- Friday, 9 January 2009
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It's not a V bottom, it's not a U bottom, it's a Nike swoosh recovery - Greg McLenon, Hotovec Pomeranz
Here come the 9600GT specs
SO, WHAT ARE the specs of the Nvidia 9600GT, other than 'late' or 'later'? Well, should you care, here they are, along with the high points of NV's press briefing on the topic.
On January 6th, Nvidia was claiming that it would be out Feb 14th at a price of "less than $200". Call me overly skeptical, but it missed the date, twice now, and didn't even come close to the promised G92 prices, then lied about the R680 price. Let's just say we don't buy the sub $200 part. Reviewers, we would make sure you see it for that price before you pimp the NV line.... again. In any case they claim a street price of $169-189. But it's on sale here for 188 EURO which, today, is $273(US).
The raw numbers are 64 stream processors, 650MHz core, 1625MHz shaders and 900MHz of 512MB/256b GDDR3. There will be a six-pin power connector, and the board will consume 95W. In the slides, Nvidia claims "Industry's best performance-per-watt", but as far as we know, there is not a single ATI 36xx card with a supplementary power connector, and the one sitting beside me definitely does not have one. We sense a corporate sanctioned fib here.
Then they go on to new PureVideo HD features, the main one of which is called Dual Stream Decode acceleration, basically a software hack to allow the use of extra cycles. YAWN. There are various enhancements to the colour schemes, which we hope for NV's sake work out better than the last few 'enhancements' that didn't do much for any disk other than the HQV benchmark. They still don't claim to do VC1 acceleration, so is there a point to the hand waving?
The funniest part is that they have a slide that says "116% Faster!!!", and immediately follow it with "Single Largest Generational Performance Increase in our History", in green no less. Does anyone else read this as them admitting that the 8600 sucked? Hint: it did.
The raw numbers, taken from a graph seen by The INQUIRER without a ruler handy shows that in FEAR, the 8600GTS hit 30FPS and the 9600GT hits 75FPS. The same cards hit 9/33, 15/32, 8/34, 18/37 and 21/45 in World in Conflict, Lost Planet, Company of Heroes OF, Crysis and Bioshock respectively. All the settings were different and very high, so it looks like they picked cases where the old card ran out of memory or hit a wall that the new one does not. These seem to be very cooked numbers, but considering how bad the 8600 was, they might be real.
They compare the same games to a 3850, and the 9600 wins every one, but then again, they are exploiting the AA weakness in the ATI cards. This page is quite cherry picked, if you ran the same tests with AA off, the NV card would likely get spanked up and down. Then again, NV won't give us hardware any more because we actually question things like this instead of parroting back company quotes like almost everyone else.
On to SLI, they show that in FEAR, the 8600GT hit about half of the 8800GTX's score, 50 vs 89 FPS where the 9600GT hits about 92. Yay. I wonder why they only showed a single DX9 game there, they really tried to rip ATI for DX10 crossfire scaling a few weeks ago, could they be such weasels that they criticized what they don't have either? Quite possibly. We will know in about two weeks.
In any case, it looks like they have fixed the problems of the 8600 more or less. There is still no VC1 acceleration, so don't look for this in many OEM boxes. Before you run out and buy it, we suggest waiting for two things, first is third party benches, the second is where pricing ends up at. In both cases, do not take the official word. µ
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Good to see you writing the truth, rather than spewing out Nvidia propaganda or fanboy rhetoric. And true, the 8600 was such a failure i would place it in the 'low range videocard' section. Even the midrange deserves better!
1. Nvidia said $449-499 product 2. It turned out to be $449-499 product =Nvidia lied about that price? ------ About that Geforce 9600 GT price. Now we have one shop that has them listed. This tells us everything about will be that cards typical price when this card will launch 10 days from today? Perhaps you are little bit jumping on to conclusions. ------ There are few reviews out there suggesting that it will be very close to HD3870 512 on performance. Too early to say from those. ------
Good jorb on the bias Charlie. I guess people are so hard up for writers they will let anyone publish a "news" story on the internet. Please refrain from posting news about Nvidia products and stick your ATI love, all you do is complain and drag the news out.... This would have been alot easier to read if someone else wrote it who didn't want to inject their bias.
Truth like it is. Thank you INQUIRER, I just wish to know if there’s a chance for the GeForce 9600 to hit the market on AGP FORM. Since ATI will deliver via their partners, the 3850 AGP. ALL PCIe owners NO COMMENTS PLEASE, It does not affect you so please save it.
I bet ya with something like this card and a good enough rig, it still wont be able to run the games to come properly in the next 12 months. Im sick of being short of cash cos the PC gaming alley is soo dam expensive. in not a console fanboy, i dont even have a console. But im understanding why ppl are going to consoles, even if you run games on the same resolution as consoles, it still wont garuntee standard 50 fps (60fps in us) gaming. PS3 here i come you cheap, glorious whore! ps. so what now every subversion release of dx there is gonna be a new platform of cards???
