Posted on Tuesday, May 13 2008 @ 22:21 CEST by Thomas De Maesschalck
Word is out on the streets that NVIDIA will play it safe with its upcoming GT200. FUD Zilla
writes the GPU giant has placed orders for both 55nm and 65nm versions of the chip:
Nvidia traditionally migrates from bigger transistors to smaller in the entry-level, less complicated chips and then tries this in the higher end. Usually this works well, and you can remember that Nvidia went from 80nm to 65nm in this order.
As it’s pressured by time it will try to make even its biggest chip in 55nm. If it fails, it will have a 65 nm version of the chip ready to take its place. 55nm means that the chips will run a bit cooler and that you can crack the clocks a bit higher and we will probably learn if the fastest version of GT200 will end up at 55nm.
Taping out two chips means doubling the cost and this will likely increase Nvidia's operating cost, but at least it will help the company to keep up in the high-end market.
It's possible that the firm will use the 55nm chips for the GTX version of the GT200 GPU and that the 65nm chips will end up in the GT version cards.
