AMD launched the 5770 within a month or so, maybe even just a couple weeks of the 5870, and this time around the 6770 is likely to be the first card available, followed by the high end , followed by the low end, high end probably within a couple weeks of the 6770. Mid November at a guess for the 6870, couple weeks after that for a 6970 maybe, 6850 somewhere inbetween, the 6770 around the 25th of October with the launch on the 12th October.
It sounds, much like I guessed AMD are going for a roughly 400mm2 die, so a 15% increase, which is all you can go up before yields kick you in the crotch like the GF100(500mm2 and couldn't be sold at a profit at all). Redone uncore(rops, tmu's) to fill out a different shader, 4 medium complexity shaders vs 4 simple + 1 complex. Hardest stuff it has to do should be much faster as rather than 1600 shaders, of which 1280 were simple ones and 320 were "complex" ones, you'll now have all shaders able to do more complex things and simple things when thats all thats required. THe 4 new shaders are smaller than the 4+1 previous arrangement, but bigger than 4 of the simple shaders, but with a die size increase and some other die space improvements, 2000 would be a sensible number to aim for, but with better shaders and better optimised tmu's/rops to feed them.
Remember the 4xxx series cards were made on 55nm, the 5xxx series were made on 40nm and the 6xxx series will be on 40nm.
IE as production ramped up on the 5xxx series production was unaffected for the previous cards as they are made in a different building, the 6000 series cards will replace the 5 series and have almost certainly stopped production on almost everything 5000 series. I wouldn't expect stock to be around for long as the 4870-4350 were TINY cores, made in massive numbers, and still produced long after the new cards hit. 5xxx production essentially stopped a couple months ago most likely, they are much bigger with much lower volume production and they've been selling like hot cakes. Theres probably not a whole lot of cores left on shelves waiting to ship.
2nd hand market is probably the best place to look for a great 5xxx series deal as people dump them for 6870/6850's.
