I think that the fact that NVIDIA wins in just about every application out there says volumes about their architectural efficiency. R600 was anything but efficient compared to G80. All that touted shader power that went nowhere, pathetic AA performance, excessive memory bandwidth, and extreme heat combined to make a product less power-efficient, slower, and uglier than the competition. And now we have HD 3850/3870 outclassed by 8800GT, 8800GS and 9600GT. 3870X2 has some serious quirks to it (as does 9800GX2 though). At least RV670 was frugal on the juice.
TBH, I think when it comes down to their massive lead in gaming benchmarks, it has a little more to do with their collaboration with game devs. I'm not claiming every title under TWIMTBP campaign, as they've also worked with others who didn't join up - and, as far as nVidia is concerned, this has been their biggest marketing achievment to date. ATI doesn't collaborate with game devs anywhere near the level that nVidia does, and that is blatantly obvious in the massive performance differences between each company. But, of note, games where ATI has spent a lot of time collaborating with the game devs, we see performance levels on par between the companies, and many times ATI will lead in those tests (at least, in regards to newer generation hardware, in lower AA levels). Games like FEAR and Call of Juarez, for example. ATi has the capability, but there's just no follow through with game devs, and no reach around for us consumers - which I think is kinda sad at times.
Physics on GPUs has gone absolutely nowhere aside from forgotten promises from NV & ATI. And there are synthetic tests out there that show ATI's shader design to be less efficient that NV's in multiple ways as well. Check out some of Digit-Life's reviews to see some signs of this. You'll find that while it can perform extremely well in some cases (geometry), it gets battered badly in others (SM4).
http://www.digit-life.com/articles3/video/rv670-part2.html
How good at math they are in some cases hardly matters when they are dramatically behind in texture fill-rate anyway. The chips are just totally off balance. I'm worried about RV770 after seeing how it may have 16 ROPs still. That means a max of 16 pixels per clock output.
The whole physics thing was brought up quick, and dropped rather fast as well - especially after ATI's announcement of physics in a crossfire setup . . . I agree as well, though that ATI's shader design have been sub-par since after the X1950 series. Those cards were great with SM3, but ATI has been behind the gate with SM4 with newer generations.
True, for the most part a GPU being good at math has little to do with texturing performance - but, again, if ATI were to spend more time collaborating with game devs to the extent that nVidia has, it would make all the difference in the world - unless ATI just decides to revamp the architecture, which is what RV770 so far will be doing. Sure, it might only have 16 ROPs, still, but if everything is clocked independantly, I don't think that will be a limitation at all . . . only time will tell, though.
[/QUOTE]Indeed. I like the ultra-agressive mid-range products we're getting. But, I think that NVIDIA has a monster GPU in the works while ATI is going to rely on dual RV770s for the top-end. I doubt that ATI can corner the high-end with a dual GPU design if NVIDIA does indeed have a 1.3 billion transistor chip coming. They just don't work out reliably/efficiently in all apps, as shown by current dual GPU cards and SLI/CF. A big single chip board doesn't have these driver issues and is going to be innately more efficient than two GPUs communicating externally.[/QUOTE]
We haven't really seen anything "high-end" from ATI since they exclaimed they're staying out of that market. Sure, the 3870x2 is priced for that market, but it's more two 3870s in one package, which still doesn't qualify for high-end, IMO. Although, if ATI get's back on the ball like they were during the X1900 series, watch that statement go out the window - I'm sure we'll see another 1337 card come from the red camp, but only if they feel it can compete with nVidia's 1337 beast.
