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Rumor: Nvidia Prepping Intel-Based MCP7A IGP Chipset for August Launch

Paul Lilly — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 14:54:36 -0500

There was a time when motherboards sporting integrated graphics were best avoided like the plague, and while that's still the case for the hardcore enthusiast, many modern micro ATX motherboards have begun closing the performance gap between their full ATX brethren. The situation looks to get even better by summer's end. According to a DigiTimes report, Nvidia plans to mass produce its latest Intel platform IGP chipset by the middle of next month with shipping product expected to hit retail shelves in early September.

Touting support for Nvidia's GeForce 9-series mGPU, the 730i MPC will be offered up with either an onboard GeForce 9400 graphics core (MCP7A-U) with a core frequency of 580MHz and shader frequency of 1500MHz, or with a GeForce 9300 (MCP7A-S) with a core and shader frequency of 450MHz and 1200MHz respectively. The GPUs don't look to rival anything close to a GTX 280, but with support for PCI Express 2.0, Shader Model 4.0, and DirectX 10, along with 16 built-in stream processors, less demanding gamers are likely to be able to get their gaming groove on with more than just Peggle.

Rounding out the feature list, both MCPs will support a 1333MHz frontside bus (think 45nm Penryn) and come in both DDR2 and DDR3 flavor. And for HTPC crowd, look for a bevy of connection options, including HDMI, dual-link DVI, DsiplayPort, and D-sub.

Image Credit: Nvidia

PNY XLR8 GeForce 9800 GTX

Michael Brown — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 18:44:20 -0500

If you’re already gaming with a G92-based 8800 GTS, there’s very little reason to move up to a G92-based 9800 GTX such as PNY’s XLR8. The architecture in both GPUs is nearly the same, with 128 stream processors, a 256-bit interface, and 512MB of GDDR3. Slightly faster clock speeds yield only a modest bump in performance.

The most important difference between these two architectures is the fact that you can build a rig with three 9800 GTX cards, thanks to the presence of three SLI edge connectors on the top of the board (the 8800 GTS has only one, so it’s limited to two-way SLI). The new card also consumes more power and requires two six-pin connections to your PC’s power supply (the 8800 GTS requires only one).

The 9800 GTX also supports Nvidia’s HybridPower technology, which will be of interest only to consumers who own a motherboard that also supports HybridPower (currently, that means a motherboard outfitted with an nForce 730a chipset). When running less graphics-intensive applications (surfing the web, using productivity software, or watching a movie, for example), HybridPower will shut down the videocard in the PCI Express slot and rely instead on the integrated graphics built into the motherboard.

PNY bumped the 9800 GTX’s clock speeds just a wee bit beyond Nvidia’s reference design: The core runs at 725MHz (from a stock 675MHz), the shaders at 1.813GHz (from a stock 1.688GHz), and the memory at 1.160GHz (from a stock 1.1GHz). These tweaks mark the extent of PNY’s customization, as the card features a reference-design cooler. All 9800 GTX cards are equipped with two six-pin power connectors and two SLI edge connectors; the 8800 GTS has one of each.

In our benchmark tests, PNY’s implementation of the 9800 GTX proved to be roughly 10 to 15 percent faster than a stock 8800 GTS—a performance delta that we don’t think justifies a price premium that ranged from $50 to $75 at press time. Adding a second 9800 GTX to run in SLI mode resulted in a 34-percent boost in Crysis performance (at 1920x1200 resolution with 2x AA and all other values set to high), but even with SLI, the game remains just barely tolerable at those settings. And that’s unfortunate, because we imagine most people won’t see how exquisite this game can look because there just isn’t any hardware available today that’s capable of delivering it.

So what if you’re moving up from an older GPU architecture? AMD still doesn’t have anything worthwhile for the hardcore gamer, and frankly, we’d still stick with the cheaper G92-based 8800 GTS. Aside from making three-way SLI a possibility and supporting HybridPower, the 9800 GTX has no significant new features worth the extra dough

EVGA e-GeForce 9600 GT SSC Edition

Michael Brown — Fri, 04 Apr 2008 18:06:23 -0500

There’s never been a better time to be in the market for a new videocard. Nvidia’s GeForce 9600 GT, represented here by EVGA’s overclocked SSC Edition, is one reason this is true.

We awarded AMD’s Radeon 3870 a Kick Ass award in our January 2008 issue when it was selling for $260. When the 9600 GT hit the market, the average street price for cards based on the 3870 plunged to $206. EVGA’s implementation of the 9600 GT was selling for $215 when we benchmarked it, but the average price for cards based on that part was just $182.

The 9600 GT is based on Nvidia’s G94 GPU, a cut-down derivative of the G92 that forms the more powerful 8800 GT and the even faster 8800 GTS (the version with 512MB of memory, not the ones with 640MB and 320MB frame buffers). By “cut down,” we mean all three chips share the same basic architecture, but the 9600 GT has 64 stream processors compared to 112 procs in the 8800 GT and 128 in the 8800 GTS.

EVGA upped the core clock to 740MHz (from a stock 650MHz) and the 512MB of memory to 975MHz (from a stock 900MHz). Nvidia’s ace in the hole is its ability to run the stream processors at a higher clock rate than the core, which helps explain how the 64 processors in the 9600 GT can outrun the 320 stream processors in AMD’s Radeon HD 3870. EVGA bumped them from a stock 1.625GHz to 1.835GHz.

If your interests lie more in film than gaming, you’ll be pleased to know that the 9600 GT has the PureVideo HD circuitry that allows it to offload from the host CPU all the decoding work needed to play high-definition movies on Blu-ray and soon-to-be-obscure HD DVD discs.