[ABT] Nvidia uses GDDR5, Finally !!

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
Well, this isn't much of a surprise as it's been bound to happen, but it's good to see some comfirmation regardless. I'm surprised that neither the GTX 285 or GTX 295 use GDDR5... you'd imagine that we'd see some nice benefits there, and help NVIDIA push even further past ATI. It is a little odd that the mainstream variant of the GTX 260/280 will be the first cards to use the higher-end memory...
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
Well they need to redsign the entire card around the new spec, # of pins, pinouts, and specs are all different from GDDR3. Bit more analysis at Xbit

I'm rather happier to see them putting it on midrange cards... considering what "midrange" means to NVIDIA, it guarantees any of the good cards are probably going to have GDDR5 at launch.

I don't remember the dates for sure but I want to say it was only six months after the 7800 -> 7900 shrink that they launched the 8800 series... NVIDIA is probably going to attempt the same with a quick turnaround here after they launch GTX 285, 265, and 295.
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
I'm rather happier to see them putting it on midrange cards... considering what "midrange" means to NVIDIA, it guarantees any of the good cards are probably going to have GDDR5 at launch.

You got that right. I'm still not sure how much of a performance gain can be attributed to just the RAM, but if NVIDIA releases the same models with both GDDR3 and then 5, it should be quite easy to find out.
 

Rory Buszka

Partition Master
It came as a bit of a surprise to me that these details were leaked via a social networking web site. Once news of this gets around to NVIDIA's top brass, I wouldn't be too happy to be Mr. Chang -- he could even lose his job on account of the slip.
 
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