Nvidia initial batch of GeForce GTX 400 series to have fewer cores than expected

Digitimes is always a wealth of information and collecting pot of industry rumors, and truth.

Nvidia's initial batch of GeForce GTX 480/470-based graphics cards will have fewer cores than the originally expected 512 due to low 40nm yield at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), according to sources from graphics card makers.

Since TSMC's 40nm yield currently is still lower than 50%, Nvidia will block some of the graphics cores with problems on the card. As a result, the GeForce GTX 480 will only have 480 cores and GTX 470 only 448, the sources noted.

I wouldn't rule out that something other than "yield" is afoot here since there could be a variety of factors involved.  The truth of the matter is we may never know.  This new GPU is very complex and should be one of the fastest GPUs on the planet when its finally released.

Bottom line, I'm not sure it's worth stressing over 32 cores. 

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