Speculation on nVidia 9 series

[Elegy]

Here's what I think the 9 series lineup might look like:

9800GTX
- 384 bit, 768Mb memory
- 256 shader processors

9800GT
- 320 bit, 640Mb memory
- 192 shader processors

9600GT and 9600GS
- 256 bit, 256/512Mb memory
- 64 SPs
- GT has higher clocks and is ~10% faster

9400GT and 9400GS
- 128 bit, 256Mb memory
- 32 SPs
- GT has higher higher clocks

Power consumption for all cards should be roughly equal to their predecessors due to the die shrink. The 9800 cards may have gDDR4 memory.

This is completely speculative and all I'm basing this on is the fact that nVidia like to double performance every generation.

Any thoughts?

[breathemetal]

I just find it odd that they'd call it the 9800, due to the ati card (the 9800 series)

It brings back memories. That was a solid card in its day.

[Bman212121]

I just find it odd that they'd call it the 9800, due to the ati card (the 9800 series)

It brings back memories. That was a solid card in its day.

Ati had an 8000 series as well. ;)

[JasonPC]

Maybe they'll go with 512-bit instead of 320 and 384 and offer a 1 Gig card.

[tacos4me]

Look at the size of G80. I seriously doubt they'll be able to squeeze in another 128 SPs, even at 65nm, that's a seriously huge die. Not only that, but think of the power requirements.

[Elegy]

Look at the size of G80. I seriously doubt they'll be able to squeeze in another 128 SPs, even at 65nm, that's a seriously huge die. Not only that, but think of the power requirements.

They'll have to think of some way to increase performance by a significant amount. Perhaps they'll manage 192 SPs then at 512 bit bus with gDDR4. That should give a minimum 50% performance increase.

I hope they don't offer a 1Gb card though, that's just getting ridiculous and it'll limit memory on 32 bit windows to ~1.7Gb. Games in the future will require more memory, not less.

[MUYA]

The die size savings from 90 nm to 65 would be great because it is square proportional. 90nm to 65 nm? The difference is 25nm squared savings per each transistors. I think it is probable that a 192 SP GPU (per NV G80 design)could be done. Almost 43% in space savings. This is taking into assumption (huge assumption which I know it really isn't) that one transistor is the wavelength squared. WIth further optimizations why not?

[Elegy]

The die size savings from 90 nm to 65 would be great because it is square proportional. 90nm to 65 nm? The difference is 25nm squared savings per each transistors. I think it is probable that a 192 SP GPU (per NV G80 design)could be done. Almost 43% in space savings. This is taking into assumption (huge assumption which I know it really isn't) that one transistor is the wavelength squared. WIth further optimizations why not?

I thought die size savings were proportional to their square but I wasn't sure. This means that every 90x90 sq.nm can be condensed to just 65x65 sq.nm - a saving of 48%. They should be able to fit in 256 SPs while keeping the size of the card the same.

[Aphot]

I wouldn't think they'd call it the 9 series, or 9800 or 9600, etc, it sounds too ati.

[MUYA]

I thought die size savings were proportional to their square but I wasn't sure. This means that every 90x90 sq.nm can be condensed to just 65x65 sq.nm - a saving of 48%. They should be able to fit in 256 SPs while keeping the size of the card the same.
My thoughts too. Everytime there is a jump to smaller lithography, the space savings is great.

I think they can get 192 SPs at 65nm with decent yields...at TSMC but 256 SPs...those would be premiums...


G80 with 128 SPs = 680 million transistors

G90 with 192 SPs + more ROPs and other bits = close to 1 billion tranistors?
That is feasable with decents yeilds at high clocks or same clocks as G80... but,

G90 with 256 SPs + more ROPs and other bits = over 1 billion transistors...yield nightnare?

Dunn we will see come Q4 :)

[Elegy]

I'm convinced 256 SPs at 65nm isn't unfeasible, especially seeing as nVidia will probably have optimizations up their sleeves.

192 SPs with 48 texture mapping units and 32 ROPs is the bare minimum for the flagship G9x in my books but I'm pretty sure nVidia will be able to fit in 224 or 256 SPs.

[MUYA]

I'm convinced 256 SPs at 65nm isn't unfeasible, especially seeing as nVidia will probably have optimizations up their sleeves.

192 SPs with 48 texture mapping units and 32 ROPs is the bare minimum for the flagship G9x in my books but I'm pretty sure nVidia will be able to fit in 224 or 256 SPs.
Maybe the 256 will be bee knees as in labeled Ultras and the 192..GTX etc...who knows...but I guess I will be upgrading next year too :p

[JasonPC]

In one of the NVIDIA inf files for a beta driver (I think it was 165.01) there were placeholders for a G98. So it wouldn't surprise me. As someone had already mentioned there was an ATI 8 series and that didn't stop NVIDIA. I guess the only difference was that ATI's 9 series was very highly regarded in its heyday. If anything NVIDIA might want to name something after a product that was synonymous with excellence ;)

[MUYA]

In one of the NVIDIA inf files for a beta driver (I think it was 165.01) there were placeholders for a G98. So it wouldn't surprise me. As someone had already mentioned there was an ATI 8 series and that didn't stop NVIDIA. I guess the only difference was that ATI's 9 series was very highly regarded in its heyday. If anything NVIDIA might want to name something after a product that was synonymous with excellence ;)
Why not a Geforce G90 Ultra ? That sounds kewl to me :D

GeForce G100 Ultra?

