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Hardware NVIDIA "MCP72" Details Unveiled
Anh Tuan Huynh (Blog) - February 8, 2007 4:22 AM
Print E-mail del.icio.us 35 comment(s) - last by PrezWeezy.. on Feb 13 at 7:04 PM
NVIDIA's next-generation single-chip socket AM2 chipset revealed

Memos sent to DailyTech reveal new details of NVIDIA’s upcoming MCP72 single-processor chipset. This will be NVIDIA’s first HyperTransport 3.0, or HT3, compatible chipset and a successor to the current nForce 500-series MCP and the upcoming AMD MCP68 chipsets.

MCP72 will support AMD’s socket AM2 and HT3 enabled AM2+. Socket AM2+ will house AMD’s upcoming Athlon 64 Agena and Opteron Budapest quad-core processors.

Unlike the nForce 590 SLI, the upcoming MCP72 is a single-chip solution similar to the previous nForce 3-series, mainstream nForce 4-series and nForce 500-series. It will also offer a small footprint and have low power consumption.

MCP72 will also be NVIDIA’s first PCIe 2.0 equipped chipset, making it ideal for next-generation PCIe peripherals and graphics cards. Other notable MCP72 features include support for six SATA 3.0Gbps and dual Gigabit Ethernet ports like the current nForce 500-series.

As with all NVIDIA chipset architectures, expect MCP72 to spawn SLI and Ultra variants. There’s also the possibility of MCP72-based integrated graphics offerings too.

Expect MCP72 to launch in time for AMD’s upcoming Agena and Budapest quad-core processors.

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nVidia for AMD!!!
By miahallen on 2/8/2007 7:38:31 AM , Rating: 2
Thank God nVidia is not abandoning AMD/ATI. I remember lots of speculation after the AMD/ATI buyout concerning nVidia's future with AMD platforms.




RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By Tsuwamono on 2/8/2007 8:15:55 AM , Rating: 3
Not alot of people thought that they would abandon AMD. Nvidia is still the largest seller of chipsets for the AMD platform. If AMD excluded them they would probably lose millions in sales as almost everyone knows that for Chipsets Nvidia is almost always the go to guy but for graphics cards ATI is almost always the go to guy.

Note to flamers: I said "Almost always" so dont flame i know both have been beaten in their respective catagories.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By VooDooAddict on 2/8/2007 10:16:28 AM , Rating: 2
(not a flame just a personal observation)

I'll certainly agree with nVidia being the AMD chipset of choice for a while now. If for no other reason the market share and available motherboard products.

On the graphics cards ... they both always seem to have attractive products across the various ranges. You can build a quality system on either and in any price segment. Occasionally, one has a clear price/performance winner in the mid range video card market, but they trade that lead often enough. The last time there was a clear winner across the entire range was the GeForceFX 5 series.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By smaddox on 2/8/2007 11:09:01 AM , Rating: 3
I would have to say there is almost always a clear winner.

The 9800 pro was the clear price/performance winner in its day, and after that, the 7800 line was by far better than anything ATI had (I currently use an evga 7800 gt, and it runs like a champ).

So basically, they trade off and on. Although to be honest, it seems like Nvidia has the lead more often than ATI. We shall see how that changes with AMD backing them up now.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By Sahrin on 2/8/07, Rating: 0
RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By vortmax on 2/8/2007 11:29:16 AM , Rating: 2
You forgot one:

Winner: nVidia GeForce 8800

I know ATI's next-gen part isn't released yet, but until it is, nVidia has the better part.

4 to 4...tied.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By peldor on 2/8/2007 12:07:29 PM , Rating: 2
R520/580 > G70

In heat, power consumption, and noise too.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By Le Québécois on 2/8/2007 2:47:17 PM , Rating: 2
Your DirectX generation listing need some corrections.

DX7:
Winner: nVidia GeForce --> The Geforce (256) had no real competition at that time. The Geforce 2 was already out when the Radeon came.
Loser: ATI Radeon/Radeon 7000

DX9 SM1: --> There's no such thing as DX9 SM1 only video cards. Both the Radeon 9700PRO and the GeForce FX5800U were SM2.0.
Winner: ATI Radeon 9700Pro
Loser: nVidia GeForce FX5800U

DX9 SM3:
Winner: nVidia GeForce 6800U
Loser: ATI Radeon X800XT (alsoSM2.0 Part) --> If by "also" you meant not at all, then you are correct because the X800 family didn't have SM3 but only SM2.1(or 2.b, 2.0+, DX9.b depending on how you name it).

