Thursday May 24, 2012 6:49 PM AEST

Atomic MPC > News > Build > Graphics Cards > NVIDIA comment on Fermi shortages, review scores

NVIDIA comment on Fermi shortages, review scores

NVIDIA's CEO touches on some obvious sore points.

The launch of NVIDIA's GTX480 card has been one of the strangest we've seen in the industry for some time; coming months after their competitor, NVIDIA's products are only just now trickling through to stores in quantities measurable in single digits.

NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang has commented on this shortage, pointing the finger towards manufacturing speedbumps as the reason behind the limited stock:

We are working with TSMC really closely. They are doing a fab job. Yields are improving. Capacities are improving. But we are finding it hard to keep up... We are working really hard to get Fermis out the door.

However many times he mentions that things are 'improving', rumours of the GTX480 and GTX470's continuing shortages are popping up all over the internet, with local Australian stores still waiting on stock - most list their deliveries on the 18th of April, but some list as early May.

The situation appears even worse overseas as reported by VR-Zone, where retailers have been promised four times the quantity of Fermi cards than were actually delivered; to rub salt in that wound, all the promised cards were pre-ordered to customers who will now have to wait.

Fudzilla have nailed down the second wave of Fermi cards to May, but we imagine that it will barely be enough to sate the demand of customers with preorders:

The second batch comes in May, but we are not sure that it will be enough to solve the shortage issue. By the time third batch arrives, ATI might have its 6000 ready or it will be close.

To add another layer to this wave of unfortunate events, reviews for Fermi haven't been overwhelmingly positive. Overclockers Club commented that "nVidia has assured us of an ample supply of cards available on launch", TomsHardware mused "So, if you break everything down into power, price, and performance, then today's preview comes off somewhat underwhelming after the build-up", Guru3D said "By next week you should see some decent availability in e-tail", and HardwareCanucks sum it up with:

When talking about availability, things become far less tangible since there MAY be some VERY limited stock in the retail channels today. General availability will likely begin somewhere around April 12th but stock of the GTX 480 will continue to be extremely tight for the foreseeable future.

Jen-Hsun Huang explained away these less-than-glowing opinions with a comment to VentureBeat:

Huang said the Fermi chips (dubbed GeForce GTX 480) got less than stellar reviews upon launch because the company didn't give reviewers enough time to review them

While this situation may have been true for some online sites and magazines, we haven't heard anything of the sort - and we had our review sample well before the NDA lifted, certainly more than long enough to form a solid opinion (that you can read in Issue 112).

Whatever the motivation behind these comments, NVIDIA remain hopeful for Fermi's success in the coming year. Perhaps most hopeful of all is Jen-Hsun himself:

"What's different now is Fermi is in production," he said. "Two years ago, I was just fantasizing about it."

Keep grabbing Atomic for the latest Fermi reviews, as we seem to be the only ones who can reliably get a few cards from manufacturers over the coming months!

