Nvidia: We Expected More from AMD Radeon HD 7970

Perhaps, the launch of the Radeon HD 7970 graphics card powered by Advanced Micro Devices’ latest Southern Islands/GCN (graphics core next) was not the most impressive one as it was a rush announcement two days ahead of Christmas. But AMD does have a next-gen GPU on the market, unlike its major rival Nvidia Corp., a clear advantage. But the latter claims that the model 7970 fails to impress.

“Honestly, we expected more from our competitor’s new architecture,” an unnamed official Nvidia initiative told NordicHardware web-site.

Nvidia itself has been astonishingly quiet about its next-generation The company has learnt its lesson when it unveiled code-named Fermi architecture about half a year ahead of actual release and would like to ensure instant availability of next-generation graphics cards after the formal launch, according to unofficial information.

Nvidia Bashes AMD’s Latest Graphics Architecture

Perhaps, the launch of the Radeon HD 7970 graphics card powered by Advanced Micro Devices’ latest Southern Islands/GCN (graphics core next) was not the most impressive one as it was a rush announcement two days ahead of Christmas. But AMD does have a next-gen GPU on the market, unlike its major rival Nvidia Corp., a clear advantage. But the latter claims that the model 7970 fails to impress.

“Honestly, we expected more from our competitor’s new architecture,” an unnamed official Nvidia initiative told NordicHardware web-site.

Nvidia itself has been astonishingly quiet about its next-generation The company has learnt its lesson when it unveiled code-named Fermi architecture about half a year ahead of actual release and would like to ensure instant availability of next-generation graphics cards after the formal launch, according to unofficial information. At present Nvidia considers scheduling the launch of code-named Kepler products on March or April. Officially, the company claims that its Kepler will be released in the first half of 2012.

While the launch of the AMD Radeon HD 7970 was rather weak in terms of publicity and in many other terms, it is clear that today, around a month after the formal product announcement, AMD has actual new-generation graphics cards on the market. Meanwhile, it will take another two or more months for Nvidia to start selling its next-gen GeForce GTX 780-series. Naturally, Nvidia is interested in slowing down sales of AMD’s code-named Tahiti graphics solution so that to satisfy delayed demand for high-end graphics boards later this year.

Kepler is Nvidia's next-generation graphics processor architecture that is projected to bring considerable performance improvements and will likely make the GPU more flexible in terms of programmability, which will speed up development of applications that take advantage of GPGPU (general purpose processing on GPU) technologies. Some of the technologies that Nvidia promised to introduce in Kepler and Maxwell (the architecture that will succeed Kepler) include virtual memory space (which will allow CPUs and GPUs to use the "unified" virtual memory), pre-emption, enhance the ability of GPU to autonomously process the data without the help of CPU and so on. Entry-level chips may not get all the features that Kepler architecture will have to often. Production of Kepler chips was supposed to start in Q4 2011.

Source: xbitlabs.com

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Overclockers reveals Radeon HD 7950 benchmark

Online retailer Overclockers.co.uk have got their paws on a reference Radeon HD7950 Graphic Card and have been showing off the the price, launch date and benchmark results of the beast.

The site said that the Radeon HD7950 ran at at 810MHz Core / 5000MHz Memory, Packs 3GB GDDR5 Memory Buffer, 1792 Stream Processors, 32ROP’s, 112TMU’s and memory runs along a 384-bit wide interface. The first set of benchmark results were obtained at a resolution of 1680×1050, 4xAA and Normal Tessellation, and showed AMD 7950 Stock (810MHz Core / 5000MHz Memory) – 1379 Score, AMD 7950 Maxed on Overdrive (1025MHz Core / 6300MHz Memory) – 1689 Score, and AMD 7950 Maxed OC on Asus OC BIOS (1180MHz Core / 7200MHz Memory) – 1936 Score.

Online retailer Overclockers.co.uk have got their paws on a reference Radeon HD7950 Graphic Card and have been showing off the the price, launch date and benchmark results of the beast.

