NVIDIA GeForce GTS 250 announced

Tuesday 03rd March 2009, 08:00:00 AM, written by Rys

NVIDIA release GeForce GTS 250 at CeBIT today, reworking GeForce 9800 GTX+ to create something with a name that invokes the heady performance heights of recent GeForce GTXs, without using GT200 as the GPU under the hood.

G92b is the chip doing the hard work, NVIDIA asking board partners to outfit GeForce GTS 250 with 1 GiB of board memory while supporting 512 MiB configurations too, on a reworked PCB that's a little smaller than on 9800 GTX+.

But that's it from a spec point of view.  Clocks are the same (738 MHz base, 1836 MHz hot, 2200 Mhz mem), enabled functional unit counts and memory bus widths on the GPU are the same (128 SPs, 256-bit to memory), output rates are unchanged (16 ROPs), and display connectivity is identical (two 2560x1600 panels can be driven).  Heck, you can even SLI a GTS 250 with a 9800 GTX+ sharing the same memory size.

The price is what makes GTS 250 attractive then, hitting $149 with 1 GiB, whereas 9800 GTX+ is generally higher with half that memory size.  9800 GTX+ prices aren't expected to fall, either, as marketing efforts and inventories change their focus to the new thing.

So, a 9800 GTX+ 1 GiB in all but name, taking up slightly less room in the system, for a handful of bills less.  It's the financial aspect that appeals the most.

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General availability is in a week.
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Tagging

nvidia ± gts, 250, 9800, gtx, plus, g92b, marketing, fail, cuda


Latest Thread Comments (53 total)
Posted by Kanyamagufa on Thursday, 05-Mar-09 03:40:40 UTC
Quoting ChrisRay
I have yet to see a single website not able to say "This is a G92 rebrand". Basically all of them say it.
Me neither. Everyone has been very straightforward as far as I can see. Most sites have gone so far as to try and speculate what nvidia was thinking when creating the GTS 250. Whether or not this is a result of the situation with Kyle I have no idea, but the sites I trusted before didn't fail me this time.Anandtech actually throws out props to Charlie! Got a good chuckle from that.

Posted by jimmyjames123 on Thursday, 05-Mar-09 06:13:58 UTC
Throwing out a shout to Charlie was utter stupidity IMO, unbelievable that they did that. Pretty poor article in general too :)

Posted by hoom on Thursday, 05-Mar-09 07:26:57 UTC
Sorry to be a spoilsport but shouldn't this thread be in the 3D Hardware, Software & Output Devices (http://forum.beyond3d.com/forumdisplay.php?f=23) section?
Especially since its just another G92 card.
(gotta say that its pretty impressive longevity of a core though)

Posted by Jawed on Thursday, 05-Mar-09 08:58:31 UTC
Quoting Freak'n Big Panda
It's *much much* easier to determine what chip your getting with ATI's naming conventions.
RV740 being called HD48xx does sorta screw with this though. The mobile part now, the desktop part in a month's time? Jawed

Posted by Mariner on Thursday, 05-Mar-09 11:10:46 UTC
The situation with mobile parts is, if anything, worse than with desktop cards.

The two IHVs both actively 'overname' their mobile parts to try and con customers into thinking they are getting more powerful solutions. Very sharp practice if you ask me.

Posted by CJ on Thursday, 05-Mar-09 12:48:46 UTC
Quoting jimmyjames123
Throwing out a shout to Charlie was utter stupidity IMO, unbelievable that they did that. Pretty poor article in general too :)
The Anand article went even further supposedly... but they pulled it and re-wrote the conclusion to be a bit milder towards nV.To me GTS250 is just old wine in new jars.
Quoting Jawed
RV740 being called HD48xx does sorta screw with this though. The mobile part now, the desktop part in a month's time? Jawed
Afaik mobile parts have always had their 'seperate' namingscheme, so a *M97* based *Mobility* Radeon HD4860 doesn't have to be the same as the RV770 based Radeon HD4830 as long as it's faster than the *Mobility* Radeon HD4850 which it is. But yeah, it still is pretty much confusing since most people will think they're using the same GPUs

Posted by homerdog on Thursday, 05-Mar-09 16:18:15 UTC
Quoting jimmyjames123
Throwing out a shout to Charlie was utter stupidity IMO, unbelievable that they did that. Pretty poor article in general too :)
It is odd though that they hadn't even been briefed on the existence of the GTS250 when review samples had already gone out to other reviewers. I doubt they would've done that if they weren't pretty sure NVIDIA was screwing them around purposefully.

Posted by Silent_Buddha on Friday, 06-Mar-09 17:06:23 UTC
Quoting CJ
Afaik mobile parts have always had their 'seperate' namingscheme, so a *M97* based *Mobility* Radeon HD4860 doesn't have to be the same as the RV770 based Radeon HD4830 as long as it's faster than the *Mobility* Radeon HD4850 which it is. But yeah, it still is pretty much confusing since most people will think they're using the same GPUs
Maybe one day we'll see them do something similar to Intel in order to futher differentiate mobile chips from desktop chips even if they are the same generation and use similar technology.

IE Intel uses Core 2 Duo for both but different model numbers.

ATI could use Radeon for both but different model numbers. Although at least they do denote Mobile Radeon for notebook parts. But the model numbers are still the same as desktop parts making uninformed people expect the same level of performance.

Nvidia could use Geforce for both and different numbers. At least with the Mac line they use 1xx which has no companion in the desktop realm. However, I'm still disgusted with G92b being named mobile GTX 260 and mobile GTX 280. That's disingenuos at best and downright scummy at worst. Implies both similar performance and same technology generation.

And yes, it's disgusting when ATI does it also.

Regards,
SB

Posted by Jawed on Friday, 06-Mar-09 17:23:17 UTC
Quoting Silent_Buddha
At least with the Mac line they use 1xx which has no companion in the desktop realm.
That's because they haven't been officially launched yet. Just like GTS240 hasn't been officially launched yet, either. Jawed

Posted by neliz on Monday, 09-Mar-09 10:22:48 UTC
Quoting Silent_Buddha
Nvidia could use Geforce for both and different numbers. At least with the Mac line they use 1xx which has no companion in the desktop realm.
ehr...Medion has "Geforce GT120" cards in their PC's for over a month now I guess.GT 120 (https://www.medionshop.co.uk/?areaID=498816CA038C6141E10000000A00007F&productID=498816CA038C6141E10000000A00007F493688C87A636F4DE10000000A00004C&shoplanguage=en) I'm sure pretty soon the rebranding of the 8600/9500's will be complete.


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