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AMD 7000 series details leaked

Nightglow said:
Definitely agree Vram should have been 3GB, & I'm surprise they are still using a 256-bit memory interface, & not 384 bit or 512 bit memory interface, even though it may add a little more to the costs.
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No point showing all your cards, just to be one upped in 6 months whilst you have to r&d for the next 2 years worth of chips. :p
 
Nightglow said:
Definitely agree Vram should have been 3GB, & I'm surprise they are still using a 256-bit memory interface, & not 384 bit or 512 bit memory interface, even though it may add a little more to the costs.
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512bit is more than they need by a massive amount and wouldn't add a "small" amount to the cost, the cost would be huge.

3gb is also complete and utter overkill, 99.9% of 7970's sold will be used on single screen systems at 1920x1080, its as simple as that. Likewise, you can't have 3gb in the current memory setup, 8x32bit memory controllers = 256bit memory bus = one chip on each memory controller = 8 chips. You can get 128MB chips, or 256MB chips now, which means 1 or 2gb, you can't have 3gb, its 1, 2 or 4gb. Adding massively to the cost to help 0.0001% of your users is completely mental, the same reason Nvidia didn't go with 3GB as standard, its nuts.

Most surround setups don't eat near 2GB of memory at 3x1920x1080, so again, who would 3gb help, just because in a couple games it makes a marginal difference over a 1.5GB 580gtx, that doesn't mean it needs 3gb, it could mean it needs 1.51GB memory.

a 384bit controller would mean, a vastly redesigned mem controller, re-organising the gpu completely as the memory controllers are usually spaced around the outside, it would mean changing all the data paths throughout the gpu, changing balancing, significantly increased PCB costs, more memory costs, higher power usage at idle and load, both due to more memory and a higher power memory controller which is where a pretty significant amount of the gpu's power gets used...... all to help 1 in every 50,000 owners?
 
drunkenmaster said:
512bit is more than they need by a massive amount and wouldn't add a "small" amount to the cost, the cost would be huge.

3gb is also complete and utter overkill, 99.9% of 7970's sold will be used on single screen systems at 1920x1080, its as simple as that. Likewise, you can't have 3gb in the current memory setup, 8x32bit memory controllers = 256bit memory bus = one chip on each memory controller = 8 chips. You can get 128MB chips, or 256MB chips now, which means 1 or 2gb, you can't have 3gb, its 1, 2 or 4gb. Adding massively to the cost to help 0.0001% of your users is completely mental, the same reason Nvidia didn't go with 3GB as standard, its nuts.

Most surround setups don't eat near 2GB of memory at 3x1920x1080, so again, who would 3gb help, just because in a couple games it makes a marginal difference over a 1.5GB 580gtx, that doesn't mean it needs 3gb, it could mean it needs 1.51GB memory.

a 384bit controller would mean, a vastly redesigned mem controller, re-organising the gpu completely as the memory controllers are usually spaced around the outside, it would mean changing all the data paths throughout the gpu, changing balancing, significantly increased PCB costs, more memory costs, higher power usage at idle and load, both due to more memory and a higher power memory controller which is where a pretty significant amount of the gpu's power gets used...... all to help 1 in every 50,000 owners?
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Informative post. That was a good read.
 
opethdisciple said:
More rumours to add to the fire.

Sounds good if true!
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If these specs are true, then a mid card 7870 sounds like a killer! Should hopefully be around the same performance as the 6970 with half the power consumption.

GCN also looks interesting, I wonder how well this will perform against Nvidia's upcoming Kepler? I also notice the power requirements are lower than the 6970 too. Not too sure how well XDR2 will play out, but specwise it looks like a good successor to GDDR5. 1ghz stock speed on the core... yummy :p.
 
If you jump to a new memory type you don't need to up the width. 384GB/sec memory bandwidth would just go unused lol.

Also with such high memory speeds routing becomes harder and memory controllers take up more space. Nvidia uses smaller, but slower speed units, that's why they don't clock as high as AMD (they can also fit more round a larger core).
 
Wasn't going to upgrade my 4890 till the 7000 series comes out and they look pretty nice if they are true. Hopefully it is a Q4 release :D.
 
A lot of people on the Beyond3D forums are saying the spec details are fake. Particularly on the point of XDR2 ram.

The guys over there are pretty well versed in the architecture of GPU/CPU's, both on consoles and PC, so dunno what to make of it.
 
Thats not surprisingly why I'm still going on previous leaks on info, though 28nm could certainly be slipping, the chips are apparently in production, but gpu's take anything up to 6 weeks to get made, they could have gone in yesterday and be 6 weeks away(and minimum 2 weeks from then till launch) or be coming out tomorrow and 2 weeks away from a launch.

XDR2, its possible, and it also seems very unlikely :p Its not known to be in production anywhere, but its not quite like your average gddr5 or ddr3, Samsung et all will build millions of those chips and sell to whoever needs them, they aren't doing that with XDR2 because there aren't customers, doesn't mean AMD haven't place a large order with someone to produce those chips though.

XDR2 launched in......... 2005, so its not like its brand new, and waiting on a good process/fab, its just really old and no one wanted it/saw a need for it, pretty much gddr in its various incarnations is just cheaper and easier. But there is a point at which xdr2 is better and the increased cost will be offset by decreases elsewhere.

AMD have a long standing habit of pushing new memory tech in gpu's and co-designing and being the first to use new memories, Rambus are also a partner of Glofo, so its all very possible.

IT would make sense for AMD to start to use xdr2 though, the ps3 uses xdr, its lower power, smaller traces, reduces the complexity of a console, more bandwidth, etc, better overall, less things to fail and with AMD supposedly in next gen Xbox and PS4, and you would think staying in nintendo boxes for some time to come, xdr2 could be a huge volume product for Glofo/AMD/consoles, I can definately see the push for XDR2 and the jump to volume production that would make it worthwhile in cost to stick on high end gpu's aswell.
 
The XDR2 RAM is unlikely, but the fact that it says the 7950 has 30 CUs when they can only be included in multiples of four (as compute unit arrays) in GCN is worse. Maths fail on the part of the rumour makers. :p

Edit: Also Thames isn't a "Southern Island". It's a river. You should know this. At a stretch, it's a town in New Zealand, although it isn't really an island. Either way, the "Thames" name is much more consistent with the older rumours that the mobile parts are named after places in London, like "Wimbledon", "Heathrow", etc.
 
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