Nvidia Unveils New Mid-Range GeForce Graphics Card

crookedvulture writes "Nvidia has uncorked another mid-range graphics card, the GeForce GTX 560 Ti. Every tech site on the web seems to have coverage of this new $250 offering, and The Tech Report's review will tell you all you need to know about the various flavors available, including how their performance compares to cards from 2-3 years ago. Interestingly, the review concludes that pretty much any modern mid-range graphics card offers smooth frame rates while playing the latest games at the common desktop resolution of 1920x1080. You may want to pay closer attention to power consumption and noise levels when selecting a new card."

Comments

Mid-range?

[XanC]

Somebody dropping two hundred and fifty big ones on a video card is mid-range?

Re:Mid-range?

[Anonymous Coward]

Somebody dropping two hundred and fifty big ones on a video card is mid-range?

Yes, $50 for the card and $200 for the monster cable.

Re:Mid-range?

[eepok]

Precisely my thought.

Budget: Free/Hand-me-down to $75
Mid-Range: $76-$150
Enthusiast: $151-$250
Takes gaming too seriously: $251+

Re:Mid-range?

[TWX]

Video cards seem to be the one aspect of computers that doesn't follow both Moore's Law and the cost reduction model that we've seen elsewhere. It would appear that for most computer components and systems, over time power increases and costs drop. In the case of video cards though, prices seem to have been stable or on the increase for the various classes of components at a given point. When my first-generation 3dFX card was top-of-the-line-consumer class it was less than $200 if memory serves. My (at the time) high end Matrox G-series dual head card was about the same price or maybe a little more expensive. Modern ATI and nVidia products seem to be more expensive compared to what the previous cards were introduced at.

I guess that the cost to game is why I got out of most computer gaming. I found myself with less and less time to play, and it's hard to justify $300 for an expansion card when I'll use it twice a month and when it'll be "obsolete" in six. Ditto for the games themselves, when they're $50 each it's hard to play more than one with such a small amount of time. I get a lot more value for my money buying games at a books/media store that buys the remnants that didn't sell originally a year ago and sells them for $10 a title or less, plus they work on hardware I already have.

Re:Mid-range?

[Tumbleweed]

Somebody dropping two hundred and fifty big ones on a video card is mid-range?

I see this reaction a lot in people who don't know the market. Ignorance of what the low and high ends of the 'range' wind up surprising people. If you're ignorant of the numbers 1 through 10, someone randomly reciting the number 5 might seem high to you. In video cards, there are $350+ cards, and even $500+ cards, in the consumer space. And that's just PER CARD, and doesn't take into account multi-card setups.

So yeah, $250 is a MID-range card. That's not to say it does (or doesn't) meet your specific needs, but expressing shock at something you're obviously ignorant of really doesn't make you sound like a smart consumer.

Re:Mid-range?

[larry bagina]

Maybe you should read up on what Moore's Law actually is.

Re:Mid-range?

[obarthelemy]

Depends how you define mid-range. Steam has a nice breakdown of actual graphics cards used to play their games: http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/ Keep in mind that these stats are for players, the actual market is much more low-end that that.

So $250 would be about in the top 5% of the gamers' market, 1% general market ?

Re:Mid-range?

[Lord Ender]

No. The MSRP is $250. This means they will actually sell for $200, which is midrange (I say $100-$200 is midrange).

Re:Mid-range?

[eepok]

Mid-Range typically refers to what the majority are willing to spend on something, not what prices are offered. The buyers, not the sellers, determine mid-range and the buyers aren't scrambling to grab $250 cards.

Re:Mid-range?

[Surt]

Yes, it is in the middle of the range from people who spend $0 additional for the on the on-board graphics of their motherboard/cpu, and the people who spend $500 for a top-of-the-line card. Mid-range, exactly fitting the definition.

Re:Mid-range?

[Surt]

I hate to say it, but 'in the middle of the two end points of the range' is pretty much the dictionary definition of 'mid-range'.

Re:Mid-range?

[Tumbleweed]

Mid-Range typically refers to what the majority are willing to spend on something, not what prices are offered. The buyers, not the sellers, determine mid-range and the buyers aren't scrambling to grab $250 cards.

People don't generally buy video cards. They buy computers with (or without) video cards. For people who actually buy video cards, $250 is mid-range.

