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Next generation iMac
- Thread starter Serban
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Nothing says things won't change, but with today's roadmap in hand, the 1000 series isn't due before sometime in 2016 - that and the 900 series just started rolling out, the line-up is a messy mix of Kepler and Maxwell chips going from the 700M to the 800M series with some 900M tossed in for good measure.
If you consider that Apple change GPU brand every 2 refresh it means we will likely have a M390X and M395X as next graphis options and then in 2017 Nvidia back again.
680mx was back in 2012
780m was back in 2013
880M was in 2014
980M in late 2014
so...every single year Nvidia released a gpu, so why 2015 should be left alone ?
It will be a rebranding for sure, too much distance from competition in the mobile cards
I also consider this a plausible scenario. All Macs introduced in 2014 have AMD or integrated graphics only. I would be surprised if they switched back to Nvidia so soon.
I also wonder if they will start to phase out the non-retina machines:
- phase out the 27'' non-retina
- introduce 21'' retina
- keep 21'' non-retina for education
880/980M would have been nice, but the only new iMac with a dGPU that came out in 2014 was the Retina model; that is, if the next iMacs use Nvidia GPUs. There's also AMD's upcoming M3xx GPUs possible.
1000M series isn't due until 2016.
In 2015 Nvidia must and will unveil new GPU, so if not 1000M series then what?
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Their next lineup is Pascal, which I recall is 2016. Maxwell is this year plus the anticipated shrink to 20nm would be fine to round the year out without anything "new" per say. Their roadmap is pretty clear.
Look at these instead of model numbers: GM200, Volta/Pascal, Fiji, Bermuda, Tonga.
The 900 series isn't fully out yet (there are only 3 chips in the line-up), the 980M is the current flagship chip but nothing says they won't come out with better Maxwell-based champions in 2015 - like a 990M or 995M or whatever.
Well the market demands a new model every year, Serban is right here. Nvidia put out three cards with essentially the same Chip (but higher clock rates), namely the 680MX, 780M and 880M.
The 980M is genuinely new, but still Nvidia might fell the need to have an updated model for fall 2015, X80M or 1080M or whatever they will call it. Will be based on the same chip most likely, but with higher clocks. Maybe also more vRAM?
There is still plenty of Maxwell to go before the end of this year. Supposedly two new chips but that's based on rumors.
As I mentioned before, a die shrink would be new enough to coast through this generation from both Nvidia and AMD. You can't expect a new architecture each and every year, especially when Nvidia has a roadmap that outlines what 2015 is bringing: basically only Maxwell. Maybe Volta and stacked DRAM as the year progresses, but likely not making it to anything but their high-end offerings initially.
Kepler was the architecture for some time so until they had something new, rebranding was just about they could do to keep up with the dim market mentality of new-new-new regardless of actual merit. Arbitrarily changing model numbers each year regardless of actual product line essentially perpetuate the renaming scheme.
The 1000-series is reserved for Pascal 2016.
As I mentioned before, a die shrink would be new enough to coast through this generation from both Nvidia and AMD. You can't expect a new architecture each and every year, especially when Nvidia has a roadmap that outlines what 2015 is bringing: basically only Maxwell. Maybe Volta and stacked DRAM as the year progresses, but likely not making it to anything but their high-end offerings initially.
Kepler was the architecture for some time so until they had something new, rebranding was just about they could do to keep up with the dim market mentality of new-new-new regardless of actual merit. Arbitrarily changing model numbers each year regardless of actual product line essentially perpetuate the renaming scheme.
The 1000-series is reserved for Pascal 2016.