The site said that the Radeon HD7950 ran at at 810MHz Core / 5000MHz Memory, Packs 3GB GDDR5 Memory Buffer, 1792 Stream Processors, 32ROP’s, 112TMU’s and memory runs along a 384-bit wide interface. The first set of benchmark results were obtained at a resolution of 1680×1050, 4xAA and Normal Tessellation, and showed AMD 7950 Stock (810MHz Core / 5000MHz Memory) – 1379 Score, AMD 7950 Maxed on Overdrive (1025MHz Core / 6300MHz Memory) – 1689 Score, and AMD 7950 Maxed OC on Asus OC BIOS (1180MHz Core / 7200MHz Memory) – 1936 Score.

The clocks managed to reach a core clock of 1180Mhz and 7200Mhz on Memory which means that the card has huge overclocking potential. Overclockers.co.uk then pushed the card to run at 2560×1600 Resolution and it did pretty well and did not catch fire. The site said that it will sell for $449 and will not only outperform a GeForce GTX580 but also overclocks better. It is cooler too.

Apparently a 1.5GB Variant is also expected in March for $399. Overclockers.co.uk’s pricing goes, they’ll price the reference model at £350.

Source: fudzilla.com

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Xbox 720 may have AMD HD6670 graphics

Microsoft may still be making good money with Xbox 360 sales, but the next generation of console is already being developed with a launch said to be at the end of the year, probably around October or November. It should be around six times as powerful as the current model and is said to feature AMD HD6000 graphics inside.

IGN have had a source ‘close to the project’ and they say that it will be using the HD6670 with full support for Direct X 11, 3D and 1080p HD output, and even multidisplay capabilities.

The Radeon HD6670 costs around £60 in the United Kingdom and while it is considered a very mainstream solution in the PC sector, it is six times as powerful as the graphics in the Xbox 360, and is 20% faster than the upcoming Wii U console.

Microsoft may still be making good money with Xbox 360 sales, but the next generation of console is already being developed with a launch said to be at the end of the year, probably around October or November. It should be around six times as powerful as the current model and is said to feature AMD HD6000 graphics inside.

IGN have had a source ‘close to the project’ and they say that it will be using the HD6670 with full support for Direct X 11, 3D and 1080p HD output, and even multidisplay capabilities.

The Radeon HD6670 costs around £60 in the United Kingdom and while it is considered a very mainstream solution in the PC sector, it is six times as powerful as the graphics in the Xbox 360, and is 20% faster than the upcoming Wii U console.

Developers will be receiving their development kit for the Xbox 720 in August. Cost of the console has yet to be decided, but there is a specific threshold they need to achieve to ensure high mass market sales.

Source: kitguru.net

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More Radeon HD 7950 benchmarks surface

Following yesterday's GPU-Z screenshot and 3DMark 11 performance leak from Donanimhaber.com, Mydrivers has come up with a few additional HD 7950 benchmarks, unfortunately still only focused on 3DMark 11.

Unlike the one seen yesterday, the Radeon HD 7950 card at Mydrivers site is set at reference 800MHz for the GPU and 1250MHz for 3GB of GDDR5 memory as well as overclocked to 1030MHz for the GPU. The results of the card were compared to GTX 570, Radeon HD 6970 as well as Radeon HD 7970 cards.

Still only 3DMark 11

Following yesterday's GPU-Z screenshot and 3DMark 11 performance leak from Donanimhaber.com, Mydrivers has come up with a few additional HD 7950 benchmarks, unfortunately still only focused on 3DMark 11.

Unlike the one seen yesterday, the Radeon HD 7950 card at Mydrivers site is set at reference 800MHz for the GPU and 1250MHz for 3GB of GDDR5 memory as well as overclocked to 1030MHz for the GPU. The results of the card were compared to GTX 570, Radeon HD 6970 as well as Radeon HD 7970 cards.

As we always note, 3DMark 11 is a decent benchmark but we always like to see a card running some game titles before we draw any conclusion. The preview results in Performance 3DMark 11 show that the HD 7950 will end up competitive to both GTX 570 and probably even GTX 580 and have a decent overclocking potential to be as fast as the reference HD 7970.

Of course, we are about a week away from the official launch date set at 31st of January when we will probably see some of the first benchmarks and know for sure.

You can check out the results here.

Source: fudzilla.com

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Nvidia Lowers Revenue Expectations Due to Hard Drives Shortages

Nvidia Corp. on Wednesday announced that it expects revenue for the fourth quarter ending January 29, 2012, to be lower than the company's previous outlook provided back in October. The developer of multimedia chips blames shortages of hard disk drives as well as lowering demand towards Tegra 2 system-on-chips for the lowering revenue.

The global disk-drive shortage caused by the flooding in Thailand had more impact on the mainstream GPU segment than anticipated. Shipments by some PC OEMs were reduced. And the higher prices of disk-drives constrained some PC OEMs' ability to include a discrete GPU in their systems.

Nvidia Suffers from Tight Supply of Hard Drives, Lowering Demand for Tegra 2

Nvidia Corp. on Wednesday announced that it expects revenue for the fourth quarter ending January 29, 2012, to be lower than the company's previous outlook provided back in October. The developer of multimedia chips blames shortages of hard disk drives as well as lowering demand towards Tegra 2 system-on-chips for the lowering revenue.

The global disk-drive shortage caused by the flooding in Thailand had more impact on the mainstream GPU segment than anticipated. Shipments by some PC OEMs were reduced. And the higher prices of disk-drives constrained some PC OEMs' ability to include a discrete GPU in their systems.

Additionally, the Tegra 2 mobile business declined more rapidly than expected, ahead of devices based on the Tegra 3 processor ramping into production in the first quarter of calendar-year 2012.

Nvidia is not the first company to blame shortages of hard drives and their increased prices for lower-than-expected revenue. Intel Corp. also suffered as manufacturers of computers had to buy more affordable chips to compensate boosted HDD pricing. Dropping demand for Tegra 2 is rather surprising, but indicates that tablet makers are now gearing for a new breed of slates with four processing engines as well as advanced graphics adapter.

Nvidia's earnings are now expected to be $950 million, plus or minus 1% percent, compared with original expectations of $1066 million, plus or minus 2%, provided on November 10, 2011.

Source: xbitlabs.com

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AMD Radeon HD 7950 listed in Europe

We managed to score an early listing of the upcoming Powercolor Radeon HD 7950 PCS+ card that was listed by one retailer in Germany with a price tag of €459.

The Powercolor HD 7950 PCS+ 3072MB is factory overclocked to 880MHz while the 3072MB of GDDR5 memory ticks at 1250MHz (5GHz). The card should pack 1792 stream processors and of course feature the same 384-bit memory interface. Although the listing at Atelco.de didn't feature a picture of the card, we are pretty sure that it should end up with the same cooler that we had a chance to see recently.

Factory overclocked card priced at €459

We managed to score an early listing of the upcoming Powercolor Radeon HD 7950 PCS+ card that was listed by one retailer in Germany with a price tag of €459.

The Powercolor HD 7950 PCS+ 3072MB is factory overclocked to 880MHz while the 3072MB of GDDR5 memory ticks at 1250MHz (5GHz). The card should pack 1792 stream processors and of course feature the same 384-bit memory interface. Although the listing at Atelco.de didn't feature a picture of the card, we are pretty sure that it should end up with the same cooler that we had a chance to see recently.

Unfortunately for us, the link was taken off while we were writing up this news post, but as usual we already took a decent screenshot of the listing. Of course, Google tends to keep records, so you can see that the link was there.

Source: fudzilla.com

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AMD Radeon HD 7950 detailed

Although we are still over a week away from the official launch date, the guys from Donanimhaber.com scored some details regarding the upcoming Tahiti based Radeon HD 7950 card.

