Futuremark has today announced their new 3DMark DX11 benchmark called Sky Diver. Futuremark’s announcement of the new Sky Diver DX11 benchmark is clearly a pre-announcement ahead of Computex Taipei next week, which we’ll be covering for you from Taipei.  This makes Sky Diver the fourth benchmark as part of the 3DMark suite of benchmarks slotting in as the 2nd most strenuous test that 3DMark will offer cross-platform to PC and Mobile users ranging from smartphones all the way up to gaming desktops. Sure, it means that there’s yet another test to run, however this is a high-end test specifically designed to be able to run on gaming laptops and mid-range desktops and maybe even the ultra-highend tablet.

With the introduction of 3DMark Sky Diver, here’s how Futuremark’s 3DMark tests break down for different classes of hardware top to bottom (DX11 feature level 11 all the way down to DX11 feature level 9).

3DMark Tests:

Fire Strike, for high performance gaming PCs (DirectX 11, feature level 11)

Sky Diver, for gaming laptops and mid-range PCs (DirectX 11, feature level 11)
Cloud Gate, for notebooks and typical home PCs (DirectX 11 feature level 10)

Ice Storm, for tablets and entry level PCs (DirectX 11 feature level 9)

Futuremark will also be showing Sky Diver at Computex at multiple companies’ booths including ASUS, MSI, GIGABYTE, Galaxy, Inno3D, and G-Skill from  June 3 through June 7th. This will likely become the standard GPU benchmark for laptops where Firestrike is too strenuous and Cloudgate isn’t stressful enough. Anyone that has ever run both benchmarks would know that there is a huge gap between the two different benchmarks in terms of stress on the GPU and system as a whole, so it makes total sense that they would come out with it. We will be sure to include this test in our future benchmarks and to add it into our GPU benchmarks for middle to low end GPUs where Firestrike is may not be very useful.

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RV740 and RV790 should be considered as a trial run for TSMC’s 40nm process, currently “the most advanced manufacturing process” on Earth. Yes, it is plain bulk silicon, thus it is not High-K/SOI and this claim can be disputed. Then again, Intel always bangs the drum of numbers, and only numbers will count when the company regains the lead. When it’s following TSMC, then it is usually talk about materials such as brilliant implementation of Hafnium for High-K process.

40nm GPU will overthrow Intel and AMD as makers of most advanced chips on the market, with their respective CPUs being manufactured in 45nm. Intel will briefly recapture the crown with its 32-nm processors in Q1’2010, but Nvidia and ATI will launch 28nm chips in Q2’10. When ATI/AMD GPG moves to The Foundry Company, Nvidia will remain sole proprietor of TSMC’s most advanced lines and is set to continue GPU lead over CPU manufacturing.

Both parts are taking advantage of the fact that 40nm process gives tremendous power-saving and cost-saving (size of the die) and putting additional architectural improvements. According to Hardware-Infos, who managed to acquire sample cards through mysterious ways, RV740 should be considered as die-shrink of 55nm RV730, but the fact of the matter is that number of Shader processors doubled to 640 Processors (4600 features 320 SP). Memory controller remained at 128-bit, connecting to 512-1024MB GDDR5 memory clocked at 800-900 MHz (3.2-3.6 GT/s, “GHz”), resulting in memory bandwidth of 51.2-57.6 GB/s. Number of texture units is staying at 32, but the number of ROP units is now set at just eight, e.g. just eight pixels leave the GPU per clock.

RV790 features unknown number of Shader Processors, but given the fact that the company decided to keep the GPU clock on the same level as Radeon 4800 series (750 MHz), you could put a wager of 1200 or even more units. Currently, RV790 samples are floating around with 1GB GDDR5 memory from now-defunct Qimonda at 900-950 MHz in QDR mode (3.6-3.8 GT/s). Combining that memory with 256-bit memory controller will result in 115-122 GB/s of available bandwidth. A lot of rumors are flying around what the final specs are, but you can expect that AMD will keep the fixed-function AntiAliasing hardware that worked so greatly with Radeon 4800, offering true “free” 8xAA.

