Radeon HD 6870 has 1120 shaders

We realized that we have never mentioned the shader number of the Barts XT part and the number of Shaders is 1120. These shaders are arch 5D and the Radeon HD 6850 also has arch 5D shaders. In AMD’s case they run at the same clock as the GPU, which is 900MHz for the faster card and they can bring quite a lot of performance.

Our first reports indicate that you can expect a 15 to 20 percent better score than a default clocked Geforce GTX 460 and this is the card that AMD targets with Radeon HD 6870. The overclocked Geforce GXT 460 should stand a much better chance but it will probably come much closer to Radeon HD 6870 price. Compared to Radeon HD 5850, the new Radeon HD 6870 is some 5 percent faster, but as you can expect it ends up losing from HD 5870. We do believe that AMD plans to phase out Radeon HD 5800 boards shortly after it launches the first Radeon HD 6000 series products, as it doesn’t want to compete with its own parts.

As for the retail market, HD 6870 will definitely outsell 5870 as end users usually buy bigger numbers.

Nvidia launches yet another budget Fermi-based GPU – GeForce GT 440

Nvidia has announced yet another Fermi-based GPU which targets an even lower price segment than the GTS 450, called the GT 440. Based on the same GF106 core as the GTS 450, the GT 440 is aimed at casual/budget gamers. For now, the product is available only to OEMs for desktops, but is expected to be priced at less than $100 while delivering Nvidia PhysX, CUDA, and 3D Vision technologies.
Check out the specifications below:
192-bit memory controller (bus)
144 stream processors (CUDA cores) @ 1189MHz
i) 1.5GB GDDR3 @ 1600MHz memory clock
ii) 3GB GDDR3 @ 1800MHz memory clock
594MHz core clock
DirectX 11 compliant
DVI, D-Sub, HDMI output
56W TDP
SLI support

While the card does seems marginally underpowered, it might just deliver on Nvidia’s new trend of providing value for money graphics processing that it started with the overclock-happy Nvidia GTX 460. The speedy memory clock is certainly impressive and unconventional. Nvidia gushed about the GT 440’s bang for your buck, and was quick to point out its efficacy at such memory-intensive strategy games as Sid Meier’s latest – Civilization V:
“Nvidia GeForce GT 440 delivers unparalleled game realism with incredibly detailed characters, terrain, and game environments on hot titles like Civilization V