As for your winner/loser list, there's not been a real winner since the GeForce 3/4 for nVidia and the Radeon 9700PRO for ATI.

Every following generation went like this:
nVidia release the new generation product first and lead the market for some time then ATI bring their new generation product to the market and take back the lead. nVidia fight back with a refresh of their current generation to take the lead again and later ATI do the same thing. Then we go back to the first step for the next generation. Sometimes nVidia and ATI switch place for who come first with a refresh of their current line of product but that's it.

So depending at WHEN you look at the market, ATI or nVidia can be the "winner" of that generation of video cards.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By Jedi2155 on 2/8/2007 4:01:24 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
DX9 SM3 ROUND 2:
Winner: ATI Radeon X1800
Loser: nVidia GeForce 7800


I think it should be the other way around do the sheer amount of time it took ATI to respond and the fact that it was rather merely competitive rather than blowing away the competition.

Many people purchased the 7800 series during the wait for ATI.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By Sahrin on 2/8/2007 11:13:59 AM , Rating: 4
I'm not sure your characterization is correct. ATI has been the performance leader in every generation except X800v6800. X1800 was faster in almost all situations than 7800, X1900 was faster in almost all situations that 7900, 9800 was faster in almost all situations that 5900 etc. etc.

Have they been huge performance leads? No. But they are demonstrable and they do exist - primarily it is nVidia fanboyism that dates back to the GeForce 3/4 series that drives nVidia's continued high market share (and ATI's seeming insistince on failure to execute their business strategy). In addition, ATI has a widely documented image quality lead (whether it continues to this generation remains to be seen).

As far as winning "across the entire range" - this is a pretty meaningless comment. If you compare by performance - the top cars will always be the top ranked. To say that "ATI is faster in the mid-range and slower in the low end" doesn't demonstrate anything but their willingness to spend more (or earn less) on parts in that market. Their technological leadership is demonstrated in the high end parts, exclusively.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By Adonlude on 2/8/2007 1:26:38 PM , Rating: 2
nVidia fanboyism drives their market share? Interesting... I am pretty sure I have the fastest graphics card in the world at the moment and I am also pretty sure it says nVidia on it.

My TNT2 was repalced by an nVidia card I can't remember which was replaced by my 9800pro which was replaced by my x850xtpe which was replaced by my 8800GTX. These companies will continue to play leap frog, get over it!


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By Sahrin on 2/8/2007 2:07:54 PM , Rating: 2
Only an idiot of uncommon quality could construe my comments that way. What I said was, nVidia faboyism drives market share when ATI leads the market - you see now that ATI is NOT leading, and their market share drops. However, nVidia's market share sustains itself even when their parts do not perform at the same level as ATI's (x1800 v. 7800, x1900 v. 7900).


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By Marcus Pollice (blog) on 2/8/2007 4:42:35 PM , Rating: 2
When talking about market share we are talking about numbers which are easily compared.

read: http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/video/display/2007020...

ATI increased their share in the discreet graphics market on the desktop, although NVIDIA had the fastest product on the market (half the quarter at least). So please don't draw conclusions based on subjective perception of the situation.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By Le Québécois on 2/8/2007 2:07:52 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
primarily it is nVidia fanboyism that dates back to the GeForce 3/4 series that drives nVidia's continued high market share


nVidia market share has nothing to do with that. It's their ability to mass produce quality and fast products many months before ATI is able to do so in every generation since the GeForce 6 family. Then every generation ATI take back some market share later when they ALSO release quality products. And again, nVidia come back with a next generation video card to take back some share. It's the circle of life...well, if video cards were living entities.

And before ATI fanboys begin to flame me, I'm currently owning a Radeon X800XL because it was the best product on the market in that price range when I was looking for an upgrade.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By frobizzle on 2/8/2007 8:18:33 AM , Rating: 5
quote:

Thank God nVidia is not abandoning AMD/ATI.


Why would they? Out of spite? Despite now being a competitor, AMD still offers a market for nVidia chipsets that is potentially worth a lot of money. Sounds like good business practices to me.


