I'm wondering if the secrecy even helps them. All the people considering going 970 or 980 might hold off if AMD gave some promising info. By that logic, them not doing so might mean they have nothing good to show. It does not hurt to have some positive leaks/PR.
I don't know but this looks a bit too 'semi-pro' for a random person online to do. This could have been an intentional AMD leak right there:
^ Most GPU observers would never be able to come up with "up to 8GB of HBM". Most of our forum missed the dual-link inter-poser scenario despite it being linked for months. So for someone to know that the card will have up to 8GB of HBM already tells us whoever made this slide knew more than 99% of PC enthusiasts.
^ This slide just builds on the first slide. There is way too much technical data here for the casual PC enthusiasts. The slide shows maximum and minimum operating HBM voltages and for the first time from any leak ever shows a picture of
dual-link interposing with TSV. The slide even goes further and says HBM 2.0 will eliminate the need for dual-link interposers. Do you know how hard it is to "fake" this type of knowledge? Does this look like something someone from a forum could put together? I am doubting that.
^ In this slide. Point #3. That shows an high depth of technical knowledge of GPU specs to specify Tier 3 of DX12. A 'casual' PC enthusiast would never be able to fake that or even think of putting something like that into the slide. He would just write something generic like "Full DX12 support." But NO, the slide specified not just Full DX12 support, but Tier 3 support. Also, Point #4 is an odd one for someone faking slides on a new AMD card. Most of us care about gaming performance and with Oculus delayed to 2016 and beyond, full VR immersion is the last thing on our minds for R9 300 series. This looks like more of a selling point for a GPU company than some random person trying to hype up an unreleased GPU.
and what is nvidia going to do at this point? Odds are they are done with maxwell high end after the 980ti.
Who knows. NV's GM200 can overclock to 1.4Ghz on air but ships with 1.075Ghz clocks. That means NV could release a 1.2Ghz 980Ti and then in 6 months a 1.35Ghz 980Ti Ultra Extreme.
So secretive to the point that we don't even know when they will launch. That just seems ridiculous. Holding information for the sake of holding it.
Could be good like Apple. Could be bad like Bulldozer.
If its to sell older cards out... not happening unless they promote those. They'll just keep losing potential sales to nvidia.
Sounds like R9 300 series isn't ready yet. I think if they were ready, AMD would have launched them already. At this point then, it makes sense just to keep your mouth shot and keep the competitor guessing and then if the product is actually good launch the entire mobile and desktop discrete line-up at insane price/performance values similar to what AMD did with HD4870, 5870 generations. With 980 at $550 and Titan X at $1000, AMD can make a huge impact. However, I have a feeling NV will try to spoil R9 390's launch with GM200 in May.
Well.. we are talking about a product based on a potentially new but unproven 20nm technology for GPUs
Highly unlikely.
most likely a new architecture.
By all indications, it's an evolution of GCN, not a new micro-architecture. AMD does GPU design differently from NV. They reuse the underlying architecture for many generations but instead upgrade the building blocks around it. HD2900->HD6900 were basically a similar underlying VLIW architecture. That's 5 consecutive generations on the same architecture that kept evolving. R9 300 series would only be a 3rd generation, which is way too early for AMD to switch the underlying architecture based on their GPU design methods.
I'm curious to see the market reaction to these 300 series. Lauching ahead of Nvidia keep AMD with the 35-40% market along the years and now they are probably at 20%.
My bet is that AMD will not go back to 30% anymore unless nvidia is late again like was with Fermi.
If AMD's almost entire focus was desktop cards with R9 300 series, they will be lucky to maintain 25% by the time Pascal launches. All we've heard thus far are rumours on desktop R9 300 series cards. Forums such as ours are very desktop GPU biased but most of the market is made up of laptop GPUs. NV probably has 90%+ market share in there!