Graphic chips for gaming soon to reach Teraflop level
Tom Martin -- Mon, 06/16/2008 - 09:53
Nvidia and AMD are about to launch new graphics chips (GPUs) with teraflop speeds that should be great for gaming. The nVidia GeForce GTX200 has 240 processors on board and 1.4 billion transistors. On a graphics card it should be priced around $649. The AMD Radeon GPU line will be a little lower in performance (about .7 Teraflops) but also lower power and lower price. The AMD chip approach apparently uses 800 processors and when used in pairs has competitive performance with nVidia.
This sounds impressive, but is it really a big deal or just a technical milestone?
While this is certainly technically impressive, the overall system design needs to be taken into account---namely transfer speeds across the bus, temporary storage into frame buffers, etc. A key question is when will game designers actually design games with these cards/chips in mind---taking full advantage of the processing power at hand vs. will they design them with a slower "common denominator" (but wider installed base)
Most (all?) of the game consoles already use sophisticated graphics co-processors to do specific jobs so I suspect this is more of a technical milestone, but it could make PC gaming more competitive.
That said, can you imagine the flight simulator that could be developed using these chipsets? It could blow your mind.
Jim
My concern with running an overkill graphics card is the added heat generated and power demands. I recently upgraded to one of the GeForce GTX cards and the severe heat it creates has forced me to rethink/rebuild my computer. Power consumption of the new unit has maxed out my 700W power supply and as a result the electricity bill has gone up 15-20 per month.
Before I used to leave the computer on all the time, now ... not so much. I will probably end up building a lesser computer to do regular routine things on that I can run all the time and only use the GTX video card when I need a program that requires it.
My advice and information is offered free of charge and I am more than happy to refund any cost you paid for the information you just read.
Are there many programs where you see benefits from the big graphics card?
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