RE: nVidia for AMD!!!
By iwod on 2/8/2007 9:55:50 AM , Rating: 2
Well, unless ATI /AMD will make better chipset Nvidia still has the best chipset for AMD platform.


Sound great!
By Anosh on 2/8/2007 5:17:29 AM , Rating: 2
I don't know about you but to me this sounds great. It seems to have just about everything new released and even somethings not yet released.

The only thing is that there is no mention of Firewire nor HD sound. But I assume all that and such will also be included and revealed once the system is launched.




RE: Sound great!
By dug777 on 2/8/2007 7:05:53 AM , Rating: 5
It'd sound better if they brought back SoundStorm...


RE: Sound great!
By FITCamaro on 2/8/2007 7:14:44 AM , Rating: 2
Seriously. Soundstorm was the best onboard audio solution of its time. About the only thing in my opinion today that's rivaled it are some of the motherboards that come with audigy chips on the board.


RE: Sound great!
By VooDooAddict on 2/8/2007 10:17:49 AM , Rating: 2
I'm guessing the reason we haven't seen a new SoundStorm is Vista's new audio stack.


RE: Sound great!
By MarkHark on 2/8/2007 3:20:46 PM , Rating: 2
" It'd sound better..."

Nice pun indeed :)


These will be low priced!
By Viditor on 2/8/2007 8:25:15 AM , Rating: 2
A single chip solution with a small footprint and low power?
The motherboards should be exceedingly inexpensive on this platform...




RE: These will be low priced!
By The Sly Syl on 2/8/2007 8:40:40 AM , Rating: 2
I'm just glad Nvidia is doing *something* that has lower power requirements; hopefully they'll bother to do the same for videocards sometime soon. Between I find it kind of funny how a CPU with a decent fan is running cooler than chipset fans and videocards these days. It's just a lot of excess heat and power.


RE: These will be low priced!
By MonkeyPaw on 2/8/2007 11:18:33 AM , Rating: 2
I really hope the low-power consumption claim is true. Honestly, I'll believe it when I see it, since every solution from nVidia these days has been far from energy efficient. In fact, NV is hotter than the competition by quite a bit. ATI and Intel don't seem to need the elaborate cooling solutions that nVidia does. I guess we will see how they do and how it compares to the next thing from Intel and ATI.

Going back to a unichip design is a little disturbing to me as well, as it suggests that nVidia won't be offering a competative IGP platform again. Back in the unichip NF3 days, they offered no IGP solution at all. I guess they can stick to the old MCP + IGP design, since they still need to develop a SB for Intel platforms. However, they can't stick with the 6100/6150 IGP for much longer, since the next ATI IGP platform will be considerably better. Honestly, we haven't heard much about nVidia's IGP plans for the future, even though AMD-ATI just gave them the Intel market. It seems like far too important a segment to ignore, since that's what OEMs love to use the most.


RE: These will be low priced!
By mindless1 on 2/8/2007 12:37:47 PM , Rating: 2
It is a bit ironic you write video cards. One of the best selling gaming cards, 7600GS, does just that. Not the fastest by any stretch and therefore nobody will be bold enough to "like" it, but there it is, your selective vision blinds what you dont' want to see.


RE: These will be low priced!
By raven3x7 on 2/8/2007 8:59:27 AM , Rating: 2
Wow thats a change i didnt expect. All recent Nvidia chipsets have been large and power hungry. Lets hope they'll pull it off because AMD has some great designs coming and Nvidia will need a solid chip to compete.


6 sata
By leviathan19 on 2/8/2007 2:17:17 PM , Rating: 1
6 sata only for the chipset is ok you can add more with another controller maybe 4 or 6 more you will have 10 to 12 sata lets take 10 2 for the optical drives and you have 8 there you have more than enough.... even my best friend that is a pr0n addict he only have 5 hdd of 750gb and thats a lot of storage




RE: 6 sata
By Sahrin on 2/8/2007 2:28:20 PM , Rating: 2
The question isn't once of space, it's devices. And second, Why in unholy hell would I want to invest 200-250 dollars in an enthusiast motherboard, then another 200-250 dollars in an SATA controller - when implementing the additional SATA channels on the Chipset would cost nVidia 3-5 dollars/chip? (Pass that on to the consumer at a 200% markup and you're still WAY under the cost of a solid controller card). In addition, truly useful RAID levels (5, 6) only become useful with 4+ drives. I don't want to boot off a RAID array so I boot from a Raptor 150, and have a SG 320 7200.10 for programs/apps/games. If I have a paltry 4 drive RAID 5 array, I've used up every single port on the motherboard.