New line-up is expected to debut during Q1’2009, most probably on CeBIT – according to our sources in executive ranks, organizing a dedicated press event at troubled financial times is considered a waste of money. Still, PR department is fighting for their budgets, because at the end of the day, dedicated press event is believe it or not, the cheapest way of getting the message through, putting all execs together at one spot and achieving the maximum effect.

We’ll see, but one thing is for certain. ATI wants the crown back from Nvidia, and the company isn’t going to remain silent.

UPDATED February 1st, 2009, 00:24AM CET – According to a story on Planet 3DNow, AMD GPG decided to brand their 40nm chips as Radeon 5000 series. Apparently, the company changed its mind when it comes to marking their products. Originally, ATI’s products went up as they would implement newer versions of DirectX, but that is now changed and tied to manufacturing process and the architecture itself. I wish to thank Sysfried for this link.

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Dual-die GPU is a good idea, but can TSMC pack the chips like Intel can?

It will be interesting to see can TSMC pack two RV870s on the same substrate, or that idea will go the way of do-do birds. We’ll see.
Oh yeah, cooling will be vapor chamber, and we should see some really interesting cooling designs. AMD already got its feet wet with vapor-chamber technology (both 4870X2 and Sapphire’s Atomic 3870 and 4870 come with vapor chamber cooling).
According to the story, the codename for the 5800 board is Lil’ Dragon. However, claim about DX11 being ready in summer of 2009 is something that I would take with a big grain of salt. During PDC’08, held last week in LA, there were talk that Microsoft will even send Windows 7 to manufacturing without DirectX 11, putting 10.1 until DirectX 11 shows up at later date. My sources compared the situation for 2009 equal to the one in 2002, when ATI shipped DirectX 9 part five months before DX9 came out.
As it stands right now, both Nvidia and ATI will have their DX11 parts ahead of actual API, giving developers enough time to optimize their respective drivers. Let’s hope for the best.

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Just like during PDC 2008 conference, Microsoft will be giving away pre-beta build of Windows 7. What makes this conference announcement important is the following tagline:

WinHEC is the only chance for you to engage with the team at this level – there is not another WinHEC planned before Windows 7 is released.

This statement confirms that Microsoft is dead-set on releasing Windows 7 before November 2009, and contacting moles at Microsoft was a given. Sadly, I wasn’t able to get a hold of my otherwise down-right reliable moles within Windows group, but one mole surfaced at Redmond campus and told me that product planning meetings are constantly taking place at accelerated pace when compared to the 2006 and 2007. The source contributed this to Ray Ozzie and the way how the team reshuffled. This mole was filled with praise for Ray, citing his eternal dedication and enthusiasm. People are highly motivated and want to send the message that Microsoft is not “dead in the water”, but “show who’s the boss”. But guys, without compelling experience, forget it.

What makes the matters interesting are things learned from development of Vista – it seems that Microsoft gave too much to the Hollywood mob, MPAAfia and others, and the “cost of hardware passed to the consumer” was never compensated. DRM mechanisms included things such as 5 read/write checks whenever video overlay is included (as well as specific game scenes – cut scenes, for example), which killed the performance of already limited integrated graphics.

When it comes to the release date, Long Zheng caught the message first. However, we might have conflicting sources, since my source is much more optimistic when it comes to release dates. His ninjas are talking about Windows 7 in Q4’09, but my mole claims that the target is – shipping a quarter earlier!

We should see a launch of official beta in Q1’09, followed by first public beta (B2) in Q2 and RTM version in time for Back-to-School shopping spree in 2009. If all things fall into place, of course. If they fall into place, Windows 7 are August go-go. If not, shipping in October is a must in order to get into systems for Black Friday/Cyber Monday (Thanksgiving) and Christmas shopping sprees.

Given the DirectX 11 hardware that both ATI and Nvidia are preparing for end of Q2’09, you don’t need to be a wizard to understand that big things will happen in 2009.

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