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19 Comments

nukejockey Apr 15, 2010 11:02 AM	If its anything like ATIs 5xxx release, we wont be seeing decent stock for months, even now its still hard to get certain 5xxx cards (although this is all dependant on brand, now on ATI anymore afaik) Too little, too late, Nvidia.
tunksy Apr 15, 2010 11:49 AM	Nividia really failed this time around, its good to see AMD doing well in at least one arena :) Just a tad confused that nvidia (knowing all the issuse TSMC were having with 40nm) didnt try to use global foundries or some other company to make their GPU on a better process.. eh
Dan_2 Apr 15, 2010 11:49 AM	I like this part. "Jen-Hsun Huang explained away these less-than-glowing opinions with a comment to VentureBeat: Huang said the Fermi chips (dubbed GeForce GTX 480) got less than stellar reviews upon launch because the company didn't give reviewers enough time to review them" No I think its more the case of the end product just isn't good enough when you factor in how delayed Fermi has been the cost to the consumer, the heat these cards generate and power consumption compared to the competition. Just grabbed the latest copy of Atomic from the newsagent this morning and you guys have just nailed it in the last paragraph about Fermi.
omega Apr 15, 2010 1:09 PM	Dan_2 - subscribe man and get your funky cover edition mailed to your home or work address - plus at a cheaper cost :)
pkroeze Apr 15, 2010 1:31 PM	you can't compare fermi to the 5XXX series coz they aren't the sime generation anymore, the fermi cards have six months more development and the perfomance increase for those 6 months is not high enough to warrant nvidia's delays. It's very dirty play by nvidia coz this way they'll win highest performance card when they come out with their dual core and get all the bonuses that come with it but if ATI had waited another 6 months the battle would have been a good one.
SceptreCore Apr 15, 2010 2:06 PM	nVidia has always been full of shit.
Hawkeye Apr 15, 2010 2:08 PM	I really disagree with you there, pkroeze (how do you pronounce that, anyway?). We just can't see how they can make a dual-core card out of this chip. It's too hot, for one. And for another, it's only a few percentiles more powerful than a 5870 - so we can't see a dual-core Fermi being that much more powerful than ATI's current dual-core. And can you imagine what a FermiX2 would cost?! Crikey! Quite simply, Nvidia's not going to win anything on this one.
tunksy Apr 15, 2010 2:38 PM	well said hawkeye! right on the money.
Mudg3 Apr 15, 2010 4:30 PM	Makes me want of hold off buying new GPU's again.
sirtrancealot Apr 15, 2010 4:50 PM	From what i read a dual CPU 470/480 would break the PCIe power limitation of 300W, so won't really be do-able until they fix the amount of juice they chew, or change the PCI-e standard. that and yeah the aforementioned heat issues. I think the only selling point for fermi at the moment is going to be if you've already forked out $600 for a 120hz display and a 3D vision kit. otherwise, ATI all the way. I would call myself an nvidia fanboy but i still opted for a 5850/oc. which i don't regret in the slightest
Karmicfloss Apr 15, 2010 5:52 PM	ATI > Nvidia atm imo. 5870 almost the equivalent of 480's? Not good enough green :( Looks like it'll be a 5870 Vapor X after all...WOOHOO! Seriously though, too hot, not enough of an increase and way too late. NEXT!
Kenno Apr 15, 2010 7:45 PM	I'm getting a sense of deja vu over all of this.... From now on, I nickname the GTX480, Voodoo 5.1
philo-sofa Apr 15, 2010 8:29 PM	My case is still lit by green LEDs, but my heart is now more than a little red... All of which makes a lot of sense given I'm alive lol. TBH given parity, I'd still go Nvidia given ATI's inferior drivers (not entirely red then), but it looks like it'll be way into 2011 before another Nvidia card will potentially grace my system.
Shadow70 Apr 16, 2010 3:08 AM	don't know what they are going on about Aussies not getting it till the 18th of april or early may as l am getting mine tomorrow morning.
singo79 Apr 16, 2010 9:25 PM	I have always bought nVidia cards, but I don't consider myself a fanboy. I have always appreciated their performance and overall compatability with games on the market, however they have dropped the ball big time. For the second time in my life I am purchasing an ATi card. I am onto my 9th or 10th PC about now and nVidia have done pretty well out of me through the years... hell my current PC is running 2 x Leadtek 8800GTX's in SLi (about $800 each I paid). But who can go past the 5970.... honestly? Okay the price is still up there atm, but it is worth the money for the fastest card on the market and need I say it.... Eyefinity! BTW, I also agree with Hawkeye and tunksy, there is no way nVidia can possibly create a GTX480X2 based on the power consumption and heat issues. Well played ATi.
fliptopia Apr 16, 2010 10:29 PM	philo-sofa: ATI drivers are inferior to ones that cause graphics cards to overheat? I think that they are getting fairly level on drivers these days.
philo-sofa Apr 17, 2010 12:26 PM	@ fliptopia: that's a bit of a 'strawman' you're setting up there. Certainly Nvidia's fan-killing drivers were an abject failure, however ATI continues to have issues with graphical corruption on HD sources, game profiles (creating a new .exe with desired CCC setting and the game loader FTL) and locked down overclocking. Nvidia just have more practical, user friendly, expansive, integrated, stable and functional drivers – that’s an objective fact IMO. To be fair ATI is closing the gap, and I look forward to the day when they are genuinely close to Nvidia in terms of quality, but till then..
t8y Apr 18, 2010 4:38 PM	@ philo-sofa, ive never had any of those mentioned issues with drivers, my past 3 GPUs have been ATI. though ive only ran single cards. also, issues with "locked down overclocking" - MSI afterburner (which is based on rivatuner) FTW. getting 1066/1300 from a 5850 here, which is hardly "locked down"
philo-sofa Apr 18, 2010 7:27 PM	^^ that's great, however in doing that you're also ramping up your idling GPU clocks and voltages, and as a result quite significantly increasing your power consumption as well as lowering your cards life. I've reached higher speeds with the AMD GPU clock tool and Afterburner, however the drivers are still very "locked down", which was my point. As for 'not having' the other issues, I'm assuming that you've never tried to force certain settings (e.g. AA) via Catalyst and that you either don't watch HD, or don't use the GPU to decode it. Basically you haven't run into issues because you haven't attempted to use the functionality. Which is also the point when it comes to ATI's drivers not quite being on Nvidias level.

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Atomic Magazine

Issue: 137 | June, 2012

Atomic is a magazine aimed squarely at computer enthusiasts, gamers, and serious PC upgraders.

Every month we bring you the latest reviews of new technology and PC components, in depth features on everything from overclocking to console hacking, and gaming previews and interviews.

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