"R420/R423/RV380/NV40"

[VeXx]

ATI

 

Of all the photos our Alexander Vorobyev sends us from CeBIT 2004 some are totally unique. Among the novelties showcased at the booth of GeCube (Info-Tek Corp. brand) there are several ATI-based graphics cards with PCI Express 16x bus. Despite the company representative withdraw from any comments, we believe one of the showcased GPUs is nothing else, but R423, the PCI Express 16x variant of R420.

 

ATI'S R420 is a 12-pipeline chip with six vertex shader units at around 500MHz and 1000MHz memory that should come out by the middle of April we learned.

Since we also learned that Nvidia plans to launch its NV40 on April 14th, we might even see Nvidia and ATI launch rival graphics armoury in the same week.

 

We can confirm, as the Germans claimed, that ATI's latest greatest prettiest part wont support Pixel Shader (PS) 3.0 which will be supported feature of NV40.

 

That lead us to ask around and we learned that only one or two titles might laucnh before Christmas that support PS 3.0.

 

We also learned that the R420, with its 12 pipelines, might just lose the performance crown game against NV40's 16 pipelines and heavily-clocked memory at close to 600MHz.

 

We guess Nvidia's marketing team will be preparing good reasons why PS 3.0 is better then PS 2.0 in this iteration of the numbers game.

 

But we learned that ATI has been counting on capturing the performance crown rather than just piling on the features to focus their marketing to that point: "We are faster even though we don’t have PS 3.0."

 

But slippery Nvidia seems to have hoodwinked its competition. Even some game developers and customers received 300MHz samples with an 8x2 marchitecture. And ATI is reeling in the ominous shadow of a 16-pipeline competitor.

 

Its R420, is already up and running at ATI's NDA-protected press fortress and no partners have samples on their booths - despite our hopes.

 

The non-disclosure press sanctum can fiddle with the card but not write about it. We can write but fiddling is forbiddden. We will just continue to wander round CeBIT to get broken parts of the puzzle

 

Live og direkte fra CeBit til oss

 

Yummy yummy yummy

 

"RV380?"

 

 

 

"RV380"

 

 

http://www.theinquirer.net/images/articles/RV380PIC!.jpg

 

NVIDIA

 

Litt om NV40 fra CeBit :

 

THE 16 by one pipeline Nvidia NV40 3D graphics accelerator is believed to be the product that will dig Nvidia out of the mire and allow it to recover from the slough of despond that ATI has consigned it to over the last 18 months.

Wandering around the Messe at CeBIT it was evident that Nvidia did indeed fail to launch this eagerly anticipated product on the opening day of CeBIT.

 

No real surprises there, but what was entertaining was watching the extraordinary lengths they went to, to enforce the policing of the few working samples it had brought. We found a friendly Nvidia partner who told us that there are three working NV40 demo systems in the back rooms on Nvidia's own booth.

 

However, as we try to serve you guys with the news and truth when it’s as hot as we get it – this means we’re not in a position to sign Nvidia’s gagging agreements.

 

Consequently, whilst we weren’t frog marched off Nvidia’s booth our requests to have a gander at what was suggested to be a working NV40, were politely refused.

 

Therefore we can’t confirm whether any product Nvidia might have claimed was NV40 was just that, or even worked at all.

 

Sure makes me wonder about the ethics of hackettes that post news, but then sign their rights away to tell the story.

 

Despite Nvidia officials confirming that NV40 was "done and dusted", it seems that if this was true, then it wasn’t able to produce more than a handful to show off.

 

And those samples that were about, seemed to be punted from vendor to vendor by a little crew of Nvidia spinning minders – that’s as opposed to the normal Nvidia mind spinners.

 

These NV40 GPU Guards were apparently under instructions to not even leave their ‘trusted’ partners alone with the prized little jewel!

 

We watched as the GPU Guards secreted an NV40 sample into a back room on a partners stand.

 

This was apparently to allow these preferred manufacturing partners to present – with Nvidia policing the fun of course - a reassurance to its larger customers that Nvidia could be back in the game.

