NVIDIA has been in talks with its add-in-board partners to make the GeForce 8800 GT cheaper. The graphics card firm suggests the board makers should cut the number of PCB board layers used for 8800 GT graphics card from ten to six to reduce manufacturing costs and lower the card's average selling price.
The lower price should make the card more competitive against the Radeon HD 3800 series but not all board makers are happy with this suggestion:
Although the Radeon HD 3800 series was launched three weeks later than the GeForce 8800 GT, Radeon 3800 demand has started to pick up, bringing the market shares of Nvidia and AMD from 90% and 10%, originally, to 70% and 30%.
If the PCB layers are reduced from ten to six, graphics card makers are expected to save more than US$10 for each card, which would allow the Nvidia products to go into price competition with those of AMD.
Despite the cost benefits, some graphics card makers are unhappy with Nvidia's suggestion, pointing out that the chip maker is in effect asking them to do the job of improving the price/performance ratio of its products, while preserving its own profit margins.
For consumers this may also be a bad thing as these cards with 6 PCB layers may not overclock as well as the cards with 10 layers.
