R600 pics and details surface: It's Huge

GargGarg Purveyor of Lincoln Nightmares Icrontian
edited February 2007 in Science & Tech
VR-Zone has learned some details about the upcoming ATI R600 cards. First off, there will be two SKUs - the base XT with 512mb of DDR3, and the XTX with 1gb of DDR4. The XT will be 9.5 inches long and consume 240 watts of power, as will the retail version of the XTX. The OEM version of the XTX will be 12.4 inches long and consume 270 watts of power, however.

A cheaper XL model slotting below the XT is planned for a later release.

Below is a picture of the behemoth OEM R600XTX.

For images, view on front page

Comments

  • DogSoldierDogSoldier The heart of radical Amish country..
    edited February 2007
    Holy shnikeys that thing is huge....
  • mas0nmas0n howdy Icrontian
    edited February 2007
    WOW

    I think I will be skipping this massive power hungry round of cards and wait for the multi-core, low-heat/power generation that I assume (altho I could certainly be wrong) will be coming after this gen.

    But i also said I would keep my X850 for 3 years and that didn't last too long after the x1900 dropped my jaw...
  • LeonardoLeonardo Wake up and smell the glaciers Eagle River, Alaska Icrontian
    edited February 2007
    Power hungry is right! Netburst Pentiums, even at their most extreme inefficiency (D8XX series) were only junior varsity power consumers compared to these new video cards! And all the criticism that was leveled - justifiably I admit - at Intel for the lousy late-edition P4s. Why are all those people silent now that such inefficiency has found its way to video cards?
  • Bad_KarmaBad_Karma The Great White North
    edited February 2007
    That thing is huge. It won't fit into my case. Oh well I was going to wait for second gen dx10 hardware anyways as I was skeptical about Nvidia and Amd's first dx10 cards. I also have a sinking feeling that I would need a spare psu just to run that thing. They definitely need to find away to shrink that board. The real question is, is how far away from retail versions is that pic.
  • LeonardoLeonardo Wake up and smell the glaciers Eagle River, Alaska Icrontian
    edited February 2007
    I think the reason why neither nVidia nor ATI have bothered to shrink dies smaller than 80nm scale (ATI) is that neither wants to slow down long enough for the RDT&E, each afraid that if they take a breather, the other will lurch farther ahead in sales. If AMD and Intel could shrink dies to 65nm (45nm for Intel within a year, maybe), why can't nVidia and ATI?
  • Bad_KarmaBad_Karma The Great White North
    edited February 2007
    Your right Leo. Especially now since AMD owns ATI. You think that they could benefit from AMD having their own wafer plants. Not too mention that they probably went with 80nm just so that with all that power running into it they wouldn't get as much electrical leakage as you would when going to a whole new die shrinkage. Then again I might be on crack with that last sentence since I'm not an engineer nor a marketing wiz :).
  • LeonardoLeonardo Wake up and smell the glaciers Eagle River, Alaska Icrontian
    edited February 2007
    AMD does have their own plants, but they don't have near the production capacity as Intel. AMD even contracts some of their production, I believe with Taiwan's Chartered Semiconductor. But when is this insane, ever increasing video card power consumption going to start a downtrend, as it is doing with both Intel and AMD's CPU? I'm not on an environmentalists soap box, but I do care about power bills.
  • Bad_KarmaBad_Karma The Great White North
    edited February 2007
    Yeah this reminds me of the old muscle cars. They kept making them bigger and more powerful until the price of gas hit an all time high. Then they had to stop producing them and revert back to going with a more efficient power plant that consumes less energy. I think some of AMD/Intel's engineers should go talk to the gpu engineers. Seriously I do hope that they can end up offering a smaller more efficient card then this first gen of dx10 cards. I also seriously hate the stock market that demands that every quarter be better than the last one or else. I don't think anyone knows what a long term investment is anymore lol. This current card will be for the enthusiast market thats for sure. I wonder if that thing could make toast without the fan.
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited February 2007
    Hello Pentium R600.
  • LeonardoLeonardo Wake up and smell the glaciers Eagle River, Alaska Icrontian
    edited February 2007
    Pentium 4Max Netbust
  • RWBRWB Icrontian
    edited February 2007
    There's TWO molex-like connectors on there that I am not familiar with.... wtf! Anyways, I've already ranted about power hungry cards when NVidias card came out. Refer to that. ;D
  • GargGarg Purveyor of Lincoln Nightmares Icrontian
    edited February 2007
    RWB wrote: »
    There's TWO molex-like connectors on there that I am not familiar with.... wtf!

    Your utility company runs some heavy-guage wires directly into your computer room for those.
  • Sledgehammer70Sledgehammer70 California Icrontian
    edited February 2007
    I think Nvidia takes its time because it is a fabless company... But that could change if they really wanted it to.
  • PieIsAwesomePieIsAwesome Ontario, CA
    edited February 2007
    The size is ridiculous.
  • lemonlimelemonlime Canada Member
    edited February 2007
    I recall hearing that the preproduction sample cards were very large and that the retail models will be much shorter. That image included there is full-size workstation card length. I highly doubt the retail model will be that long--perhaps the size of the 8800GTX. Very few cases can accomodate full-size expansion cards.
  • GargGarg Purveyor of Lincoln Nightmares Icrontian
    edited February 2007
    lemonlime wrote:
    That image included there is full-size workstation card length. I highly doubt the retail model will be that long--perhaps the size of the 8800GTX. Very few cases can accomodate full-size expansion cards.
    Gargoyle wrote:
    The XT will be 9.5 inches long and consume 240 watts of power, as will the retail version of the XTX. The OEM version of the XTX will be 12.4 inches long and consume 270 watts of power, however.

    Correct as always ;)
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