believe it or not ,there is alot MOre market in the Gaming iNdustry than where the Radeon9700 targeting ,
NV30 is not the only product of Nvidia ,in FAct they are going to release near 10 Directx9 products this year ..
We have the price/performance market where ATI doesnt have
anything now until 2003 with its radeon9500 ,and where Nvidia will release Nv28 (Geforce4 ultra)this year probably .15 directx9...;)
and even Geforce4 will be a really nice product for the $150-199$ range.. even in price watch Geforce3ti500 are are slow as $115..
which plays all games at Highquality .. :)
ATi radeon 9000 is the Low solutions of ATi ,which is the
Card that is going to make 100x times more money for ATI that its Top product alone,not everyone spend more than $200-$250 for a video card.. just look how well ATI survived in last 3 years ;)..

WHat above AMD ? they have been
in the Dust in the performance with INTEL who owns how much 90% of the market ? ouch! and as you see SMart companies like Nvidia will find always ways to keep competitive in any market posible.. ;)

So dont waste much energy thinking (wishing) Nvidia get out of the Business ,as i say there is a lot of market in the Gaming Industry.
Ati performance lead is a relative one ,One that is true today ,
and may not in the 2003 ,Nvidia has much much more money that ATI ,more MArket share 2xtimes!!! than ATi dude,Nvidia is the standar
period .so its not that easy to make your dreams comes true it will take no less than 2-3 years to Nvidia of failures,lack of focus ,and tons of more delays to go "out of business", something i dont think is going to happen anytime soon unless Nvidia employees/Engineers/Manangment turns to monkeys afternight ...;)

My predictions today are even more competitions ,the Gaming MArket
Pc/console is growing and Growing and One company will not be enough
to cover all ,so i see Creative,Trident,Matrox,PowerVr/Maybe new companies (bitboys)?or Via and others in the competition too.


however anyhting is possible i know ,and i would no be So surprised if i see ATI in next 3years in the 2d/video editing market like at their beginings 15years ago... Where they belongs ;)

[PreservedSwine]

Originally posted by Nv40




I wouldn't be too concerned about ATi going out of business too - WAY too premature to even consider it. hehe..
we can play this game ,dude ,I never though ATi was out of business last year (remember RADeon1 and RADeon2 was totally Smoked
by Nvidia) even took their market dominion in just 3years a record :), We may think its is not easy to survive for 3 years beeing
the second ot Third place in the shadows of Nvdia ..
is not that easy dude to Nvdida get out of business ,look MAtrox ,
they are still On ,even 2 years without releasing a product ,
Because believe it or not ,there is alot MOre market in the Gaming
iNdustry than where the Radeon9700 targeting ,just look how well ATI survived in last 3 years ;).. or WHat above AMD ? they have been
in the Dust in the performance with INTEL who owns how much 90% of the market ? ouch! and as you see SMart companies like Nvidia will find always ways to keep competitive in any market posible.. ;)

So dont waste much energy thinking (wishing) Nvidia get out of the Business ,as i say there is a lot of market in the Gaming Industry.
Ati performance lead is a relative one ,One that is true today ,
and may not in the 2003 ,Nvidia has more money that ATI ,more MArket
share 2xtimes!!! than ATi dude, so its not that easy to make your dreams comes true it will take no less than 2-3 years to Nvidia of failures,lack of focus ,and tons of more delays , something i dont think is going to happen anytime soon unless Nvidia Emplyees/Engineers/Manangment turns to monkeys afternight ...;)

My predictions today are even more competitions ,the Gaming MArket
Pc/console is growing and Growing and One company will not be enough
to cover all ,so i see Creative,Trident,Maybe new companies (bitboys)?
or Via and others in the competition too.

however anyhting is possible i know ,and i would no be So surprised if i see ATI in next 3years in the 2d/video editing market like at their beginings 15years ago... Where they belongs ;)

You got all that out of my post? I didn't even intend many of the points you addressed????????Wishing Nvidia out of business??? Where exactly did I say, or even leave that impression. You were responding to my post right? Becuase I dodn't think you actually read it.....
If you had, you would have noticed me telling someone else that nvidia is a great company, and being behind for a product cycle or two doesn't mean they are going out of business. Then you might have noticed where I mentioned the Nvidia card line-up is pretty strong, and well positined in todays market (With the lone exception of the Geforce4MX, which suck ass)
Then you might have noticed that I mentioned having more video companies can only mean good things for us consumers..... and that I have no loyalties to any money grubbing company.

So it seems we are in agreement, except on that last part;)