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Nvidia reveals Fermi GPU architecture

Hopes for new frontiers
Thu Oct 01 2009, 10:12

THE GREEN GOBLIN has been showing off its Fermi architecture at its GPU Technology Conference in San Francisco.

In what looks like a first wave of chip details, Nvidia has been praising Fermi's GPU-compute capabilities.

Fermi has a number of computing features never before seen in a GPU, which according to Tech Report should enable new applications for GPU computing and create some new horizons for Nvidia's GeForce and Tesla products.

Fermi has 16 streaming multiprocessors and 512 discrete cores, more than double the number of CUDA cores of the GT200.

Nvidia's next generation GPU uses 64-bit interfaces and six DRAM interfaces, which means that Fermi has a total path to memory that is 384 bits wide. This is fewer than the GT200, but Fermi more than makes up for that by delivering nearly twice the bandwidth per pin via support for GDDR5 memory.

fermi-die-finalThere is not enough information available to tell if Fermi will give ATI's Cypress a kicking yet. So far Nvidia has not revealed the details about its graphics resources or what clock speed the GPU will achieve.

Tech Report seems to think that the GPU clock speed will be about 1500MHz, a reasonable frequency target for Fermi's stream processing core and about the same as that of the GeForce GTX 285. If we assume Fermi reaches that speed, its peak throughput for single-precision math would be 1536 GFLOPS, or about half of the peak single-precision floating point speed of the ATI Radeon HD 5870.

It also thinks that if Nvidia uses the same 4.8Gbps data rate for GDDR5 memory that AMD has for Cypress, Fermi's peak memory bandwidth should be 230GBps, roughly 50 per cent higher than that of the Radeon HD 5870, which has a memory bus width of 256 bits. µ

 

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Comments
Re:FERMI GPU faked

Ricky Bobby, not only is the GPU a Fake the whole nvidia company is a fake!!!!!

posted by : Semiguy, 02 October 2009 Complain about this comment
FERMI GPU faked

check it out at semiaccurate.com

They don't even have the card...

posted by : Ricky Bobby, 02 October 2009 Complain about this comment
not remotely interested

How many beautiful beaches did they destroy to make that card?

I think I'll keep my $90 HD4770, on account of the fact that spending $400 on a video card is ridiculous.

posted by : Chris, 02 October 2009 Complain about this comment
@erick.mendes

erick.mendes I don't think you need to wait for nvidia, they have nothing to offer. They only produce crappy products and that's a fact!

posted by : Semiguy, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
@dave

Dave, the Radeon 5000 series may use more power on FULL LOAD, but on idle the power usage has really dropped like 50 w... So, considering the feature set and power, the 5000 series from ATI are a great product. Let's wait and see what Nvidia can put in the table.

[and I hope they bring something really wicked, cause I want to see prices coming down, so I may put my hands in a Fermi/Cypress faster ^^]

posted by : erick.mendes, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
Re:Semiguy give your head a shake

ATI makes the best video cards in the world, PERIOD. It is second to none. How do I know this you ask. Because I do! Nvidia is just wasting time and money building these second rate video cards which burns out, catches on fire, and rapes and kills women and children. I wish Charlie was here, he would support me. I'm sorry to all the Nvidia fanbois out there the truth hurts!

posted by : Semiguy, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
GT300 May2009 Bashing & Thrashing

dont fight guys... i spent whole day finding an article which pulled GT300's pants down and peed in its pants.

cuz of late finding my post is gtting burried deep below in chain.

Charlie Demerjian
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1137331/a-look-nvidia-gt300-architecture
Vs
Nick Farrell
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1556946/nvidia-reveals-fermi-gpu-architecture

round 1 ...fight!

posted by : Muhammad Imran/mi1400, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
When will this guy learn?

I tried to warn Rector Huiz and commissioner Gordon that this maniacal Jensun Huang was not going to go away.

Now the world + dog on his terms?, and cheap as chips?

Not likely to see the back of him. In the old Matrox, Neo would have had a fighting chance. Agent Smith likes to play with his nvision.

Quick! Hand me that airtight nano-composite shell with electromagnets on each end.

posted by : Mack Groover, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
Get INside Story From ....

Rumour Is That Nvidia Is Too Bloated to Work DX11 & Slower than GT2XX Series, at this Time. Yet, How Many Experts Have Gushed Real Swill? Heres Idea. Join FaceBook & My Page Here:

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So Far Captured Mike & Charlie & Mr. MoorHead & Quit Few Computees', plus Few bulldogs Whom Arn't Straight. Yet Slowly Making Nest of Pundits & Some Intresting Links, You Could of Read Todays Article, Yesterday Morning from Theo Valich, There. One Person: tomas lee, got so angered Quit My friendship, About half Dozen Dropped only to find could of Hidden Their Comments & been Better Off.

Track; Lucky Loos, CEO & even Intel Vpro. Some are amazingly straight Forward. Thrustee'. EveryWhere there. Wouldn't even Consider this Lout. So GO Bang Mikes Drum....

DRASHEK

posted by : Zudu Kin...., 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
ATI cards aren't big?? huh??

Uh, the last i checked, they were huge and used more power than the last generation. Bashing Nvidia because they use more power is like criticizing a Hummer because its bigger than a Suburban. They both suck (gas).

posted by : dave, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
relative speed

it really should be faster than the 5870 by a fair margin, at a minimum it has ~50% more memory bandwidth, and it is much faster at some math operations (though slower at others).

It will probably be slower than a 5870x2 though, I think really it's just a repeat of the current generation, except nobody knows when it will be released.

posted by : Andrew, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
Open your eyes

Nvidia is trying to push it's GPU into the highly parallel CPU arena. The company is betting this arch can be used for CPU and HPC applications. Note the incresed number of floating point units!

Nvidia having pushed CUDA and jumped onto OpenCL earlier than most, this should be obvious to anyone who can see beyond the surface of their monitors.

posted by : hoohoo, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
Semiguy give your head a shake

Semiguy, if your supposed to compare the 5870x2 to the GT300 then what the heck does ATI have to compare a GT300x2?

Come on give your head a shake there laddie.

posted by : Deanjo, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
No way 1.5G v2

ya nvidia card is just to big and powerful. I will stick with my ati card.

Sorry nvidia I don't need your crappy power.

Long live Charlie! Nick you suck balls, for not bashing nvidia for their crappy products.

posted by : Semiguy, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
1.5G

Semiguy
- 1.5G is not unreasonable, as their current generation products run at about this speed in 55nm
- so they should be able to hit this speed, or thereabouts in 40nm
- ATI was able to up their clocks going from 55nm - 40nm
- ATI's architecure runs its 'cores' at a little less (~1GHz), but they have more ALUs.

posted by : Phil, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
No way 1.5G

Fermi can never target 1.5G speed. Look at the size of die and transistors. Keeping thermals in mind, I think they will target for 750 - 900MHz. Anything beyond that will be nightmare on thermals.

Secondly Fermi should be compared to ATI Radeon HD 5870 X2.....not 5870.

I think Nvidia will have tough challenges on yield. Look at the die size man...its huge....

For gaming purpose, I would rather go for 5770 than....

posted by : Semiguy, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
Nvidia

dont know how to make good graphics cards, just big ones.

posted by : Jamahl, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
Okaaay.

Muscle man and his muscle card have gone mad. I don't want a super-sized GPU to play games. Where is nvidia going? Will they introduce something that can compete with say 5770 and when?

posted by : Guy from -----, 01 October 2009 Complain about this comment
aboutus
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