Nvidia Graphics Card With 7,936 CUDA Cores, 32GB HBM2 May Be Coming

(Image credit: Shutterstock)

An Nvidia graphics card with a huge core count was apparently benchmarked with Geekbench 5 before any official announcement from the manufacturer, as spotted by a Twitter user. We were already taken aback by two unidentified Nvidia graphics cards last week listed with 7,552 and 6,912 CUDA cores. But this latest finding is mind-blowing, with the CUDA core count allegedly reaching 7,936. 

Since this is hardware that Nvidia hasn't even confirmed yet, we should take the benchmark results with a grain of salt. Interestingly enough, the Geekbench 5 submission is from the same time frame as the submission for those other two unnanounced Nvidia cards. The system used even has the same CPU, an Intel Core i7-8700K, and motherboard, an Asus Prime Z370-A

Given the scale of the specifications, all three unnanounced graphics cards potentially hail from the Quadro or Tesla families -- more likely the latter. What we can infer based on the specs shared on Geekbench is that the cards target workstation and data center users as opposed to gamers. The graphics cards are rumoredly based on Nvidia's upcoming Ampere microarchitecture using TSMC and Samsung's 7nm facilities. 

The table below compares specs shared for the recently discovered Nvidia graphics card (Nvidia GPU 3), as well as the two unannounced cards we covered last week (Nvidia GPU 1 and 2). 

Specs

Swipe to scroll horizontally
ModelArchitecture (GPU)Streaming MultiprocessorCUDA CoresBase ClockMemory CapacityTransistor CountDie Size
Nvidia GPU 3?1247,9361,110 MHz32GB??
Nvidia GPU 1?1187,5521,110 MHz23.6GB??
Nvidia GPU 2?1086,9121,010 MHz46.8GB??
Nvidia Tesla V100SVolta (GV100)805,1201,245 MHz32GB HBM221.2 billion815 mm²
Nvidia Quadro RTX 8000Turing (TU102)724,6081,395 MHz48GB GDDR618.6 billion754 mm²
Nvidia Titan RTXTuring (TU102)724,6081,350 MHz24GB GDDR618.6 billion754 mm²
Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 TiTuring (TU102)684,3521,350 MHz11GB GDDR618.6 billion754 mm²

The Nvidia graphics card in question allegedly has 124 Stream Multiprocessors (SMs). For the sake of discussion, let's assume that Nvidia doesn't modify the number of CUDA cores per SM on its next GPU architecture. At 64 CUDA cores inside each SM, the nameless Nvidia graphics card would have a whopping 7,936 CUDA cores, putting the Tesla V100S' 5,120 CUDA cores to shame.

The graphics card finished the Geekbench 5 benchmark with a 1.10 GHz base clock, but early engineering samples aren't representative of the final specifications. A relatively lower base clock is expected, however, as data center products don't operate at high clock speeds. The Tesla V100S, for example, ticks at a 1.245 GHz base clock.

Nvidia GPU 7,936 CUDA Cores

Nvidia GPU listed with 7,936 CUDA cores (Image credit: Primate Labs Inc.)

According to the Geekbench 5 report, there's 32MB of L2 cache on the graphics card. For comparison, the Tesla V100S has a 6MB L2 cache, so 32MB would be a pretty substantial upgrade.

The graphics card was also listed with 32GB of ECC memory. It's allegedly running at 1.2 GHz across a 4,096-bit memory interface, which points to the presence of HBM2

With the coronavirus turmoil, Nvidia isn't canceling GTC 2020, its annual GPU event, but is instead holding the event online. That means we'll still see CEO Jensen Huang deliver his keynote address. And since Nvidia has gone out of its way to ensure that the GTC show goes on, we suspect it has something extremely interesting to share with the hardware world.

Zhiye Liu
News Editor and Memory Reviewer

Zhiye Liu is a news editor and memory reviewer at Tom’s Hardware. Although he loves everything that’s hardware, he has a soft spot for CPUs, GPUs, and RAM.

  • Giroro
    I think Nvidia's marketing is going to follow AMD with all their 7nm and 50 yrs hype in the vein of the 7/07 Ryzen launch date and RX 5070.

    I predict on 03/08, Nvidia will announce the RTX 3080 Ti at 0803 in the morning. it will have 30 RT cores, 80 SMs (with 3080 CUDA cores split between them), 308 Tensor Cores, 30.80 GB of memory (308.0 GBPS bandwidth) and cost $3080 for a special edition designed and signed by Clifford Joseph Harris Jr.
    Reply
  • PaulAlcorn
    Giroro said:
    I think Nvidia's marketing is going to follow AMD with all their 7nm and 50 yrs hype in the vein of the 7/07 Ryzen launch date and RX 5070.

    I predict on 03/08, Nvidia will announce the RTX 3080 Ti at 0803 in the morning. it will have 30 RT cores, 80 SMs (with 3080 CUDA cores split between them), 308 Tensor Cores, 30.80 GB of memory (308.0 GBPS bandwidth) and cost $3080 for a special edition designed and signed by Clifford Joseph Harris Jr.

    You made me Google "Clifford Joseph Harris Jr." Nice touch :)
    Reply
  • thGe17
    Most likely, this is no "graphics card", but a HPC-GPGPU design, respectively it is a successor to Volta.
    Reply
  • escksu
    I strongly believe this is not a gaming card. ITs most likely successor for Tesla.
    Reply