"Green Fusion . . . "

Green Fusion . . . "
Ed Stroligo - 10/26/06
http://overclockers.com/tips01054/

After reading it, I like the idea of it very much.
Me as the folder, I found this part particulary interesting...

A better cluster processor for scientific use that will let users tap into the comparatively massive parallelism and floating point capacities of GPU architecture for non-video activities

Click to expand...

My only real question is, how good of graphics are the designing into it? I know not to expect something on par with dual 7900gtx's in sli... but are they going to put in power on the level of say a 9800, rage 3d or x1xxx series?

I imagine something along the lines of low to mid range X1XXX series chips. I don't think that incorporating something as weak as a Rage based chip benefits anybody. I imagine they would go with at least a DX9 compliant card, you want these machines to be vista compatible.

This does have very interesting implications as the F@H gpu project expands.

The possibilities for the future are interesting, but short term, this:

'If such a chip can chop $50 or more off the price of a cheap box, the OEMs certainly won't mind, and it could give the Semprons some big advantages over the Celerons'

Is the important thing, it means that a 65nm K8 Sempron can be competitive with a 65nm 'Allendale' or 'Milville' Celeron, or even maybe 45nm derivatives, because the extra performance of the 'Core 2' chips, and even maybe the smaller/cheaper process would be offset somewhatby the small but important cost savings.