Question about videocard generations

[anthrax]

Is it true that the GF 7800 series is just an evolution of the 6800 with 8 more pipes and high clockspeeds ?

What about the ATI line?
Is the current x1800 series related to the x800 series...and was the x800 just an evolution of the 9800 series?

 

[TSS]

AFAIK, a new generation is always a "evolution" of the last one if the core stays mainly the same, and the feature set does too, just highr clocked then its not the case. but every step up is another evolution of the previous card.

though the 7000 series and the x1k series are maybe more of a evolution since core designs are more altered. especially the XT's memory controller has been completely revised. and the 7000 series are much more efficient then the 6000 series.

 

[xtknight]

Yeah, the 7800 is very very close to the 6800. It optimized shader instructions within the pipeline, bumped the clocks and pipes.

The X1800 is quite radically different from the X800, which was just 4 R300s molded together AFAIK. The X1800 introduces a completely different memory controller and SM3.0/HDR support.

 

[duragezic]

So none of the X800 cards of the past year or so (the generation after 9800/9800XT but before the newest X1800) have SM3 support? Couldn't this be a problem?

 

[LostTime77]

Correct.. The x800 line only has shader model 2.0b

 

[mwmorph]

the 6xxx was a revolution. the 7xxx series evoloved from the 6 series.
the ati 9xxx series was so good for it's time comparatively, that they just basically evolved it to the Xxxx seires. unfortunately they fell behind that seires with no ps3, lower performance per clock(it was the other way around with the fx series v.s. the 9xxx seires. the fx series had higher clocks v.s. the lower clocked 9xxx seires. when the x800 seires rolled out, they needed higher clocks for the x800s to compete with the 6800s.)
Ati is playing catchup now with a revolution in the x1800s