Sub-$100 Nvidia GeForce 8400 Coming this month

According to the company's partners, Nvidia plans to launch a cheap version of its GeForce 8-series graphics card, the GeForce 8400, on June 19. Sources interviewed here at the Computex show said that the card will be available in two versions, one with 256-Mbytes of frame buffer memory, and the other with 128-Mbytes. The memory interface will also be cut down as well, to just a 64-Mbyte memory channel. 

The move could help Nvidia further in the discrete desktop graphics market, which it currently controls. According to Jon Peddie Research, Nvidia's market share in discrete desktop GPUs climbed 5.5 percent to 59.3 percent in the first quarter. Nvidia's partners say that AMD's ATI graphics division will have to cut prices to gain back share, a tactic that the GeForce 8400 could cut off at the pass.

The hook, however, will be the price: less than $100, which will bring a cheap form of DirectX 10 compatibility to the masses, the partners said.

While the exact price was not available, the two models will probably be priced at $79.99 on the high end. Reports have indicated that the cheaper card will be sold for about $50; however, Nvidia's partners did not confirm that information. Nvidia's GeForce 8500XT with 256 Mbytes of frame buffer RAM is priced at $99, although one company, XFX, is offering a $10 rebate on Amazon, which has pushed the price down to $89.


Features of the card were not available, although sources said their information indicated that the cards would be clocked at 450 MHz with a 400-MHz memory clock. HDCP support should be included, although the cards will probably lack HDMI as a cost-saving feature, they said. It was not known whether the cards will be SLI-enabled.