i think the 399$ for 4850x2 is not a big title , cuz pay 100$ more and take 4870x2 , or for less than 399$ you can take 3 card's 9800gt on sli

Tatty_OneActually.....not necessarily, strange as it may sound, one of ATi's problems over the last 2 years is not that they have not produced good solid value for money cards but that they sold them at little profit to make up for the fact that in some cases they were not performance competative with the opposition, you know, the "10% slower but 20% cheaper" thing.

Basic math suggests that selling 1 million units at a $10 per unit profit does not bring in as much revenue as selling just 500,000 units at a $25 profit per unit, the one has the bigger market share, the other has the bigger profit.

Absolutely true, but (there's always one but :)) what Ati needed right now was to regain the lost market share above anything else. This way they don't make as much profit with the cards now, but they could make more in the future: higher chances of people buying another one for CrossFire, word of mouth, status towards the next cards etc... For example I highly doubt Ati is going to lower the prices anytime soon or by much (apparently RV730XT is going to launch at $130-150, doesn't make sense if HD4850 was going to be around there in few weeks IMO). They couldn't compete on pure performance either this time so being competitive in prices while increasing market share was the best option now that Nv is "weak". Later they will follow selling on that same market share out of sheer inertia. At least this is the theorybehind the strategy they are following for sure.

IMO the profit per RV770 card is a lot lower than that of RV670 and the latter was already low. But that's what they have to do now even though it is hurtng them in the short term IMO (and maybe the whole graphics industry in the long, average selling price has gone down a lot more than the increment of the number of cards sold). The traditional pricing (the one Nvidia uses and Ati before RV670) is more on the lines of GT200 pricing. People think Ati has much better profits with RV770 than Nvidia with GT200. I doubt it, because of what you said, but on the other hand they are taking inertia.

hayder.masteri think the 399$ for 4850x2 is not a big title , cuz pay 100$ more and take 4870x2 , or for less than 399$ you can take 3 card's 9800gt on sli

Hmm yeah but will HD4870 X2 be 25% faster than HD4850 X2 to justify the price difference? And above all, if it's doubtful right now if going for anything higher than HD4870/GTX260 makes sense, will this change in a pair of months? There may be a point to go higher, but how much and at what price?

I wonder what GT200's refresh will be like. NVIDIA can shrink that big boy down. ATI's already at the smallest node, I believe. Not sure when 45nm will become available. And it's not like 4870 is a light-footed watt burner.

It's not impossible that a shrunk GT200 could blow away RV770 in every way and be usable in a dualie configuration. So, quick rush out R700 before it loses its current positioning.