Heck even GeForce G80 GTX? that sounds ok.

Someone please explain to me..as I am not knowledgable in 3D stuff. Geometric shaders perform primitive processing? It's the same right? Pre-geometric shaders in the GPU, all primitive creation and manipulation used to be done the CPU right? Therefore a bottleneck. In the DX10 GPUs, primitive processing and related calculations are done in GPU and because of the parallelism, it is faster implementations that having to rely on the CPU?

[harl]

My bet, *600 series will have 128bit (GDDR4 should provide "enough" bandwidth)

I believe *800 must get 512bit bus at least in the top series
and 256 stream processors ... to much transistors, maybe they just pump
up the clock speeds

[qube]

i tink it will dubbel the mem and have 768 bit memcontroler

[fivefeet8]

Speculation: :p

G9x GTX:
Unified Shaders Arch
192 Stream Shaders @ 1900+ mhz
Fully working dual issue Mad+Mull per shader
Double Precision capable
28 ROP's @ 700+ mhz
768/1152/1536 meg 384bit GDDR4 RAM @ 2400+ mhz
65 NM process node

Theoretical Numbers:
Memory Bandwidth: 384bit/8byte x 2400 mhz = 115.2 GBs/sec
Pixel Fillrate: 28 ROPs x 700 mhz = 19600 Mpixels/sec
Peak Shader Operations: 192 SPs x 1900 mhz = 364,800 Ops w/out MULL

8800gtx Theoretical Numbers for reference:
Memory Bandwidth: 86.4 GBs/sec
Pixel Fillrate: 13800 Mpixels/sec
Peak Shader Operations: 172,800 Ops w/out MULL

[Darkoz]

Take a look at some leaked specs posted over at XBit Labs.....
http://www.xbitlabs.com/discussion/3953.html

1. By Q4 2007 (Xmas) NVIDIA will be releasing their GeForce 9800 series GPUs.
Unlike previously expected the codename for nVidia's next generation GPU will NOT be "G90" but instead be "G92".

I have some info form NVIDIA insider about the upcoming G92 graphics processors.

G92 will be released in November 2007 timeframe in the form of "GeForce 9800" series.

"G92" GeForce 9800 GTX specs.

- 65nm process technology at TSMC.
- Over one billion transistors.
- Second Generation Unified Shader Architecture.
- Double precsion support (FP64).
- GPGPU native.
- Over one TeraFLOPS of shader processing power.
- MADD+ADD configuration for the shader untis (2+1 FLOPS=3 FLOPS per ALU)
- Fully Scalar design.
- 512-bit memory interface.
- 1024MB GDDR4 graphics memory.
- DirectX 10.1 support.
- OpenGL 3.0 Support.
- eDRAM die for "FREE 4xAA".
- built in Audio Chip.
- built in tesselation unit (in the graphics core"
- Improved AA and AF quality levels

Pros.

65nm process will allow for better yields and better power consumption. power consumption will be lower than that of a GeForce 8800 GTX.

GeForce 9800 GTX will be over two times faster than a GeForce 8800 Ultra in real world games and applcations.

Release date : November 2007. There will be TWO products at launch: The flagship GeForce 9800 GTX and the second fastest GeForce 9800 GTS.

price for the GeForce 9800 GTX will be 549-649 USD.

price for the GeForce 9800 GTS will be 399-449 USD.

[breathemetal]

This really gets me excited (nana2)

[MUYA]

Take a look at some leaked specs posted over at XBit Labs.....
http://www.xbitlabs.com/discussion/3953.html
There is no realible source for that. Plus its post to the story. I think it's a guestimate rather than facts pulled from inside sources

[DRen72]

There is something I don't quite get though. With specs like that who would need SLI anymore. Isn't nVidia trying to push SLI? Afterall, its more profit. Still, if those specs are on target...Wow.

A 9800GTS may even outbench 8800GTX SLI.

[Arioch]

I bet if those specs are true we are looking at a $799 GTX - they already broke the $600 barrier with the "8" series. I would probably also ditch my SLI setup for a single card, especially with the price I expect them to sell for.

[Bman212121]

There is something I don't quite get though. With specs like that who would need SLI anymore. Isn't nVidia trying to push SLI? Afterall, its more profit. Still, if those specs are on target...Wow.

A 9800GTS may even outbench 8800GTX SLI.

You should look at the rumor mill for this time last year. The same things were said about the 8800 series. With some of the games that are coming out in Q4 I'm sure you'll need these new cards to push the envelope on 24" or larger monitors.

[slaWter]

Considering those rumored specs I have a good feeling that one GTX will handle those new games in Q4 for <1920x1200 resolutions.

[DRen72]

You should look at the rumor mill for this time last year. The same things were said about the 8800 series. With some of the games that are coming out in Q4 I'm sure you'll need these new cards to push the envelope on 24" or larger monitors. That may be true and the 8800GTX was for sure a nice surprise in terms of performance, but we all knew that 7800GTX SLI had some limits (mine did) so the boost from the 8800GTX was needed. Which leads me to what slaWter says...
Considering those rumored specs I have a good feeling that one GTX will handle those new games in Q4 for <1920x1200 resolutions. Given how fast an 8800GTX SLI setup can be, a single 9800GTX will be very fast indeed. 9800-SLI might be overkill in terms of what you will gain for the $$$.