Re:Mid-range?

[Fulcrum of Evil]

Video cards seem to be the one aspect of computers that doesn't follow both Moore's Law and the cost reduction model that we've seen elsewhere.

How do you mean? Moore's law is all about transistor density - the fact that Nvidia maintains specific price points and varies performance to compete is irrelevant.

Re:Mid-range?

[Cthefuture]

I think it's because video cards are becoming more like whole computer systems in themselves. More and more general purpose computing features and such. Just recently I have been playing with GPU development and I have to say that for certain tasks it's quite impressive.

Really $250 (GTX560) or $350 (GTX570) is not out of line for what you pay for a mid-range CPU, it makes sense that the video card is in the same ballpark.

But like everything I do wish they were cheaper.

Re:Mid-range?

[tepples]

Not everyone is trying to play the latest shooter at the highest resolution and frame rate possible.

And a lot of these people are happy with Intel onboard "Graphics My Arse".

Re:Mid-range?

[wagnerrp]

You should look at the chart again. The top two cards of each graphics series is going to be in the $200 and up range when purchased, so tallying those up from the December survey, you get somewhere around 45% of the users. Significantly higher than the 5% you seem to have pulled out of nowhere.

Now what is the general market? The people who are going to buy their own graphics cards are going to be professionals doing 3D or computational work, gamers, and HTPC builders. Everyone else is going to stick to their integrated Intel graphics and be none the wiser. The HTPC market is going to buy all low end stuff, the professional market is going to buy primarily high end stuff, and the gamer market, according to that survey, seems to be right in the middle of that price range. For people who actually would buy a video card, which is the only market that matters to video card manufacturers, $250 indeed does seem to be mid-range.

Re:Mid-range?

[tlhIngan]

Actually, Moore's law focuses more on the economics of chip making. Because chips become cheaper to make over time, manufactures are able to double the transistor density every 18 months without increasing the cost.

The Moore's law states that the increased transistor density is a side effect of cheaper manufacturing processes, not the other way around.

Correct. But CPUs, GPUs, and chipsets, which are full of random logic are not the stunning examples of transistor density. In fact, what limits the transistor density in random logic parts is wiring density and I/O count (wiring density is how close you can put all the little connections between transistors, I/O count being the number of pins). In fact, most such chips are I/O limited as well which limits what the chip can do.

Memory (all types - EEPROM/Flash/RAM) is however silicon-limited. Once you reach the maximum transistor density, the only way to increase storage is increase silicon area consumed (which means less chips and exponentially greater cost as defects claim more chips).

It's also why memory tends to be anywhere from a half-generation to full generation ahead of CPUs and the like.

Intel's 4 billion transistor CPUs aren't terribly dense when you think a 8/16+ GB memory card already has at least 4 billion transistors, especially the microSD formfactors which limit you to one flash chip. Most of those 4 billion transistors also aren't involved in any computational path, either, being used in cache and various other processor memories onchip.

1920x1080 is considered common these days?

[intellitech]

Jeez, I feel old.

Re:1920x1080 is considered common these days?

[TWX]

Yeah, I hear you. I was used to 1280x1024 or 1600x1200, so these 16:9 or 16:10 aspect ratios take some getting used to.

What really irks me, though, is a seeming lack of development for inexpensive high-res monitors that go beyond "1080p". My current display is a 20" 4:3 ratio 1600x1200 unit, and if I wanted to go bigger I'd want more than 1080 rows. I sort of understand the complaints that audiophiles had back in the eighties with the Red Book CD standard and being limited to 44KHz 16 bit audio and no functional implementation of more than stereo audio. Before that they enjoyed quadraphonic sound in whatever quality the analog recording equipment and playback equipment could achieve, and while lower end equipment and poor media maintenance might have led to results less than 44KHz 16 bit, high end stuff and good practices would have yielded much better sound. By releasing Compact Disc as the high end system and later as the de facto standard for everyone they cut off the ability to get more.

Re:1920x1080 is considered common these days?

[grimJester]

What really irks me, though, is a seeming lack of development for inexpensive high-res monitors that go beyond "1080p". My current display is a 20" 4:3 ratio 1600x1200 unit, and if I wanted to go bigger I'd want more than 1080 rows.