According to their info, the card should be running at 800MHz for the GPU and 1,250MHz (5GHz) for 3GB of GDDR5 memory paired up with the same 384-bit memory interface. In case you missed it, the Radeon HD 7950 packs 1792 stream processors, or 28 GCN compute units as AMD calls them these days.

In addition to the reference specs, Donanimhaber.com also scored 3DMark 11 Extreme and CPU-Z screenshot of the Radeon HD 7950 card running on 880MHz for the core. According to results, the card scores 2385 marks and still ends up faster than the GTX 580.

Core clock set at 800MHz

Although we are still over a week away from the official launch date, the guys from Donanimhaber.com scored some details regarding the upcoming Tahiti based Radeon HD 7950 card.

According to their info, the card should be running at 800MHz for the GPU and 1,250MHz (5GHz) for 3GB of GDDR5 memory paired up with the same 384-bit memory interface. In case you missed it, the Radeon HD 7950 packs 1792 stream processors, or 28 GCN compute units as AMD calls them these days.

In addition to the reference specs, Donanimhaber.com also scored 3DMark 11 Extreme and CPU-Z screenshot of the Radeon HD 7950 card running on 880MHz for the core. According to results, the card scores 2385 marks and still ends up faster than the GTX 580. As always, 3DMark 11 doesn't always reflect the actual real-world performance so we'll have to wait a bit longer to see how well it performs in various game titles.

As you already know, it looks like AMD gave a green light to its partners for non-reference cards since day one and there will be a lot of custom cooled and factory overclocked cards once it launched on January 31st. According to what we know, the price is still set at US $449.99.

You can check out more here.

Source: fudzilla.com

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Exclusive: And the Nvidia Kepler/GK104 price is……..

We hear that Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) has sent out Kepler pricing to AIBs in the far east, or will once the New Year party dies down. A few green-tinged moles, we think it’s the New Year’s celebratory hair dye, tell SemiAccurate that the initial Kepler/GK104 cards will be priced around the $299 mark. This should tell you quite a bit about how large the silicon is, but not necessarily what it will be marketed as.

There are two caveats to this number that you should be aware of. First, this is the initial round of pricing, and as we know, they do change, volume, yields etc.

Initial number head out to AIBs as a New Year's gift.

We hear that Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) has sent out Kepler pricing to AIBs in the far east, or will once the New Year party dies down. A few green-tinged moles, we think it’s the New Year’s celebratory hair dye, tell SemiAccurate that the initial Kepler/GK104 cards will be priced around the $299 mark. This should tell you quite a bit about how large the silicon is, but not necessarily what it will be marketed as.

There are two caveats to this number that you should be aware of. First, this is the initial round of pricing, and as we know, they do change, volume, yields etc. Second, it could well be a red herring to try and crater AMD 79xx sales, even given the number of sources that gave us the same number. Lets see how long it takes for the echo chamber to ‘independently confirm’ this one.

Source: semiaccurate.com

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AMD Radeon HD 7970 now shipping from Newegg

AMD's highly anticipated flagship 28nm single-GPU card, the Radeon HD 7970, has now officially become available from Newegg nearly twenty-four hours before its official launch.

The 28nm Tahiti-based GPU is available from six different add-in board partners - Sapphire, PowerColor, HIS, ASUS, XFX and Gigabyte - with a price range between $549 and $599 and approximately $8 dollar shipping within the continental United States.

We expect more AMD retail and online e-tail partners should have already received inventory and will begin listing the card for sale within the next twenty-four hour time period.

$549 - $599, high consumer demand

AMD's highly anticipated flagship 28nm single-GPU card, the Radeon HD 7970, has now officially become available from Newegg nearly twenty-four hours before its official launch.

The 28nm Tahiti-based GPU is available from six different add-in board partners - Sapphire, PowerColor, HIS, ASUS, XFX and Gigabyte - with a price range between $549 and $599 and approximately $8 dollar shipping within the continental United States.

We expect more AMD retail and online e-tail partners should have already received inventory and will begin listing the card for sale within the next twenty-four hour time period. Meanwhile, we expect Newegg's preliminary inventory to be purchased very quickly, as these cards are drawing large amounts of anticipation from PC hardware enthusiasts who value their overclocking potential and overall performance benefits.

Newegg's product listing for AMD Radeon HD 7970 models can be found here.

Source: fudzilla.com

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Rest of AMD's OEM-only HD 7000 rebrands detailed

After detailing the AMD Radeon HD 7670 OEM-only rebrand based on the same Turks GPU found in the HD 6670 card, the guys from Tomshardware.com managed to score details for the rest of the rebrand lineup. In addition to the HD 7670, the lineup includes the Radeon HD 7570, Radeon HD 7470/7450 as well as the entry-level Radeon HD 7350 card.

The Radeon HD 7570 is based on the same Turks GPU and with the same specs as the HD 6570, while the HD 7470 and the HD 7450 will be based on quite well known Caicos GPU with 160 stream processors, previously seen on the HD 6450 card. The last card in the lineup, the HD 7350, comes as a surprise as it is based on now quite old Evergreen family Cedar GPU, the same one that was happily ticking in the HD 5450 card.

Everything below HD 77xx

After detailing the AMD Radeon HD 7670 OEM-only rebrand based on the same Turks GPU found in the HD 6670 card, the guys from Tomshardware.com managed to score details for the rest of the rebrand lineup. In addition to the HD 7670, the lineup includes the Radeon HD 7570, Radeon HD 7470/7450 as well as the entry-level Radeon HD 7350 card.

The Radeon HD 7570 is based on the same Turks GPU and with the same specs as the HD 6570, while the HD 7470 and the HD 7450 will be based on quite well known Caicos GPU with 160 stream processors, previously seen on the HD 6450 card. The last card in the lineup, the HD 7350, comes as a surprise as it is based on now quite old Evergreen family Cedar GPU, the same one that was happily ticking in the HD 5450 card.

The good part of the story is that these are only meant for OEMs but then again rebrands are never popular. You can check out more details here.

Source: fudzilla.com

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Radeon HD 7970 shows up at Amazon.de

Just a day before it should officially show up in retail/e-tail, German/Austrian Amazon has jumped the gun and listed AMD's HD 7970 with a price set at €529.

According to our sources, the final price of the card for Europe is set €499. The FOB price is set at around US $480 but when you add tax and some retail margins you end up at around €499/US $549. Of course, Amazon was never one of the cheapest and you can expect at least some of the retailers/e-tailers to sell the card for €499.

The rest of the e-tail/retail should start to list the cards tomorrow and you can check out the Amazon listing here.

Listed at €529

Just a day before it should officially show up in retail/e-tail, German/Austrian Amazon has jumped the gun and listed AMD's HD 7970 with a price set at €529.

According to our sources, the final price of the card for Europe is set €499. The FOB price is set at around US $480 but when you add tax and some retail margins you end up at around €499/US $549. Of course, Amazon was never one of the cheapest and you can expect at least some of the retailers/e-tailers to sell the card for €499.

The rest of the e-tail/retail should start to list the cards tomorrow and you can check out the Amazon listing here.

Source: fudzilla.com

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Close up on the Radeon 7000 series

GPU manufacturers must be desperate for the present generation of consoles to fade away and die. With so much money available to publishers in the console space, there’s a reduced drive to create games that need much more than the weak-arsed specs found in a PlayStation 3 or XBox 360.

Still, we know that a quantum leap will happen at some stage – at which point we’ll all be reaching for ‘more’.

If you’d like to digest the 7000 series launch in no time at all, we have the video for you:-

GPU manufacturers must be desperate for the present generation of consoles to fade away and die. With so much money available to publishers in the console space, there’s a reduced drive to create games that need much more than the weak-arsed specs found in a PlayStation 3 or XBox 360.

Still, we know that a quantum leap will happen at some stage – at which point we’ll all be reaching for ‘more’.

If you’d like to digest the 7000 series launch in no time at all, we have the video for you:-



Source: kitguru.net

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