I wonder why nvidia/ati don't use that console trick and put a scaler in that just expands the lowres picture to HD resolution, making it seem it's more than it is. And that would also, when designed cleverly, work as a primitive anti-alias system. Think of the bogus ads/literature they could release? 'our card has crysis running at 1080P running at 60FPS!! (note: iScaled resolution)'
It's good advice to clean through all the FUD surrounding video cards. I'll just wait until the only reputable video card site, HardOCP, tests a retail version of the card. Before you try to stand up for your sire of choice, read this: http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTQ2MSwxLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==
aww the 9600... the little brother of then 9700(greatest card ever made). lol as nvidia is nearing the 9x00 series ati is nearing thr 4x00s lol. ati 4600 hd and the nvidia 9800
Oh STFU already. Charlie is doing a great job. And although you cand deny his ATI fanboyism he is telling the truth. With an aggresive manner against nvidia as the arrogant SOBs deserve, but the truth nevertheless. Oh i so much want to see nvidias butt getting kicked this year once they release their power hog of a graphics card the GT200.
By dissing Nvidia, Charlie pointed himself out already some ATI's weaknesses too which doesn't make ATI look any better really. As for the price, it's common with EVERY vendor or manufacturer to rip off European customers. Therefore the 9600GT might very well be the $200 in US but of course prices are much higher in Europe. So don't try to tell that's some Nvidia only case.
I don't understand something, is this information based on leaked details from NV journalists pre-launch briefing? When was that event if I may ask?
Thats one of the worst written articles I've ever read. You should be fired. Granted, I agree with most of what you say, its very unprofessional.
I'm an NV fanboy...boo hoo...stop cawing NV liers...it hurtsis my feewings...NV nevwer lies...you are biased...boo hoo
This is one of the most bias articles I have read. The fact of the matter is once AMD bought ati they single handedly destroyed the name and quality of Ati's products. I have no idea how AMD manages to stay in business. It seems like they're always tripping over their own feet trying to just keep up with intel and Nvidia. Its to bad because before AMD purchased Ati, Ati had some really nice products and stayed on top of nvidia keeping the market fresh with new ideas. Now there is no more innovation because AMD can not compete worth a damn to force the development of new products. Thats the truth so ya this new nvidia card is not what it could be but thats because it does not have to be anything special to beat AMD's pile of junk. Get your stuff strait AMD!!
Kevin just wrote a HOLE LOTTA CRAP, the fact is the ATI 3870 x2 is THE MOST POWERFUL GRAPHICS CARD ON THE MARKET!!!! and for only $600 n.z. its a steal!! considering the 8800gtx is still on the market for $800 What were you thinking? Do you reserch what you write? Or do you just write? ATI 3870 x2 is THE MOST POWERFUL GRAPHICS CARD ON THE MARKET!!!!
Ok people really AMD managed to kick Intel’s ass for a while in 2006 and start of 2007 and AMD was working with 89 bill while Intel was working with 890 bill Intel was just being greedy for a while and wasn’t reinvesting and was just haemorrhaging money into the owners pockets then Intel turned around and looked at what AMD was doing then they started investing there money so AMD really is the better company but Itell dose offer better performance now no doubt I must say I am Intel all the way atm but if someone gave me solid prove that AMD had came out with a better processor I would be there Well ATI and AMD Ooooo such a bad move I must say spending all that money when they were just getting ahead I don’t think they are going to make any head room in the next 6 years I think that’s if they don’t go bankrupt with Itell Bringing out its flag ship proccessor the QX9650 with the 45nm process the future isn’t looking bright for AMD or ATI because I think AMD’s just went over to the 65nm process Hummm.... I’m sorry personally I think people are stupid for sticking to one brand... I have been researching this for 2 months here’s the short version of graphics cards in 2008 ATI offers better video playback and at low resolution eg 1280x1024 ATI can offers better frame rates and with all the anti alising off in 3D graphics so if you are using a 15 to a 19inch screen and you don’t mind the affects down ATI is better for you Now if you want to play with a 22ich screen and up with all the affects up to max then NVIDIA is for you and also if you don’t mind taking up a bit more of your processor while watching high def videos Personal I am going to be buying a 24inch screen soon so I’m going to be buying a NVIDIA graphic just go look it up your self if you dont agree
ATI cards have *always* delivered superior graphics rendering quality, its been the mainstay of their marketing pitch for years. Nvidia have always focused on framerates, even ones way over te 25 fps your eye can see and made this their marketing angle. The truth is the 3870x2 now delivers the highest fps and 3dmark scores coupled with the best graphics rendering quality and guess what its also better at HD video playback. There is now only one choice for the highest quality and best framerates and its ATI. If you're happy to buy second best and pay more for it as well, then I am sure you'll delighted with the latest Nvidia heat pumping power munching dinosaur. Remember 24 frames/sec is all you can see, anything much above this is a waste of power and simply marketing spiel. If your desparate/stupid enough for your 300 frames/sec first person shooter, then Nvidia will take your money (and a lot of it too). If you want the finest visual gaming experience, then buy ATI and keep the change, saving double on the electricity meter into the bargain.
why did you not post that this card is 256-bit? is it because it will make the 9600gt a good card? seems overpromoting an ati product gives you also the right ot lie (or intentionally hide) about actual specs