I had the same dilemma a few years ago and decided to get a 2560x1600 monitor. They cost a bit more, but given the lack of progress, it'll still be high tech ten years from now. Although some 2160p TVs have been demo'd I'd call it pretty unlikely you can get those at a decent price within a decade.

Re:1920x1080 is considered common these days?

[Surt]

http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&cs=04&l=en&sku=224-8284

(Dell, 27" U2711, 2k resolution (2560x1440)
Frequently on sale for $800.
Or did you need 2k vertical? That's going to be much harder to come by.

250 is midrange?

[bhcompy]

5770 is a nice midrange card. Plays everything well, mostly with high settings. 140$ is a nice price for a 5770 w/ 1GB GDDR5. For nearly the same price as the one mentioned here you're in CrossfireX with more power behind it

Re:250 is midrange?

[Cthefuture]

Uh sure, or you could get a $125 nVidia GTX 460 and completely destroy that 5770 in terms of performance and features. Plus you get a lot better drivers.

Re:250 is midrange?

[Gadget_Guy]

I went from an nVidia card to the 5770 purely because I didn't want to heat up my computer room just by having the computer on. (I also went for a low powered CPU for the same reason).

I live in Australia and which gets rather hot around here. I found that it doesn't matter how much better the performance is of one card if it makes the room so oppressively hot that I just don't want to use the computer in the first place. With my current setup, I can use the PC on the hottest day and still have the room only 1 or 2 degrees higher than the rest of the house. It is also nice that I often have to look at the computer lights to know if the PC is on, as compared with than being able to hear the fans from another room.

During winter I have been known to turn on my old computer just to warm the place up. It really does make a difference!

Power/performance envelope

[CAIMLAS]

It would appear that, based on power use and the performance of various chips, that the CPUs days of being the power hog and performance workhorse of the common desktop are over. Anything which today needs high-end CPU can (or at least, should) be able to utilize the GPU on the card as well - and to greater effect.

At the same time, We're seeing similar power use increases in our GPUs today that we did 8-10 years ago with CPUs. Performance is increasing, but power input is, as well. 40db for a graphics card is quite a bit, as is 230+ watts (ohmygod, that's more than my entire system while playing a game).

I wonder how long it'll be until we see the same kind of power performance improvements in GPU design as we saw in CPU design a couple years ago.

All said, it's quite a contrast from the 700Mhz celeron I still have cooking away with the 'whole system' power envelope at about 25 watts (PSU is only 35 watts), and have for the past 8 years. No, it's not gaming, but it's doing quite a lot just the same.

Well four reasons

[Sycraft-fu]

One is as you say the de facto standard thing. The top ATSC rez is 1080, so that is what a lot targets. However another part is just money. It is expensive to pack more transistors in a small space and that's what you need for higher rez monitors. People are pretty price sensitive so the market would be kinda small, meaning the unit price goes up meaning the market is even smaller. Another is interconnect bandwidth. Single link DVI and by extension older HDMI only supports up to 1920x1200@60Hz. That's just all the more bandwidth it has. Newer standards support higher resolutions, but they are pretty new. Many things still don't support them.

However a big one is simply interface scaling. Until recently, OSes couldn't really handle resolution independence well. In fact many still can't. Even those that can, they have to wait for apps to catch up. Windows 7 handles scaling flawlessly and if you have apps that support it, it all works great. However when you get an app that does it at best looks ugly, sometimes doesn't scale at all, or at worst has some elements (like the fonts) scale but not others. Developers have to get on board and start using new methods to allow the OS to scale their app arbitrarily. Otherwise, a high rez monitor just means tiny items and that is a no-go for most people with less than perfect vision.

We'll see higher rez monitors in time, and there already are some (you can get 2.5k 27" and 30" displays from a number of companies for reasonably affordable prices), however it'll be a bit. There's a number of issues t be dealt with.

Bargain bin gaming is for single players

[tepples]

I get a lot more value for my money buying games at a books/media store that buys the remnants that didn't sell originally a year ago and sells them for $10 a title or less

In a lot of cases, these games are in the bargain bin precisely because 1. the publisher has pulled the plug on the online multiplayer matchmaking servers, and 2. the game offers no local multiplayer (shared-screen or spawn installation) option.