Nvidia is grabbing all the attention at the moment. After confusing us by making the GeForce 9800 GTX the same chip as the GeForce 8800 GTS, and the GeForce 9600 GT a cut-down version of it too, Nvidia has put off their successor until nearly the end of 2008. According to the rumours, the company's next-generation chip is ready to go right now, but there is simply no need for it at the moment.

The long reign of the GeForce 8000

The graphics business hasn't been quite as one-sided as the processor business over the last couple of years. But Nvidia has mostly had the upper hand since it launched the GeForce 8000 series. ATI's Radeon HD 2900 XT could not take the top performance slot, even if it did represent decent value.

For the next month or so, ATI does have the fastest card in many benchmarks, the Radeon HD 3870 X2. But it only just beats Nvidia's GeForce 8800 GTS (the 512MB version, just in case you're confused...), which is significantly cheaper. So the soon-to-be-released GeForce 9800 GTX and GX2 should take the top slots, even if they are merely a bit faster than the GTS.

With the GeForce 8000 series arriving at the end of 2006, Nvidia has been dining out for quite some time on the same architecture - far longer than usual. Graphics chips have generally had an annual cycle in the last few years, with a refresh halfway through. But it could be close to two years before G80 and its developments are radically upgraded. The new chip is now expected in the third, or even fourth quarter of 2008.

The GT200 secret

There's considerable confusion what Nvidia's new chip is actually called. It was referred to as G100 for a bit, at least by industry commentators. Now it's being known as GT200. Nvidia itself has switched over from the Gxx nomenclature (and the NVxx before it) to yet another GPU reference system. So the GT200 also goes by D10E (desktop, 10th generation, enthusiast market).

There's still no definitive idea what G100/GT200/D10E will actually be, either, or how it will perform. Rumours fly about the web with abandon, though, and recently a VR-Zone forum post claimed Nvidia's new chip was capable of over 16,000 in 3DMark06 when running at 2,560 x 1,600. But it turned out to be a fake.