At least a smiley, maybe. There are actually a lot of people who believe that simply because it's a smaller process that it's automatically cheaper to manufacture. Good to see you aren't one of them. :thumbsup:
I didn't think I would need sarcasm tags, but it looks like some people still need them.
I'd like to see Asus or MSI come out with there own cooling on launch day, but if not I will order whatever is out on the 12th (pay day), if they are available. If they are hard to get, it will be easier to wait and see how the 7950 performs, or if it can be unlocked to a full blown 7970.
Asus will be 3 slot cooling if it does and i sure as heck don't want that
Over at Overclock. Let me find the link
http://www.overclock.net/t/1192539/fud-amd-hd-7950-wont-show-up-on-january-9th
Speculation is that amd doesn't want to make the same mistake it did with the 6950
I consider myself a hardcore gamer but not an "enthusiast" level gamer that this thing is targeted too. I'll wait for Pitcairn reviews, specifically the 7870.
If I were Nvidia I would drop the 580s to 300. Not like theyre going to get sold anyway and just collecting dust. Sell 300 of them is a bigger profit than selling 50 or so at the current price
$300 right now would not only be too low relative to the card's performance, it would also be way too low a profit margin, if any at all. Let's say the 7970 sells at ~$575. Considering the stock performance and OC margin, the 7970 has a quite good performance boost on the 580, but it's definitely not requiring the 580 to be dropped to 300$. Something like $450 actual selling price would be more than enough for it to be good value.
I'd say it depends what the production cost is. Surely at some point you've got to sell the damn things, but the best is to maximize profit without even having a stock of hard seller cards that are impossible to sell without losing money on each unit. If they don't drop the price right now, that could happen at some point. If, on the other hand, they slowly drop the price so that it's always at least a decent value, then they keep selling cards and don't end up ever with a huge stack of cards that are impossible to sell.
$300 right now would not only be too low relative to the card's performance, it would also be way too low a profit margin, if any at all. Let's say the 7970 sells at ~$575. Considering the stock performance and OC margin, the 7970 has a quite good performance boost on the 580, but it's definitely not requiring the 580 to be dropped to 300$. Something like $450 actual selling price would be more than enough for it to be good value.
Sure they cannot be left with unsold 580s that are impossible to sell without a loss. I just don't see why they would have to drop the price in one go, though. That's just not necessary, even considering AMD has new cards to fill the gaps.
The 7950 is really the card we're talking about here, because it's the one most likely to equate 580 performance. The 580 is a bad sell at $500 compared to the 7970. That means that if the 7950 performs just like the 580, AMD aren't going to release the card at $500, that simply wouldn't work. Say they'd release the 7950 at $450 then. There's no reason why Nvidia would drop the price further than $450 then, if it performs the same as the 7950. Even if the 7950 is a bit better than the 580, Nvidia can cut the price by a further 10/20 or 30 bucks no problem. There's no danger of undermining their own cards either, as the 570 is much lower, below $400.
Then what happens is that the 7870 becomes the joker (let's ignore the 7890 for now as I don't believe there's even a rumoured date for it). Depending on how it performs compared to both the 580 and 570, it could undermine them a lot. At rumoured pricing of $300, there's a lot of potential for it to be a much better value. Then again, the cards currently priced around that point also are much better value already.