The first "proper" Kepler news Fri 17th Feb?

[555BUK]

The 560ti 570 and 580 were hailed as excellent cards. All that Nvidia did, though, was fit them with low leakage transistors (to lower the power draw) as well as a TDP throttle to stop them using as much power when ran in something like Furmark, and a better cooler (a vapor chamber, oddly the same one that had used when they revised the too hot too loud 260 and 280).

They also revised the shader architecture, unlocked 32 additional sharders, and reduced transistor count from 3.2bn to 3bn.

All of that smacks of fail. The fact that OCUK (almost two years on) has a huge batch of EVGA GTX 480s says it all.

The GTX480 significantly outperformed the 5870 at launch, and does so by an even wider margin now. Even AMD's revised 6970 only just about matched the GTX480's for performance.

At £450 they were horrifically over priced, so any one waiting for them with any sense just went 5870 as the 480 and 470 pretty much confirmed all of the rumour and speculation. They were too hot, too loud, too late and most importantly of all too expensive.

I kind of agree here. £450 for a single GPU graphics card is horribly expensive, even for a card that was comfortably the fastest card of it's generation.



In truth, almost all of the problems NVidia suffered with Fermi can be put down to the very poor 40nm process. Perhaps they were also a little naive producing such a large die, but the GTX580 proved that the basic architecture was sound. Hell, the 580 almost competes with AMD's top 28nm part, and the 580 was really what the 480 should have been from the very start (barring process hiccups).

The 480 was and still is a very good card. I had no regrets upgrading from a 5870 to one, and then onto a 580. Infact, my 480 was not that much noisier or hotter than my 5870 or GTX580, and few people who have owned 480's have had bad words to say about them. They may not be within the 9700Pro or 8800GTX class for performance, but they are closer than the current 7900 series will be given respective generations.

Sorry, but I have very fond memories of my GTX480. In performance terms it was just as good / better thab the GTX580 gieven the half-generation gap.

 

[ALXAndy]

The GTX480 significantly outperformed the 5870 at launch, and does so by an even wider margin now. Even AMD's revised 6970 only just about matched the GTX480's for performance.

Don't agree. I have the Custom PC here that tested the 480 at launch.

Bad Company 2 no FSAA

480 - min 56
5870 - min 52

Crysis no FSAA-

480 - min 20
5870 - min 21

Crysis 4XFSAA

480 - min 18
5870 - min 15

Hardly worth £100, what?

 

[edgedemon]

The only people who bought the 470 and 480 were those that -

1. Absolutely hated ATI and would have bought a dog poo with Nvidia written on it.

2. Had rattled on for ages about how marvellous Fermi was going to be and how wrong all of the information doing the rounds was, so left themselves with no choice.

Don't forget all the deluded poor fools in the corner crunching seti
We don't get a choice over red or green - it has to be the green for us
There are more of us then you think as well...

 

[ALXAndy]

Don't forget all the deluded poor fools in the corner crunching seti
We don't get a choice over red or green - it has to be the green for us
There are more of us then you think as well...

Oh absolutely. There are many using them for a good cause

Folding for example. Sadly I can't afford to run up huge electricity bills, but I most certainly doff my cap

 

[555BUK]

Don't agree. I have the Custom PC here that tested the 480 at launch.

Bad Company 2 no FSAA

480 - min 56
5870 - min 52

Crysis no FSAA-

480 - min 20
5870 - min 21

Crysis 4XFSAA

480 - min 18
5870 - min 15

Hardly worth £100, what?

Anyone can quote a few individual benchmarks and hope to prove a point.

Truth is that the GTX480 was faster than the 5870 at launch and is moreso now. It is the 6970 that is neck & neck with the 480 (some games the 6970 wins, some the 480 wins, some are even). Here you go, a slightly broader range of benchmarks and resolutions that contains all 3 cards. It offers a varied set of tests which includes both recent games, and ones around at the time Fermi and the 5800's were launched.

 

[Sin_Chase]

What can you spend your credits on edgedemon?

 

[ALXAndy]

Anyone can quote a few individual benchmarks and hope to prove a point.

