by Anton Shilov
11/27/2002 | 07:16 PM
Although NVIDIA did not declare any recommended prices for their GeForce FX based graphics cards, it is quite clear that they will be pretty expensive at launch, from $370 to $470, I would suggest. Apparently there will be two GeForce FX versions: the GeForce FX 5800 and 5800 Ultra, the former is likely to be cheaper compared to the latter, so take the prices above as the approximate retail prices for different version of the GeForce FX powered devices.
What is a bit surprising is that according to this German web-site, some companies may start to sell their GeForce FX based solutions a bit earlier than another and ask from 500 to 600 Euro for a graphics card. Of course, the situation will not last long since there will be a lot of companies to offer the mentioned products in February and March, hence the prices are very likely drop to $320 to $420 by late March. On the other hand, not a lot of us buy graphics cards for more than $300, therefore NVIDIA will have to offer something new in $200 to $300 price range this Spring.<%BANNER[article]%>
Earlier this year I saw the roadmap of the Santa Clara, California-based VPU developer and, according to the plan, the company intends to launch NV31, NV34 and NV35 code-named visual processing units in the year 2003. The NV35 and NV34 seem to be delayed towards very late Spring or even Fall, whereas the NV31 should come a bit earlier. According to NVIDIA’s roadmap, the NV31 is to substitute the higher-end GeForce4 Titanium GPUs in the performance sector,the NV34 is planned as a next-generation mainstream solution and the NV35 is said to once again raise features and performance bar for enthusiasts.
Since ATI does its best to roll-out their full lineup of Microsoft DirectX 9.0 supporting solutions to the market, it becomes a really critical task for NVIDIA to answer the rival with their products that provide the same or better functionality and performance. As reported over here, the management team intends to launch “an additional version of the NV3x” in the April quarter (late January to late April). It is very logical for NVIDIA to launch the product for performance sector in Spring, just like they did with the GeForce2 GTS in 2000. Although this will not allow the company to fully transit the product lineup to the “NV3x” family in one quarter time, the simplified version of the GeForce FX (NV31) will help to successfully compete with ATI among broader range of market segments.