8800gt is going on a diet to become 9800gt

I can't believe Nvidia are doing this, they're breaking a lot of ties with enthusiasts and vying for the (admittedly larger) OEM market. Those and the less knowledgable enthusiasts, who will buy the 9-series because it's better than the 8-series...
I think my GTXs will be replaced with ATi cards at present, I couldn't bring myself to buy into a better-numbered worse card than I have now....

The 9 series cards are for people who didn't jump on the 8 series, not for people like you with GTX's. Out of curiosity, what ATI cards are you going to "upgrade" to from your GTX's? From the benchies I've seen, even 2 3870X2's cant keep up with GTX's in most games with with the IQ turned up.

That's exactly it. They need the new model numbers for the big OEMS to offer.

Personally I think everyone expects too much out of NV now, kinda assuming they have more ready to offer than they actually do. Just because their 8800GTX was amazing and been out for over 1.5 years, people assume they are holding out on us not releasing their next beast simple because AMD hasn't pushed them to do so. We expected the same from Intel back when their P4 800 bus chips were the kings, and then came the A64's and it took them a long time to deliver leaving AMD to hold the lead for a while. Not saying ATI/AMD will hold the lead, just saying if they had released a true step up GPU they may very well have taken the lead for a while, leaving NV to scamble for a counter attack. NV may just been giving 100% throwing everything they have (ready) at us already. Just my $0.2.

I think your right, nVidia is throwing everything they can right now. Its confusing, crazy, disappointing to some, but a testament of just what theyre capable of. They need to catch up on the process nodes, and what better way than to do so than with all these mini launches? Ive been hard on nVidia too, as well as somewhat disappointed. Remember this, when the GTX first came out, or the G80, it far surpassed what nVidia had hoped, so for another such increase, it takes time, and a lil luck. The luck can be elimanted with time, and if the rumors of the G200 are true, then its about time

seeing as Nvidia is just making and has been making money by the loads the past years, I don't see any lay offs coming.

I'll say this again don't get your hopes up, the higher they are, the further they fall. Wait and see, concentrate on the current. When and if ati cards are number 1 we'll see a rebound from Nvidia. Thats how the market is.

The Ati was number standing from the 9800 XT all the way to the 1950 XTX. then lost for the 2000s and 3000s. We'll see the 4000s soon and hopefulyl they will bounce back, I can't wait to jump back to ATI.

took the words right out of my mouth!

Well, to me there needs to be some game releases to actually give me a good reason to upgrade from my GTX's to anything supposedly better.

When they make a game that has better graphics than say COD4 that can look more real with a video card that supports new shaders then I will jump on that bandwagon.

Until then my GTX's will continue to overheat my case...

3000 series were never meant to be a ultra killer. AMD never said that. It was supposed to be a better 2000 series at lower cost and heat.

2000 series? ATI **** up. They really need to get with the brute force program like they did with 9700pro.

As for the new 4000 series it will easily beat G92. Not by huge gains but it will once they get Gddr5 rolling into their cards.

http://www.nordichardware.com/news,7623.html

AMD is bringing in 4000 series supposedly on May with GDDR3. GDDR5 for a later release. Comes equipped with 480SP 16 ROP 32 TMU.

Odd as it may sound I think Intel and ATI might team up against Nvidia for a good GPU fight. WHY? you ask. Sometimes it's best for the weak and the strong to team up to fight a mutual enemy. Not to Geek up the forum more, but think about the Matrix. The humans and the system shared a moment of mutual disagreement to fight agent Smith. Just think of Intel like the system, ati like a human and Nvidia like agent Smith.

Ok that's just how I think of it.

lets be realistic now...what are the chances of amd/ati and intel teaming up for a joint project? even though its not impossible, it is very unlikely in my opinion.

Wouldnt it be great if they did? Come together as to how theyre going to use raytracing? Have a common ground? A quatified approach? Damn, dont know what was in that drink I just drank......

if they did that, the prices on the cards would be astronomical. if they all work together for one product, then they can all collectively charge whatever price they want. So if AMD, nVidia and Intel all had different GPU's that used raytracing, the pricing would be competitive...but if they all work on it at once, then they could sell the card for $1,000 or more if they wanted.

Well, from recent "comments" we know that Intel and NVidia really don't like each other. It should be an interesting year in the graphics and CPU markets.

I like hybrid power suport. I was thinking about waiting till the 8200 chipset was launched for the hybrid power feature, but decided It wasn't worth the expense of a 9800gtx, a 9800gt, maybe..

as for the general whining about why the graphics card companies aren't releasing anything earthshattering...
..what earthshattering software is thier to take advantage of it

just ask the people who joined the physix bandwaggon at the begining how usefull hardware is with little software suport.

Internet War.

No company makes leaps and bounds over their previous products time after time. If that was so we already would be running 32 core cpus @ 200Ghz from Intel and AMD.

Its funny how people expect the next product release to be as explosive as the previous offerings.

I catch myself thinking the same sometimes but then I wake up and smell the coffee...

I think they wouldve been better off to introduce the 9 series as an energy efficient verson of the 8 series, calling it something like 8800 GTX-E for "energy efficient" or something to that effect. I think that would have been much more acceptable to the die hard enthusiasts.

Just my opinion for what its worth...

since they are better than their 8800 counterparts, I would think they should have been labelled the 89XX series.

9600GT = 8900GS
9800GTX= 8900GTX
9800GX2 = 8900GX2
for future releases:
9800GT = 8900GT
9800GTS = 8900GTS
9800GS (would assume itsbetter than the current 9600GT) = 8950GS

if the 99XX series coming out is still just a little bit ahead of the current 98XX series, we could have then made a whole string of 8950xx cards.

Everything tsd16 listed on the left hand side.



Whats better about them other than the 9800GX2?

Not much really...