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NVIDIA releases seven GeForce 400M Notebook GPUs, possibly GF104/6/8 Based
Reported by Sub on Friday, September 3 2010 1:59 pm
NVIDIA has unveiled seven mobile GPU parts today, most of them listed in the 259.47 driver leak. The cards released are two GTX 400M performance products - GTX 470M and GTX 460M, and no less than five GT 400M mainstream products - GT 445M, GT 435M, GT 425M, GT 420M and GT 415M. However, these cards reveal many peculiarities. NVIDIA insists that all the Geforce 400M products are Fermi DX11 based, and not rebrands, which could indicate the release of several GF106 and GF108 products, well before their desktop counterparts.
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NVIDIA has unveiled seven mobile GPU parts today, most of them listed in the 259.47 driver leak.
The cards released are two GTX 400M performance products - GTX 470M and
GTX 460M, and no less than five GT 400M mainstream products - GT 445M,
GT 435M, GT 425M, GT 420M and GT 415M. However, these cards reveal many
peculiarities. NVIDIA insists that all the Geforce 400M products are
Fermi DX11 based, and not rebrands, which could indicate the release of
several GF106 and GF108 products, well before their desktop
counterparts.
The GTX 470M is clearly based on GF104, featuring 288 SP, or a full 96 disabled. It features a 192-bit interface, much like the desktop GTX 460 768 MB. In short, it is heavily downclocked GTX 460 768 MB with 48 SP (and maybe further funcitonal units) disabled.
The GTX 460M is a more interesting product. It features a square die - reminiscent of GF106 rather than GF104. It also features 192 SP, much like the GF106. However, the specifications list it with a 192-bit memory interface. Could the GF106 feature 192-bit memory after all? Certainly, the leaked GTS 450 specs suggested a memory bandwidth bottleneck. Perhaps Nvidia is reserving the 192-bit for the desktop GTS 455?
Moving to the GT 445M, this seems to be a GF106 based product as well, with 48 SP disabled. The GT 445M comes with two memory options - GDDR3 / 128-bit and GDDR5 / 192-bit, with the latter offering over twice the memory bandwidth.
The three cards, GT 435M, GT 425M and GT 420M all appear to be very similar cards, differentiated by clock speeds and memory size. All three feature 96 SP and a smaller die - suggesting these are GF108 based. Finally, we have the GT 415M which is features only 48 SP, and is mostly likely a salvage GF108 part.
NVIDIA have not revealed details regarding pricing and TDP - two areas in which the GTX 480M failed. We would expect the GF104 based parts to considerably improve on these areas. However, it is clear that even with one year old Evergreen GPUs, AMD has a comfortable advantage in the performance/watt/die-size metric. Like the desktop arena, we hope NVIDIA price these cards aggressively. However, we don't understand the need for five GT 400M cards, where three are near-identical and the other two seem like they belong to a different class.
It also appears that NVIDIA have GF106 and GF108 parts released, surprisingly before the desktop versions. Certainly, the September 12th and October 13th release for GF106 and GF108 respectively are well on schedule. NVIDIA is pushing Optimus and the emergence of 3D Vision notebooks with 120 Hz displays and 3D glasses heavily, and these could be important selling points for the consumers.
The GTX 470M is clearly based on GF104, featuring 288 SP, or a full 96 disabled. It features a 192-bit interface, much like the desktop GTX 460 768 MB. In short, it is heavily downclocked GTX 460 768 MB with 48 SP (and maybe further funcitonal units) disabled.
The GTX 460M is a more interesting product. It features a square die - reminiscent of GF106 rather than GF104. It also features 192 SP, much like the GF106. However, the specifications list it with a 192-bit memory interface. Could the GF106 feature 192-bit memory after all? Certainly, the leaked GTS 450 specs suggested a memory bandwidth bottleneck. Perhaps Nvidia is reserving the 192-bit for the desktop GTS 455?
Moving to the GT 445M, this seems to be a GF106 based product as well, with 48 SP disabled. The GT 445M comes with two memory options - GDDR3 / 128-bit and GDDR5 / 192-bit, with the latter offering over twice the memory bandwidth.
The three cards, GT 435M, GT 425M and GT 420M all appear to be very similar cards, differentiated by clock speeds and memory size. All three feature 96 SP and a smaller die - suggesting these are GF108 based. Finally, we have the GT 415M which is features only 48 SP, and is mostly likely a salvage GF108 part.
NVIDIA have not revealed details regarding pricing and TDP - two areas in which the GTX 480M failed. We would expect the GF104 based parts to considerably improve on these areas. However, it is clear that even with one year old Evergreen GPUs, AMD has a comfortable advantage in the performance/watt/die-size metric. Like the desktop arena, we hope NVIDIA price these cards aggressively. However, we don't understand the need for five GT 400M cards, where three are near-identical and the other two seem like they belong to a different class.
It also appears that NVIDIA have GF106 and GF108 parts released, surprisingly before the desktop versions. Certainly, the September 12th and October 13th release for GF106 and GF108 respectively are well on schedule. NVIDIA is pushing Optimus and the emergence of 3D Vision notebooks with 120 Hz displays and 3D glasses heavily, and these could be important selling points for the consumers.
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