Truth is that the GTX480 was faster than the 5870 at launch and is moreso now. It is the 6970 that is neck & neck with the 480 (some games the 6970 wins, some the 480 wins, some are even). Here you go, a slightly broader range of benchmarks and resolutions that contains all 3 cards.

I didn't say it wasn't faster mate. I said -

It was late.
It was hot.
It was loud.
It was too expensive.

Emphasis added on the most important part. It cost £100 more than the 5870 and was nowhere near faster enough to justify the extra £100.

Sorry, but 4 FPS in any circumstances at any moment in time does not justify £100 extra. That 4 FPS in certain circumstances then changes to 1 FPS.

So when £100 is at stake even one single cherry picked benchmark is of crucial importance.

We will see if your opinion changes when Kepler comes out. That's if it performs very similarly to the 7970 and costs £100 more.

I can't see that happening, because put simply Kepler does not smack of fail.

It smacks of "eeee ya lucky buggers".

 

[edgedemon]

What can you spend your credits on edgedemon?

Im hoping they will count when Im at the pearly gates knocking to come in - or Im completely shafted and heading downstairs if they don't

 

[555BUK]

I didn't say it wasn't faster mate. I said -

It was late.
It was hot.
It was loud.
It was too expensive.

I fully agree that the 480 was too expensive compared to the 5800, and that it was late, and that it run hotter and maybe even louder. Few people buy top end cards for quietness, coolness or because they are cheap. Top end cards are purchased mainly for their performance, with everthing else being a secondary concoern. The overall package counts, but performance is the Holy Grail and the 480 certainly delivered there.

So,
It was late.
It was hot.
It was loud.
It was too expensive.
It was clearly the fastest card of it's generation

 

[bru]

The fairly simple explanation is, they can't NOT release a high end part, so whatever is the highest kepler they can release gets the high end branding, its got nothing to do with AMD as it only looks bad with AMD. Seeing as all it can do is make it look like AMD have closed the gap on the top end Nvidia parts this generation.

As happens a lot I don't find my self in agreement with a lot of your post, but this one section, I do agree is quite correct.
The part being released even though we know it to be a midrange part (assuming the rumours are true) will show to the normal bod in the street that AMD have closed the performance gap to Nvidia's highend cards, when in reality due to AMD being conservative with the clocks on their 7970 and (again assuming the rumours are true) the good performance of the GK104, Nvidia have increased the performance gap. (midrange now as fast/faster than AMD's top end).

 

[ALXAndy]

I guess it all depends on what you consider to be "delivers".

Putting out at worst 1 FPS more than the 5870 and losing in other tests certainly doesn't suggest it delivered to me, considering they had six months (or close to it) to make sure it beat the 5870 and that was the best they could do.

Now obviously it wasn't a terrible card, that would be a little unfair. It just had absolutely nothing at all going for it at £450.

Now had it been released six months before the 5870 ? I am sure then it would have been seen as a product that delivered, as it would have decimated anything before it (4890, 4870, 285 etc). However, it was six months after the 5870 and failed to deliver on price and performance.

If we went back in time to release day (even knowing that 10-15% performance increases were coming in another six months) then we would still look at it the same, as we have to judge it based on what it does on release day.

Same goes for Kepler. It will be made or broken on what it does on the day it arrives.

Also, going back to my post above.. The two games tested (and what made or broke the 480) were, at the time, the most critical games for it to do well in. Crysis was still huge as it still had not been tamed by any single GPU (into completely playable frame rates) and Bad Company 2 was yesterday's Battlefield 3.

And, right now at this moment in time a card is solely judged upon that game.

 

[andybird123]

what was it you were saying about rubbishing someone else's post and then writing an essay about what you think?

 

[Sin_Chase]

Can you discuss the relative merits of age old cards elsewhere?

 

[ALXAndy]

what was it you were saying about rubbishing someone else's post and then writing an essay about what you think?

We're having a discussion. A nice friendly open one. That's all.

Nowhere have I said he was wrong ! he's more than welcome to his opinion as am I ?

I've read over it twice and I don't see anywhere that I even so much as remotely became condescending.

Context.

Can you discuss the relative merits of age old cards elsewhere?

You mean can we discuss Nvidia's last launch of a graphics card somewhere other than the graphics card forum?

Sorry I find that confusing. Fermi has quite a lot to do with Kepler IMO.

 

[555BUK]

And, right now at this moment in time a card is solely judged upon that game.

But right now we are judging the 5800's & Fermi in retrospect, whereby we have the ability to pass a fair judgement based upon both cards performed under "available games at launch performance", and "current/future game performance".

The GTX480 now performs MUCH better within CURRENT games than the 5870. That £100 price difference at lauch is now justified by the CURRENT performace gap and CURRENT resale vaules for both cards. Looking on the MM shows 5870 go for ~£80 and GTX480's fetch ~£150. All of that extra performance for a real-terms £30 difference in price almost justifies the high price.

Fermi's 400 series has proven to have much better logevity than the 5800's. GTX480's can still play just about every game on high settings @ 1920x1200, 5800's struggle.

I agrue that whilst Fermi was indeed 6 months late, it has proved to be more than 6 months ahead of the 5800's in pure performance terms.

At the time, the 5800's were undoubtedly the sensible choice. With hindsight, 480's have proven better.

 

[spankingtexan]

Kepler is so powerful it can even search for habitable life on other planets. NASA said so lol.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/main/index.html

 

[ALXAndy]

But right now we are judging the 5800's & Fermi in retrospect, whereby we have the ability to pass a fair judgement based upon both cards performed under "available games at launch performance", and "current/future game performance".

The GTX480 now performs MUCH better within CURRENT games than the 5870. That £100 price difference at lauch is now justified by the CURRENT performace gap and CURRENT resale vaules for both cards. Looking on the MM shows 5870 go for ~£80 and GTX480's fetch ~£150. All of that extra performance for a real-terms £30 difference in price almost justifies the high price.

Fermi's 400 series has proven to have much better logevity than the 5800's. GTX480's can still play just about every game on high settings @ 1920x1200, 5800's struggle.

I agrue that whilst Fermi was indeed 6 months late, it has proved to be more than 6 months ahead of the 5800's in pure performance terms.

At the time, the 5800's were undoubtedly the sensible choice. With hindsight, 480's have proven better.

Oh I agree totally. The 480 has most certainly come into its own over the last year. Mostly because of vram usage (and I would imagine that's why it managed to outclass the 5870 with FSAA on even back then). I was even seeing better performance from my 470 when I sold it due to drivers.

As I said man, it was in no way a terrible card. Nvidia just made it very hard to sell at the price they decided on.

 

[dave_beast]

Kepler is so powerful it can even search for habitable life on other planets. NASA said so lol.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/main/index.html

Ahh, that's where it's been

 

[Insanties_birth]

I fully agree that the 480 was too expensive compared to the 5800, and that it was late, and that it run hotter and maybe even louder. Few people buy top end cards for quietness, coolness or because they are cheap. Top end cards are purchased mainly for their performance, with everthing else being a secondary concoern. The overall package counts, but performance is the Holy Grail and the 480 certainly delivered there.

So,
It was late.
It was hot.
It was loud.
It was too expensive.
It was clearly the fastest card of it's generation

I don't know, some people have watercooled or 12 fan cases but not all of us care to bother with that crap or have the money but still want a good card. I don't want some loud, hot, expensive card that costs more and is barely better than the others. It's a balancing act, do I want to throw my money away or do I go for price / performance. Generally I go for p / p so I'd have not bought a 480 even if it was the fastest. I have a GTX 460 so I'm not against Nvidia but before the 460 and the 5xx series those cards were to be avoided for most people.

 

[555BUK]

Oh I agree totally. The 480 has most certainly come into its own over the last year. Mostly because of vram usage (and I would imagine that's why it managed to outclass the 5870 with FSAA on even back then). I was even seeing better performance from my 470 when I sold it due to drivers.

As I said man, it was in no way a terrible card. Nvidia just made it very hard to sell at the price they decided on.

VRAM wouldn't explain why the 1GB GTX560's and 6870's are also as fast/faster than the 5870. The main difference is shader power, and that's why AMD beefed up the 6900's in this area. You could argue that the GTX480 was 6 months ahead of the 6970.