9800 Release Date?

[dinnerplate]

I've heard again and again that the 9800 series is going to be released in December, then pushed back to February, etc. etc. Anyone know when it's coming out?

[Frag Maniac]

Last I heard it sounded like March for the 9800 GX2 and June for the 9800GTX and likely GTS and GT too. The only one that I would put a lot of stock in at this point though is March for the 9800 GX2 because there have already been prototype pics of it popping up.

[werty316]

The word on the street is the 9800GX2 is due out in March and the GT200 AKA 9800 sometime in Q2 of this year.

Things will be very interesting this year.

[Goliath182]

Yea id say about March i heard rumors of the 9600 showing up in Feburary but they will probably push it back to match up with there other cards

[Chakka]

Whats the difference between the gx2 from nvidia and the 3870 x2 from amd? It seems that Anandtech keeps on pimping up the amd product cause you can run crossfire on a single slot P35? What gives and will these new nvidia cards do the same?

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3219

[werty316]

The HD3870 X2 and 9800 GX2 both work on the same principals. Anandtech can't really make an opinion on something that isn't out yet.

[PP Mguire]

Yea seriously, the HD3870X2 is a dual GPU board and the 9800GX2 is going to be Nvidias. Phoey. Bring on the 9800GTX.

[Acidtears33]

The 9800GX2 is a dual board / single slot card that still has the problem of SLI scaling. It is two video cards slammed together with a bridge connector in the middle of them to get them to talk to each other.

The X2 is two chips on a single board and the PC doesn't know the difference. If you look at the performance of one 3870 and compare it you get something like 95-99% scaling.

[PP Mguire]

Right on, got me there. I thought the 9800GX2 was a dual GPU board as well. Well from the looks of things im liking the HD3870X2.

[Kougar]

What Acidtears said. :)

HD 3870 X2 is a single card with two GPUs. 9800GX2 is two cards with one GPU each but in a tight sandwich. Hd 3870 X2 uses a single cooler, and the 9800GX2 will use two coolers... Just look back at the "7950 GX2" for an idea.

[werty316]

Actually the 9800GX2 uses one cooler based on the dissection pics floating around. It shows the heatsink sandwiched in between the two video cards as shown in the first two pics here: http://forums.vr-zone.com/showthread.php?t=230836.

As far as I know the HD3870 uses a copper heatsink on one core and an aluminum heatsink on the other core so technically it uses two heatsinks along with one fan cooling both heatsinks.

[Sadasius]

That GX2 is the ugliest damn card I have ever seen. That thing is going to have some heat issues especially with that ridiculously weird fan that would have to spin at a pretty high rate to get adequate flow across the heat sink. This must be a first stage engineering design taken apart because this thing needs some love before it hits shelves. It kind of reminds me of 'Frankenstein'. Should call it that actually because it is not pretty that is for sure and it's a bunch of weird parts slapped together just like Frankenstein. Thanks for the link Werty316!

[werty316]

:icon_tiphat:

Personally I think the 9800 GX2 isn't gonna do very well.

[asterasy]

Yea, I think the X2 will be a bit of a nono. I'll just get the 9600GT or something.

[Sadasius]

Well I think the GX2 has a shot besides we still don't know what it can or cannot do. We can speculate from the design of it now that we have pics thanks to werty316 but other then that we will have to wait and see what it can do. The chip that's on the cards is different. A 'G92-450-A2'. This chip may make all the difference in the world. But the design sucks because of the overlap of the cards case. Some people will not be able to use this because it will get in the way of their ram slots. Others will have their upper PCIe port blocked for sound cards etc. Whoever thought of this design really did not pay attention to the products it has to go into.

http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/images/articles/1199396117RddjtJdk0Z_1_2.jpg

[PP Mguire]

Nah, i have a feeling it will do good.

[Frag Maniac]

What Acidtears said. :)

HD 3870 X2 is a single card with two GPUs. 9800GX2 is two cards with one GPU each but in a tight sandwich. Hd 3870 X2 uses a single cooler, and the 9800GX2 will use two coolers... Just look back at the "7950 GX2" for an idea.More specifically the double slot cooler the 3870 X2 has is quite a bit more effective as it has a larger heatsink and centrifugal fan that exhausts out the back of the case like the 8800GTX and Ultra do. Why does Nvidia insist on repeating old ideas that were problematic in their previous GX2s?

[PP Mguire]

Probably becasue they might still have some of the old 3dfx team on their side ahahaha.

[ABerd]

I want to be able to buy a card now from EVGA and step up to the new 9 series . . . BUT no one knows when the 9 series will come out :cry::cry::cry: