Nvidia Corp. plans to showcase its next-generation code-named GF100 graphics processor publicly at the Consumer Electronics Show later this week. This will be the first demonstration of the next-generation GeForce based on Fermi micro-architecture to the general public.

“There will be a sneak peek of GF100 at our booth at CES in Las Vegas next week. Stop by and say hi,” a statement posted in Nvidia’s Facebook blog reads.

Previously Nvidia demonstrated its next-gen processors based on code-named Fermi architecture only to press or supercomputing specialists. The international Consumer Electronics Show is aimed at both general consumers as well as CE professionals.

Mass production of the code-named GF100 chip (NV60, G300, GT300) will be ramped in the first quarter of Nvidia’s FY2011, which begins on the 26^th of January and ends on the 26^th of April, 2010.

The leading supplier of graphics processors has reportedly notified its partners that it would officially launch the GeForce “GF100” graphics chip in March ’10, according to a previous media report. In addition, Nvidia plans to release a rather mysterious code-named GF104 chip in Q2 2010. The GF104 graphics processing unit will target the high-end market, according to the media report.

The flagship Fermi graphics processor will feature 512 stream processing engines (which are organized as 16 streaming multi-processors with 32 cores in each) that support a type of multi-threading technology to maximize utilization of cores. Each stream processor has a fully pipelined integer arithmetic logic unit (ALU) and floating point unit (FPU). The top-of-the-range chip contains 3 billion of transistors, features 384-bit memory GDDR5 memory controller with ECC and features rather unprecedented 768KB unified level-two cache as well as rather complex cache hierarchy in general. Naturally, the Fermi family is compatible with DirectX 11, OpenGL 3.x and OpenCL 1.x application programming interfaces (APIs). The new chips will be made using 40nm process technology at TSMC.

Tags: Nvidia, Fermi, GF100, GT300, NV60, Geforce, 40nm