 

This privilege was also rather time limited, as the manufacturing partners were apparently expected to cram all their customers into a 1½ hour time slot, before the NV40 was scheduled to be whisked away from them to the next partner.

 

This whole rigmarole seems to have come as a surprise to each Nvidia partner, so they weren’t even able to plan out a schedule to invite their preferred customers.

 

Other stuff Nvidia seem not to be telling all its partners is the launch date, or even the retail name of the product, though some partners have speculated that FX 6000 would show consistency.

 

Regarding the launch date, Nvidia have said that everything will be clear within a few weeks. This fits in with some partners seeming to be under the impression that a launch in the second week of April is on the cards so to speak.

 

We agreed not to photograph what we saw, but can confirm the following.

 

When removing the heatsink, we noted that the NV40 GPU itself was, in comparison to what we have seen before, quite large.

 

However whilst our earlier information indicated that it comprised of 205 -210 million transistors, our sources currently say that what we were holding was a 175 million transistor part.

 

With the heatsink removed we could see that a small formed surrounding was employed to assist leveling of the heatsink.

 

Unlike the ill fated GeForce FX 5800 Ultra (NV30) where a heatsink on the back of the PCB could also interface with a small section of the PCB directly behind the GPU as well as the memory modules, additional circuitry in this area on the NV40 prohibits this.

 

Whilst a heatsink still seems necessary to assist thermal control of the new lower voltage memory modules, the heatsink on the front of the GPU will have to do all the work.

 

Eight 32MB video memory modules are installed – four on each side of the PCB and as we first reported from Computex in Taiwan – these are of the new GDDR3 type.

 

However these were not from Micron, which at that time seemed to be both ATi and Nvidia’s GDDR3 development partner. Instead, Samsung seems to be the preferred supplier of the 256MB we saw installed.

 

The primary shocker was that the board requires two large 4-pin power connectors as opposed to the single power connector on current high-end products.

 

Perhaps a lot of end-users who have been thinking that they might wait and upgrade to NV40 when it becomes available, should start saving their sheckles to upgrade to a new power supply unit as well.

 

One final thing, contrary to previous speculation, we think that ‘NV40’ that will come to market may be what was originally planned, as NV45 is, we’re told, the PCI Express part.

 

Whether that has an AGP to PCI Express bridge chip remains to be seen.

 

Dette ser så meget spennende ut, ettersom jeg har lest ser det ut som om NVIDIA har utrolig mye å by på denne gangen. Jeg fant desverre ikke noe mer informasjon om R420 eller R423

 

Litt info og bilder fra ATi og info fra NVIDIA

Endret 21. mars 2004 av VeXx

[Arve Systad]

Flott jobba! Interresant lesestoff!

 

*glede seg til NV40 og R420 blir lagt ut for salg*

[VeXx]

Gleder meg utrolig mye jeg også, ser ut som om NVIDIA kan komme seg tilbake på banen her, men vil ikke si noe før jeg har sett real-life ytelse

 

EDIT : fiksa bildelinkene, Digit-life likte ikke at jeg linket til de

Endret 20. mars 2004 av VeXx

[Tåkelys]

Vil de nye grafikkortene komme som AGP, og ikke bare PCI Express? Ser ikke for meg at jeg orker å kjøpe nytt hovedkort ennå. Men merker at 9800PRO kortet mitt begynner å slite litt i f.eks FarCry.

[Insomniac]

Vil de nye grafikkortene komme som AGP, og ikke bare PCI Express?

Ja

[scoot]

Er dette de kortene som tar over for Radeon familien ? OG evt FX ?

[jokki]

woow

spennende nytt dette, men som sagt så bør alt som sies nå tas med en liten klype salt.

 

Venter på testene, men tror faktisk at Nvidia vinner denne grafikkduellen.

[Robin B]

Ingen av de bildene er av R42X , mangler strøm utak.

[Arve Systad]

Men merker at 9800PRO kortet mitt begynner å slite litt i f.eks FarCry.

