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Chip maker Nvidia has unveiled new GeForce GTX 970 and 980 graphics cards, and has revealed their UK prices and release date.
The GPUs are Nvidia’s first high-end products based on its latest Maxwell chip architecture, and are available now from add-in card suppliers such as ASUS, EVGA, Gainward, Galax, Gigabyte, Innovision 3D, MSI, Palit, PNY and Zotac, priced at £259 for the 970 and £429 for the 980.
The GeForce GTX 980 and 970 GPUs will also be sold by UK system builders including Scan, Overclockers, PC Specialist, CyberPower and Chillblast, as well as other system integrators across the EMEAI region.
Nvidia says the cards are ‘a major development for the PC games industry, and will set new standards as the world’s most advanced GPUs’.
The confirmation comes after weeks of rumours about the cards, including leaked prices and images.
Nvidia says its new Voxel Global Illumination (VXGI) technology enables gaming GPUs to deliver ‘real-time dynamic global illumination’ for the first time, meaning in-game scenes feel more lifelike as light interacts realistically in the game environment.
VXGI is being added to game graphics library Nvidia GameWorks, so developers can build future games with dynamic environments. It is being integrated into popular games engines like Unreal Engine 4, and will be available to developers later this year.
Other new technologies, including multi-frame sampled anti-aliasing (MFAA), dynamic super resolution (DSR, allowing games to be rendered at 4K or other high-end resolution then scaled down to the native resolution on the user’s display), VR Direct (increasing performance with virtual reality headsets) and energy-efficient design, allow the GTX 970 and 980 to render frames in the highest fidelity at higher clock speeds, claims Nvidia, and lower power consumption than any other GPU in their class.
“Maxwell has been years in the making, inspired by our gamers, and created by the best minds in 3D graphics,” said Jen-Hsun Huang, Nvidia’s co-founder and CEO.
“Its extraordinary performance, efficiency and technologies will empower developers to do their finest work and delight gamers worldwide.”
More details, specs and videos can be found on the GeForce website.
