Next Generation Video Cards

[Vanzagar]

Anyone know approximately when AMD or nVidia will be releasing their next generation of vid cards? Are they shooting before the end of this year or is it pretty safe to say we have to wait until 2012?

This generation is getting pretty long in the tooth isn't it, when was the first model released?

Thanks,

Vanz

[jlippo]

2012 and it is expected to be 'speed' upgrade. (roughly double in power when compared to gtx580.)
We have to wait for 2013-2014 for true next generation. (ie. jump from G80/GTX280 to Fermi.)

[frenchy2k1]

Both AMD and Nvidia are expected to release their refresh around new year. AMD is rumored to have some release before and nvidia has said nothing before 2012.
Both will have a new architecture and both will be on 28nm at TSMC.

@jlippo: G80 was the 8800GTX. GT200 (Tesla) was the GTX280.

Nvidia has been ~ doubling their shaders with each new generation (G80: 128, GT200: 240, GF110: 512).

[frenchy2k1]

Edit: hiccup and double post

[Ninja Prime]

NV rumors are saying march at the earliest, probably meaning april/may. ATI is rumored for december, but thats probably mid-range stuff, jan-feb is rumored for high end.

[Vanzagar]

Thanks guys... too bad, I was hoping for a price drop for the gtx 570, it's been at $350 for months now, and the evga version is still out of stock at Newegg, maybe I'll buy it at Amazon, gonna wait about another month or 2 before pulling the trigger...

[Viral]

It might drop just after the new year, but I doubt prices will lower too much coming up to christmas with nothing new out to drive prices of older hardware down.

[jlippo]

Originally Posted by frenchy2k1

@jlippo: G80 was the 8800GTX. GT200 (Tesla) was the GTX280.

Ups, didn't remember the GT200 naming scheme.
they should have stayed with NV.. it was lot better as it told which part was speed bump and so on..

Point remains, we are getting new chip in 2012 which is a speed bump. (no huge new features.)

[Kain]

How big of a performance increase can we expect from going from a GTX 580 to a GTX 680 and going from a HD 6970 to a HD 7970?

I am thinking about buying two GTX 580s in SLI but the last thing I want is having a single GTX 680 coming close or matching the performance of two GTX 580s in SLI for half the price.

[Ninja Prime]

Originally Posted by Kain

How big of a performance increase can we expect from going from a GTX 580 to a GTX 680 and going from a HD 6970 to a HD 7970?

I am thinking about buying two GTX 580s in SLI but the last thing I want is having a single GTX 680 coming close or matching the performance of two GTX 580s in SLI for half the price.

If I was to guess, being that 28nm -> 40nm is a bigger jump than 55nm -> 40nm was, probably the jump will be bigger than GTX 280 to GTX 480 and 4870 to 5870 was. The last round of upgrades was pretty lame because they were both stuck on the same process as before, so 480 to 580 was just really from yield improvements and minor fixes, and 5870 to 6970 was a architecture change with minor improvements.

Theres a few factors that are up in the air though, AMD is changing architecture again, which in theory should yield even better improvements, but then fermi was supposed to do that too, and it ended up being less of an upgrade for it. Another factor is, NV might go for a smaller chip similar to AMD this time around and instead of a doubling of shaders and hardware, they might only go for 50% for 768 shaders, which could cut into the amount of an upgrade we see.

All thign considered, I'd say 80% or so is likely, and 100+% is possible.

[abcgamer]

I want to build a PC next year around this time probably. But not sure where are the big games that are going to push GTX 600 series? Metro Last Light and Far Cry 3 should be good enough for current high end cards. GTX 600 series should be future proof

[i SPY]

Originally Posted by Ninja Prime

NV rumors are saying march at the earliest, probably meaning april/may. ATI is rumored for december, but thats probably mid-range stuff, jan-feb is rumored for high end.

Actually AMD will release 7970 on 22.Dec.2011, 7950 on 9.Jan.2012.