OK, we all know by now that the new GTS 250 is just a rebadged 9800GTX+ with some cosmetic changes and slightly better power regulation. I'm not so bothered about whether this is a good or bad thing (personally, I think it makes the card more desirable and I will be considering it in my next build when it's released - depending on price) - but I'm really interested to hear everyone's theory on *why* NVidia has chosen to go down this route.
So, let the speculation begin
It costs them less money. The major cost for Nvidia is developing new chips. It is cheaper for them to rehash the older chips than developing newer ones. The shift to 55nm will also enable them to reduce costs.
Anyway why should it make the card more "desirable" ??
Many of Nvidia's partners produced custom PCBs and coolers for the 8800GTS 512mb,9800GTX and 9800GTX+ !
Does this mean Palit or Galaxy could invent a new series for some of their cards which have grossly different PCBs,coolers and even non-standard RAM(the last is mostly seen in ATI cards too). Some of the cards also have much lower power consumption and lower thermal requirements too!
The main difference is that the GTS250 has is a 55nm version of the G92 chip found in the 8800GTX 512mb and 9800GTX. Even the 9800GTX+ cards had the 55nm chip.
Basically this is a 65nm to 55nm rehash of the same chip as three different series!!
What a con!!
At least ATI made some more substantial changes from the HD2*** series to the HD3*** series with the addition of DX10.1, a die shrink, addition of improved UVD and of course the shift from 512 bit memory access in the higher end cards to 256 bit.
Last edited by CAT-THE-FIFTH; 06-03-2009 at 10:55 AM.
I'll start. (That is, I tried to start but CAT beat me to it!)
I think NVidia had a cut down version of the GTX260 designed and ready to go to fab towards the end of last year, for a general launch around now. I anticipate that the cost of moving fabs over to the new chips would necessitate them launching in the £150 - £200 price bracket - just below the GTX260. Then the economy went down the pan, people had less money to spend on graphics cards, and the 4830 and 4850 were walking away with the lower mid-range market. So NVidia changed their strategy to relaunch in the £100 - £150 market. I also suspect that the GTS250 they've launched now was originally intened to be something like a GTX 180, topping out a complete rebrand of the 9-series GPUs to GT? 1XX (there were reports earlier this year that NVidia intended to do this anyway).
In other words, I believe this is a reflection of NVidia reacting to the ecenomic climate, rather than an indication of their planned strategy.
I suspect they have a job lot of G92 chips still to clear and are losing ground to ATI in that performance sector so needed to do something to try and shift them all. It's a lot cheaper to re-spin a product as being "new" than actually develop a better chip and some people might even be fooled into thinking they are better than a 8800GTS or 9800GTX!
I presume you mean a new system and not a replacement to your current 8800GTX unless power consumption is very important to you?Originally Posted by scaryjim
Which bit are you asking about - choosing to continue selling a 8800GT chip, or the rebranding again to GTX250?
The latter is quite simple - you have to keep putting out 'new' products in this field to stay in consumers and retailers minds. Otherwise 55nm versions of the 8800GT would just be sitting at the back of shop's inventories.
The former is a more complex question. Sure, G92 is a very good chip, but it's not 3 generations ahead of it's time. GT200 (the successor) is certainly powerful, but it's also huge and costly to make, without an easy way to scale down performance while realising cost benefits by doing so. Effectively nVidia went the wrong way by concentrating on a top down chip approach and they've been a bit caught out by AMD who designed a more scalable chip in the first place. As a result nVidia could either design a completely new performance chip, which wouldn't be cost effective to do just for one market segment, or carry on producing the now very old chip. Luckily for them they have the development influence to ensure that developers don't use new features such as dx10.1 that the old chip can't support.
It seems to me that AMD/ATI have done a really good job making their current generation GPU design quite modular/scalable, so they can release a range of parts using the same general technology, but just change the number of stream processors. With NVidia, that doesn't seem to be the case. Although saying that, I don't really see anything wrong with them using their last-gen stuff in the lower-end cards. It's not like it doesn't work or anything.
I don't think that calling it a GTS250 makes it more desirable, I think the modifications to the PCB and power circuitry make the GTS250 more desirable than the incumbent 9800GTX+. Personally, I don't care what it's called - they could've badged it the 9850GTX++ and I'd still like the look of it
I would personally go for a GTX260 as they have very impressive idle power consumption for such a powerful graphics card.
Going from a 8800GTX to a GTX250 seems to be not much of an upgrade TBH.
I would wait for the newer 40nm cards.
Absolutely - I won't be upgrading my 8800GTX for a while! With Diablo III and Starcraft 2 coming out I'll need at least 2 gaming PCs in the house...
The rebranding rather than bringing a chip based on GT200 to the mid-range, which I think you've answered quite succinctly
what exactly is wrong with using last gens high end stuff in this gens lower end cards?
i've got 2 of them in my PC and it only consumes 130W when idle.
which IMO is just unbelievable.
Many of Nvidia's board partners have done EXACTLY the same thing. Look at the reviews of cards with custom PCBs and power regulation which have lower than reference card power consumption. This has been happening for years. If anything it happens more with ATI and yet ATI do not feel the necessity to keep renaming the cards all the time.I don't think that calling it a GTS250 makes it more desirable, I think the modifications to the PCB and power circuitry make the GTS250 more desirable than the incumbent 9800GTX+. Personally, I don't care what it's called - they could've badged it the 9850GTX++ and I'd still like the look of it
This does not warrant a rename to a new series. It is the same chip!!See - you are getting caught in the Nvidia marketing hype already!!
What happens when people buy a new PC or want to upgrade their existing card then?? Many people do not have the time, interest or knowledge to be trawling round forums and websites to know that the card is rebadge.
Do the sales staff know or even care if it is a shop for example??
Do web retailers even indicate this?? No!
Most people are not geeks and simply want to buy a new card and slot it in - the most they will even check beforehand is whether their PSU has enough wattage. Do many people even know about why using a cheap PSU is not good?? No!
The fact of the matter is that if power consumption is an issue then wait for the newer ATI and Nvidia 40nm cards coming out. These should have better performance and lower power consumption than the cards they are replacing.
In fact lets wait for the RV740 to come out in a month and we can see if the 40nm process does lead to power savings.
Last edited by CAT-THE-FIFTH; 06-03-2009 at 11:17 AM.
The problem i have with it is it was the mid-high part when it was the 9800GTX+ and now its still the mid-high part, in pretty much the same part of the market behind the 260... doesnt really leave them any room to close the gap between the two cards. They really should have made it the GTS230 or something like that to give themselves a bit of room to spread the market out.
That's because they are probably planning to re-release the 8800gs as it gts230just like they re-released it as the 9600GSO
Well that could have been the GS210
9600GT - GTS210
9800GT - GTS220
9800GTX - GTS230
i dunno really just anything that gave them a big of headroom to expand the market.
Personally, I'd rather have seen:
GT 120 (9400)
GT 130 (9500)
GTS 140 (9600GSO)
GTS 150 (9600GT)
GTX 160 (9800GT)
GTX 180 (9800GTX+)
To make it clear that this is the immediate predecessor line to the GTX 2xx
And they could still have had a big fanfare about it...
Well, they are not staying on the GT200 series for that long, 40nm gpu's are coming out by Q2 people say, and then there are the GT300 at the end of this year I believe. And the 9800gtx+ isn't all too much slower than the GTX260 overall...
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