Computer Hardware: 2008

[Jonathan]

http://anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/intel/ ... i=3038&p=3

$266 for an Intel Core 2 Quad. Anandtech has a great chart comparing the equivalently priced Core 2 Duo (which is clocked faster) across of a variety of threaded workloads. For rendering/media apps, the quad is 10-20% faster. For games, the dual core is faster across the board still.

[Jonathan]

http://theinquirer.net/?article=41837

NVidia's successor to the 8600 may not suck. If somebody comes out with a fanless version, this might be what I upgrade to.

I did a bit of poking around and could not find any fanless 8800s. I am not surprised.

[Jonathan]

UT3 demo comes out next week. Preliminary data has the 8800 GTS 320MB being the best price/perf. Seems like the mainstream cards are ok, too.

http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=46 ... ert&pid=14

[Jonathan]

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3127&p=4

60% speedup in UT3 going from single core to dual core. 10% speedup going from dual to quad.

[Jonathan]

Nvidia's 8800 GT is supposed to launch on October 29.

http://myevilprocessor.blogspot.com/200 ... 512mb.html - prerelease benchmarks have it stomping the 8800 GTS. I think it may be cheaper, though it's hard to sort through all the rumors. ATI is said to be launching a competitive card for Christmas as well. Christmas 2007 may be a very good time to buy a graphics card.

[Jonathan]

http://forums.vr-zone.com/showthread.php?t=197629

8800 GT also has the HD playback (h.264 and VC-1(?)) that the 8800 GTX/GTS lack. And it is a single-slot card.

The 256MB is definitely going to be cheaper than the 8800 GTS 320MB, which you can buy for $290. I haven't been able to find the price differential between the GT 256 and the GT 512. I suspect both are going to be really good buys.

One caveat is that these cards don't support DX10.1 (I think). No idea if that's going to be significant or not.

I think I will be getting one of these as soon as there is a fanless or super quiet version.

[VLSmooth]

I think I will be getting one of these as soon as there is a fanless or super quiet version.

Once compatibility information (or a new heatsink) comes out, I highly recommend Thermalright's after-market coolers ( Newegg link )

I'm currently very happy using a HR-03 Rev A on my BFG 7800GT OC paired with a 92mm Nexus DF1209SL-3 fan ( silentpcreview | heatsinkfactory | endpcnoise ). All my fans are at the lowest speed, my GPU runs perpetually at 44 degrees Celsius (idle, ffxi, 1920x1080 h264, etc), and it's completely inaudible from ~2 feet away.

I'd give an after-market cooler serious thought if you haven't already.

[Jonathan]

Ugh. $55 plus accessories and it is freakin huge. I really just want a heatpipe design. We'll see.

[Peijen]

Can you comment on intel's G35 or nvidia MCP78 or AIT RS780?

[Jonathan]

I don't really have any specific insight into those products.

[Jonathan]

ATI's offering is supposed to come out in a month or two and be very competitive with Nvidia's. I haven't seen any leaked scores yet.

[Jonathan]

NVIDIA has invalidated the existance, not only of AMD's hardware, but of much of their own line up with the release of this incredibly high value card based on the G92 GPU.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3140 "The Only Card That Matters"

[Jonathan]

Looks like ATI HD3870 may upset GF8800GT position

INQ keeps alluding to ATI performance of a part that no one has reported on the perf.

[quantus]

If they don't release some samples soon, there's not gonna be a holiday release and very likely more of a loss for AMD... Really, I doubt they're gonna get enough volume out the door even if they start releasing now. They'll probably only get a few tens of thousands of cards made at best right now unless they've got a big warehouse full of them already. That's probably not the case now that nVidia's made their release. It's not like this is gonna be a Wii vs PS3 vs Xbox360 type deal where people wait in line for Wii's while xboxes and ps3s sit on shelves since MS was smart and made directx the monopoly portion of the gaming stack that everyone else designs towards. I wonder if MS will start charging royalties or something. Probably not now that the EU is fining them, but who knows what the future will bring.

[Jonathan]

I'll be very interested to see if any developers start targeting the subset of DirectX that Cedega/Cider supports as their software stack. Because that effectively breaks the MS monopoly.

[Jonathan]

Drop dead shipping date for a holiday release is the week of Thanksgiving. You can launch whenever, but if you don't ship by Thanksgiving no one will be able to get their hands on any in quantity. So you're right, they've only got three weeks left.

[Jonathan]

While the Radeon HD 3870 isn't faster than the GeForce 8800 GT, if AMD can hit its price point, it is a viable alternative if you're looking to save money.

8800 GT: fast
HD 3870: bit cheaper

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3151&p=12

8800 GT 256MB will come out soon.

[Jonathan]

At first Phenom was going to launch at either 2.8GHz or 2.6GHz; then we got word that it would be either 2.6GHz or 2.4GHz. A week ago the story was 2.4GHz and lower, then a few days ago we got the final launch frequencies: 2.2GHz and 2.3GHz.
...
The problem is, and I hate to ruin the surprise here, Phenom isn't faster than Intel's Core 2 Quad clock for clock. In other words, a 2.3GHz Phenom 9600 will set you back at least $283 and it's slower than a 2.4Ghz Core 2 Quad Q6600, which will only cost you $269. And you were wondering why this review wasn't called The Return of the Jedi.

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/sh ... i=3153&p=1

[quantus]

Are the architectures similar enough again where pure clock to clock perf matters again? The pipeline lengths are probably similar again, maybe?

[Jonathan]

Phenom/Barcelona is still 3 wide. Core 2 Duo is 4 wide.