14 DAY TRIAL // NVIDIA hasn't even officially released its new D10U-based graphics cards lineup, but a few lucky journalists attending this year's Computex show were able to spot one of these cards. To make matters even more interesting, despite the fact that the new D10U cards haven't yet been officially announced, rumors about an NVIDIA new card lineup are already spreading fast. This new GPU is supposed to be dubbed D12U, which should literally make it two generations better than the upcoming lineup.
Apparently, the D12U is going to mark NVIDIA's first run at a GDDR5-enabled graphics card. However, according to memory manufacturers, the first NVIDIA GPU to support GGDR5-memory is not going to be available until late 2009.
If that be the case, then ATI will have quite a long experience with its RV770XT-graphics cards, which are expected to come with GDDR5 memory. This is all the more likely to happen especially as NVIDIA's D12U is most probably now in its design stage. Still, even if the new GDDR5-enabled NVIDIA graphics cards are expected to arrive in late 2009, it certainly looks like the company is not wasting any time and has already begun talks with memory manufacturers about the supply of high-speed GDDR5 memory.
Currently, the GDDR5 is made on a 70nm manufacturing process but, if NVIDIA plans to wait until 2009 to begin shipment of it, the manufacturing process is most likely going to improve until then. According to memory manufacturers, the 55nm process is expected to be implemented sometime in 2009, thus enabling graphic cards to become more energy efficient.
As per the same authority, the GDDR5 memory standard will probably be featured on high-end products within the next year and a half. By that time, the price is expected to have dropped significantly, thus making GDDR5 more cost-effective and ready to be implemented into mid-range and low-range products as well.