The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.

    Does future Macs come with nVidia VGA cards ?

    Discussion in 'Apple and Mac OS X' started by bigspin, Jun 21, 2008.

  1. bigspin

    bigspin My Kind Of Place

    Reputations:
    632
    Messages:
    3,952
    Likes Received:
    566
    Trophy Points:
    181
    Apple insider hint future mac VGA cards will be nVidia based. See the quoted news & bold line.Looks like no place to the ATI Red Ruby ? :confused:
    Can you guess the future MBP VGA card :D

    Here's the news & hint point
     
    bigspin, Jun 21, 2008
    #1
  2. ValkyrieLenneth

    ValkyrieLenneth Notebook Evangelist

    Reputations:
    38
    Messages:
    301
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    May be 9500M-GT ? or 9600M-GT :)) Who knows anyway :D
     
    ValkyrieLenneth, Jun 21, 2008
    #2
  3. thepreacha619

    thepreacha619 Notebook Evangelist

    Reputations:
    13
    Messages:
    470
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    we'll know in july (hopefully.)
     
    thepreacha619, Jun 21, 2008
    #3
  4. Nirvana

    Nirvana Notebook Prophet

    Reputations:
    2,200
    Messages:
    5,426
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    0
    maybe not next gen. of mbp, but def. will in the future.
     
    Nirvana, Jun 21, 2008
    #4
  5. masterchef341

    masterchef341 The guy from The Notebook

    Reputations:
    3,047
    Messages:
    8,636
    Likes Received:
    4
    Trophy Points:
    206
    even the current mbp uses nvidia graphics... sort of expect them to stick with it, especially with their investment in cuda.
     
    masterchef341, Jun 21, 2008
    #5
  6. talin

    talin Notebook Prophet

    Reputations:
    4,694
    Messages:
    5,343
    Likes Received:
    2
    Trophy Points:
    205
    Only Apple knows, but like many others, I'm anxiously waiting to find out what's next in the mac line. :)
     
    talin, Jun 21, 2008
    #6
  7. bigspin

    bigspin My Kind Of Place

    Reputations:
    632
    Messages:
    3,952
    Likes Received:
    566
    Trophy Points:
    181
    Same here....I want 9700GTS or 9800GTS with 17" MBP
     
    bigspin, Jun 21, 2008
    #7
  8. ltcommander_data

    ltcommander_data Notebook Deity

    Reputations:
    408
    Messages:
    1,398
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    55
    The chances that Apple will being using nVidia GPUs exclusively is very low. First, because of the pure economics of it, where it is in Apple's favour to have nVidia and ATI fight for contracts to offer the best products at the best price. Unless nVidia has managed to guarantee Apple insider access to new GPUs and low prices like Intel has done, which seems unlikely seeing nVidia's strategy revolves around board partners who would be angered, Apple wouldn't make any sort of exclusive deal with them.

    Furthermore, if the thrust of the nVidia exclusive argument is Snow Leopard's support for GPGPUs, then that completely doesn't make sense, since Snow Leopard's GPGPU support relies not on nVidia GPUs and CUDA but on OpenCL. The whole point of Apple proposing OpenCL is to be open source and GPU agnostic, rather than being locked into the machinations of nVidia and ATI with their proprietary CUDA and CTM/CAL/Brooke+ (our whatever ATI is calling it these days).

    EDIT: And in terms of the next MBP GPU, there's no way to tell of course, but I wouldn't be surprised if Apple went with an ATI one. ATI were saying before how they've landed a massive amount of design wins for the next GPU family compared to the previous 2xxx series so that increases the liklihood. I believe ATI GPUs have better integration of Blu-ray support since they have built-in sound chips allowing sound to be output through a standard DVI port and with desktop GPUs including a DVI to HDMI convertor. Seems a simpler choice if Apple is finally moving to support Blu-ray. Finally, ATI's next GPU family looks to be produced on a 55nm process which would presumably make them cooler and cheaper than nVidia's next GPUs which are mostly 65nm, which may explain the number of design wins.
     
    ltcommander_data, Jun 22, 2008
    #8
  9. masterchef341

    masterchef341 The guy from The Notebook

    Reputations:
    3,047
    Messages:
    8,636
    Likes Received:
    4
    Trophy Points:
    206
    you might have a point about how opencl is an open standard... i thought it relied on CUDA tech, but maybe i was just looking at a CUDA for mac thing.

    anyway, cuda is available for several operating systems at this point in beta form. its pretty amazing. i don't know about ati's equivalent at this point.

    i would say its a 50/50 toss up between ati and nvidia if opencl is an open standard, i didn't realize that.

    however, ATI streaming audio through the DVI port just isn't practical. it's not nearly enough of a reason for apple to choose ati over nvidia. no. apple is most likely just going to slap on a legitimate hdmi port that is designed to carry audio in the first place.
     
    masterchef341, Jun 22, 2008
    #9