Power consumption of up-to-date graphics cards have risen from around 60W to about 160W in the last three years and it is highly likely that this trend will continue. Even though PCI Express 2.0 is set to overcome the current power consumption limits, PCI special interest group (PCI SIG) is working on a standard for add-on cards that fit into current platforms, but consume up to 300W.

PCI SIG recently announced that it was working on electromechanical specification of PCI Express add-on cards that addresses graphics power and thermals greater than those supported by PCI Express CEM 1.1 and PCI Express 150W 1.0. Its purpose is to provide additional capabilities for PCI Express graphics within the existing framework of an evolutionary strategy that is based on existing motherboard form factors.

Currently both ATI Radeon HD 2900 XT and Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX/Ultra fit into present PCI Express 1.1/1.0a specification. As is known, according to PCI Express 1.0a standards, a device that consumes maximum of 150W should consume maximum 75W from the mainboard's slot and maximum 75W from power supply unit's PCI Express connector. The GeForce 8800 GTX/Ultra has power consumption of about 130W and while it devours more than 80W of power from power supply unit (PSU), it uses two connectors, which means that there should be no problems. The Radeon HD 2900 XT consumes approximately 160W and uses one 6-pin and one 8-pin connectors while sucking up to approximately 110W from a PSU, according to measurements by X-bit labs. However, exact specifications for graphics cards that consume more than 150W and more than 75W from PCI Express connector are not defined.

The new PCI Express 225W/300W graphics card electromechanical specification is primarily designed to deliver additional electrical power to a PCI Express graphics add-in card and provide increased card volume for the management of thermals, according to a statement by PCI SIG.

The 30-day member review for the version 0.5 draft specification ends on Wednesday, June 6, 2007.


http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/video/display...0522115634.html

Damn... why nowadays gfx cards consume more & more power as their performance increase???

... unlike CPUs which performance increase amidst wif still some drop in power consumption???

Dun NVIDIA & ATI understand 2 go green amidst now d world faces power & pollution crisis??? Dun they giv a damn of d environment???!!!

Dun diz guys strive 4 better 'performance per Watt' rather > pure performance?

<sigh>

Nonsense wei, I dont wanna get a 1000W psu in a years time!!!

lolx... scared adi... need 1kw psu...

wah that time the mother board need how many pin socket..............

why they cant make more efficient GPU ar ?? CPU and rams is getting less and less power hungry but GPU getting more and more

Future graphic card looks like this? Water cooling system is required?

As the manufacturing process becomes smaller and smaller... more energy is lost in terms of heat because the copper wires cannot conduct enough electricity due to them being so thin.

So to overcome the scale at which the card is manufactured at, more power is needed thus causing the GPU to require more watts. This is why you have a lot of energy loss as the scale becomes smaller and smaller.


EDIT: this is my explanation for the increased consumption. Very basic explanation, it does have some holes in it so take with a pinch of salt.

This post has been edited by Aoshi_88: May 24 2007, 11:44 AM

Only the low level local interconnect scales with the process. The higher level interconnect generally does not shrink with a process shrink.

There are many reasons, one of them is that power density is still increasing with process shrinks. You get ~30% less power per transistor but you can fit ~2x the number of transistors in the same area. And these chips keep getting bigger too.

kind of scarry when u think about the graphic card will eat all your psu power

This post has been edited by stone13: May 24 2007, 12:00 PM

logic..high performance=high power consumptions..
same as vehicle..high cc=high fuel usage.
for my thinking ler..

i think later on 1KW PSU is a must is power consumption keeps increasing like this

hmmm..agree with u bro..mati laaa..

which means in the future all laptops are not competent of highend 3d games anymore

which laptop compatible of high end 3d games available in malaysia anyway...

i think hmm just get what you need and dont fall for consumerism. It doesnt benefit us but it benefits the marketeers. When your need only requires a 256ddr2 gpu, dont fall for consumerism by getting a 8800gts or whatever. well, if you think about it, the lesser you buy highly priced items, the time will play a good game with the suppliers and the supply demand method will definitely reduce the card prices down. But honestly, who needs such power consumption, when people can barely earn enough to pay their monthly electrical bills?

My two cents worth.

DELL is already having a 8600 Go laptop
But the heat generated is unimaginable.

i hope graphic card can make as external device...........

cannot imagine why the manufacturers dont come u with a green card.. if we all make noise and not buy then they will have no choice,,right?

They should bring the graphic technology towards environmental friendly!!!