Add to that the fact that your extra controller solution takes up an additional PCI/PCIe slot (if PCI the performance is abysmal) with a hot SATA controller.

Great alternative. Thanks leviathan, thanks nVidia.


RE: 6 sata
By jkresh on 2/8/2007 3:25:00 PM , Rating: 2
I think what Leviathan was suggesting was the board might have an additional controller integrated (like a lot of boards now have 4 or 6 main + 2 or more from a silicone image controller)...


RE: 6 sata
By Viditor on 2/8/2007 8:31:36 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
Why in unholy hell would I want to invest 200-250 dollars in an enthusiast motherboard, then another 200-250 dollars in an SATA controller

I think you missed the whole point here...
The enthusiast board will probably be closer to $100-175 with the budget board in the $50-70 range. Also, the majority of todays boards add an additional on board controller (not part of the chipset) anyway, which usually costs them less than $15...they will probably be included in those enthusiast boards.


RE: 6 sata
By PrezWeezy on 2/13/2007 7:04:53 PM , Rating: 2
Well you can also get SATA backplanes that split each SATA from the board to 7 or 8 ports. So if you have 6 x 8 that's 48 devices. That's a hell of a lot of devices. And if you read some of Anandtech's reviews you can see that you can have 8 devices per SATA II 3.0 GBPs port and not decrease performance at all.


How is this better than the 500 series?
By Sahrin on 2/8/2007 11:29:50 AM , Rating: 1
AMD Chipsets are about features (because the MCH is on-CPU). What compelling features does this thing have? PCIE2.0 and HT3 will be standard across all serious enthusiast competitors in this generation. If this is the best nVidia can muster (Granted, we don't have much yet, but the thing that is killing me is 6...SIX SATA ports? That's it? And I'm willing to bet, no IDE controller to boot. 6 drives. Assume all major optical drives will be SATA at this point, this gives you room for 2 optical drives and four hard drives. What about eSATA? And RAID? You can't build a reasonable RAID 6 array from this (assuming it is even a feature). *sigh* These chipset makers (I'm looking at you, DAAMIT) need to get serious about packing their chipsets - not just the bare minimum will do.




By tmok2007 on 2/8/2007 12:26:48 PM , Rating: 2
Couldn't agree with you more. What are these guys thinking? To be a highend chipset, it should have at least 10 SATA-II ports. If two are going to be used by optical drives, that will still leave us 8 for a decent RAID subsystem and a couple eSATA. Six may be good enough for mass market for now, but it is not good enough for the enthusiasts. Also, how come no one is offering IEEE 1394b? There have been add-on cards for this for years. Apple has it. There are also several external drives (Maxtor One Touch III 1TB and WD My Book Pro) that can benefit from this interface. I'd expect it to be built into the motherboards already. Just because Microsoft doesn't support it natively doesn't mean that the chipset manufacturers shouldn't. Come on guys. I don't need 10 USB ports. Give me the 10 SATA and 1394b, and I can live happily with 8 USB. Finally, I hope nVidia will do a better job QA'ing their stuff next time. Their 680i chipset didn't leave us with a good first impression. A lot of people are still gun shy about it, cause you just don't know whether it will work or not.


By ricera10 on 2/8/2007 2:33:14 PM , Rating: 2
From the article:

quote:
As with all NVIDIA chipset architectures, expect MCP72 to spawn SLI and Ultra variants. There’s also the possibility of MCP72-based integrated graphics offerings too.


Those six sata ports are probably for the base chipset. It's probably assumed they'll add more for the ultra and SLI variants.


By Dactyl on 2/8/2007 5:21:19 PM , Rating: 2
I get the impression this is their value line chipset (small, cool, good enough for 99% of non-gamer PC users)

They may have a two-chip solution for their high-end motherboards, but I don't see any reason why the MCP72 would be one of those chips.


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