9800pro klarer i lag med en grei CPU å kjøre Far cry flytande i 1024x768 full detail og medium antialiasing!

[MistaPi]

Ingen av de bildene er av R42X , mangler strøm utak.

Kanskje den er gjemt under kjøleribba, under den fliken på toppen. Eller kanskje den er på baksiden av kortet.

[Tåkelys]

9800pro klarer i lag med en grei CPU å kjøre Far cry flytande i 1024x768 full detail og medium antialiasing!

Jeg kjørte det i 1280x1024 med masse eye candy. Da er det litt småhakking enkelte plasser. Går bedre i 1152x864. Men kommer til å kjøpe et av de nye kortene, når de kommer.

[Ducky]

Venter på testene, men tror faktisk at Nvidia vinner denne grafikkduellen.

Tror at Ati vinner nok en gang..

nVidia sin 5950 er jo klokket høyre enn 9800xt men de yter omtrent likens..

[VeXx]

Ingen av de bildene er av R42X , mangler strøm utak.

Satt og diskuterte det på Beyond 3D, strømuttakene skal visst være på baksiden av kortet.

[VeXx]

Angående hvem som går av med kronen denne gangen, er det ekstremt uklart. Det spekuleres utrolig mye rundt ATIs pipelines og vertex shadere og at det er bekreftet at ATI ikke ville implentere Pixel Shader 3.0 pga de vil fokusere på en kraftigere PS2.0.

 

13 april (muligens før) får vi se NVIDIA NV40 i aksjon og se hva det duger til. Til nå har jeg hørt at det kjører noe slikt :

 

Far Cry 1600x1200 No AA/AF = 55fps

Halo 1600x1200 = 53fps

 

Det jeg sitter og lurer på er om det er minimum fps eller gjennomsnittelig (FPS drops)

 

Spennede tid i vente

[FJERNET111]

Litt rart at det bildet av R420 bruker både den gamle og den nye ATi logoen....

 

Hørte at dette var et Gecube R380 og ikke et R420

[VeXx]

Litt rart at det bildet av R420 bruker både den gamle og den nye ATi logoen....

 

Hørte at dette var et Gecube R380 og ikke et R420

Lurer også på det, men ATi bruker visst begge logoene etter det jeg har sett.

[Robin B]

Dave Baumann har bekreftet at det ikke er R 423.

 

 

 

Pic 1: Equivelent of 9600 XT PCI-Express (probably mock up) (RV380)

Pic 2: Lower end version of RV380 using TSOP memory (Again, probably mock up sample)

Pic 3: Real, working, RV380 reference sample from ATI.

 

 

http://www.beyond3d.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10926&start=20

[Stig-Arne]

Tror at Ati vinner nok en gang..

nVidia sin 5950 er jo klokket høyre enn 9800xt men de yter omtrent likens..

Når skal folk innse at klokkefrekvens ikke har alt å si ?

Endret 21. mars 2004 av Morpheus^

[VeXx]

Dave Baumann har bekreftet at det ikke er R 423.

 

 

 

Pic 1: Equivelent of 9600 XT PCI-Express (probably mock up) (RV380)

Pic 2: Lower end version of RV380 using TSOP memory (Again, probably mock up sample)

Pic 3: Real, working, RV380 reference sample from ATI.

 

 

http://www.beyond3d.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10926&start=20

Så det i dag

[Simen1]

Lovende! Blir spennende å se når de kommer.

 

PS. Det er jo i det minste bra å se at de avbildede kortene ikke har ekstra strømkontakt. PCI-Express porten kan levere 75W så en ekstra kontakt ville i såfall betydd et enormt strømforbruk ala det FX5800 hadde. Godt strømforbruket/varmeutviklingen er under 75W i det minste.

 

Edit: Sår først nå at det ikke var R423, men "bare" Radeon 9600-baserte kort. Skulle bare mangle at disse bruker mindre enn 75W. Dagens utgaver bruker jo under 25W (som AGP-porten er i stand til å levere)

Endret 21. mars 2004 av Simen1