In the lead-up to Computex Taipei this year, one of the hottest discussion topics has been trying to guess what graphics market leader NVIDIA has in store for PC gamers at the show. This is not simply idle media speculation about what used to be a niche market but an important question for a gaming industry that has found itself all grown up and now affects millions of users. With about 360 million active PC core gamers worldwide, the gaming market has become just as much part of pop culture as movies and music. Gamers are everywhere.
In terms of revenues, gaming represented about US$64 billion in household spending in 2014. In comparison, worldwide box office totals were US$40 billion and global music revenues were about US$20 billion. PC gaming represents about a 40% chunk of the gaming market and is on track to reach US$29 billion in software revenues in 2015.
And perhaps no other company has a greater influence on PC gaming than NVIDIA. Because while it may be the developers who see to it that the market has great and fun games, players still want to be amazed, so production value matters a great deal. NVIDIA is the place the market turns to when it comes to enabling those special effects.
GTX 980 Ti is on the Computex agenda!
NVIDIA understands its role in the market and that ultimately it all comes down to delivering more horsepower, because more horsepower means more special effects. According to Tom Petersen, Distinguished Engineer at NVIDIA, the company is constantly pushing the limits of its technology in order to release even better GPUs. Last year, NVIDIA announced Maxwell, its latest generation GPU architecture that delivers unmatched performance, twice the energy efficiency of the previous generation, and major new graphics capabilities including the latest DirectX 12 (DX12) advancements. Maxwell also increased GPUs efficiency in terms of performance per watt by a factor of two.
The first Maxwell GPUs, the GeForce GTX 980 and GTX 970, were followed up earlier this year with the release of the NVIDIA TITAN X, giving the company claim to the fastest GPU in the market. TITAN X, based on Maxwell and the new GM200 graphics processor, boasted a 50% increase in CUDA cores, memory bandwidth and render output units (or ROPs) and doubled the performance and power efficiency of its predecessor by combining 3,072 processing cores for 7 teraflops of peak single-precision performance with 12GB of onboard memory.
Now with Computex set to begin, there has been strong anticipation and excitement for the event, as it will serve as the launching pad for the GTX980 Ti graphics card, a more mainstream version of the GM200 solution, and also based on Maxwell architecture.
Demand for Maxwell has been strong, with NVIDIA reporting that its first quarter gaming revenues were up 25% year over year. Moving into the second half of the year the gaming market is expected to see multiple growth drivers beyond new and exciting game titles that will help continue to drive PC gaming demand and that is why the market was hoping the GTX980 Ti would be available as early as possible. Pricing for 4K monitors has been dropping and products are becoming much more affordable, with the related monitors requiring enhanced graphics performance to deliver the full 4k experience. Windows 10 with DirectX 12 is also launching in the second half of the year. And virtual reality (VR) is set to hit the market. With the launch of GTX980 Ti, gamers will be able to take full advantage of the latest market developments in the second half of the year.
Virtual reality is becoming real
There is a lot of enthusiasm in the industry for VR, with NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang recently noting that this is not surprising considering that anybody who has tried VR is generally blown away by it. While VR is expected to launch later this year on multiple platforms, users will require 90 frames per second in stereo to fully appreciate the experience. Few graphics cards on the market can deliver the full VR experience, so demand for the GTX 980 Ti is also expected to be strong in this area.
Understanding that VR is the future of gaming, NVIDIA has invested quite heavily to make sure virtual reality delivers a great experience. NVIDIA's GameWorks VR SDK incorporates a number of new features to increase performance, lower latency and increase compatibility for VR headsets. For example, VR SLI tunes the way multiple GPUs work together when they're paired to drive virtual reality experiences; context priority helps cut discontinuities between head movement and action on screen; and Multi-res Scaling (MRS) is an innovative new rendering technique to accelerate performance in VR games. Commenting on the VR headset market, Petersen pointed out that based on NVIDIA's focus on enabling the technology, it is not surprising that leading players in the VR space - companies such as Oculus, Valve and Epic - are all partnering with NVIDIA.
G-SYNC goes mobile at Computex
Petersen is quick to point out though that VR is only one market segment for gaming and that the goal of NVIDIA is to enable as many different exciting use cases, on as many different platforms as possible.
This is why the popular G-SYNC technology from NVIDIA will be taking a front seat at Computex as well, with NVIDIA announcing that it is extending the technology to notebooks. The issue that G-SYNC resolves is that while monitors refresh at fixed rates, graphics cards render images at frame rates that will vary dramatically, even within a single scene of a single game. G-SYNC synchronizes the display refresh rates to the graphics card (GPU), eliminating screen tearing and minimizes display stutter and input lag to deliver what Petersen call a silky smooth gaming experience and enabling completely immersive game play, one where every frame matters.
The technology has been extremely popular with gamers using desktop monitors but with the introduction of the Maxwell-based GeForce GTX 970M and GeForce GTX 980M notebook GPUs late last year, an increasing number of gamers are now using notebooks, as the performance delivered is about 80% of the desktop equivalent and resolution support is well beyond 1080p. Moreover, with features like Maxwell's Dynamic Super Resolution (DSR) technology, games can be rendered at 4K and then scaled down to the native resolution on the notebook's display. The results are an image that is much higher quality than one rendering directly to 1080p. With so many games choosing to go mobile, it will follow that NVIDIA extend G-SYNC to notebooks. NVIDIA and its partners will all be highlighting the latest G-SYNC monitors and notebooks at Computex this year, bringing added excitement to the event.
SHIELD: Bringing NVIDIA into the living room
While enjoying video content used to be the sole realm of the living room TV, the viewing experience has slowly but steadily been redefined, with smartphones and tablets increasingly being used to watch video content from services like Netflix, YouTube and Twitch. However, nothing can replace the TV when it comes to comfort and enjoyment in the relaxing atmosphere of the home living room.
Now with the recent launch of the NVIDIA SHIELD, home users will not only be able to access this video content from the comfort of their living rooms, they will also be able to use the TV to take advantage and enjoy all the same music, apps and amazing games that they access on their other Android devices.
NVIDIA SHIELD is the world's first Android TV console, and it was designed to give users control of their digital entertainment at home. Video and television content can be watched at 4k or HD by using services and apps such as Netflix 4K Ultra HD, Sling TV, Google's Live Channels, as well as by using TV apps from major broadcasters such as HBO, CBS Sports, Fox News and more.
Moreover, NVIDIA SHIELD transforms the user experience from just watching TV to playing TV, as the platform makes a new class of Android games possible. There are over 200 games on Android TV, and almost 20 titles are coming only to SHIELD.
More than 50 titles have already been optimized for SHIELD and NVIDIA has stated that various AAA titles, including console games, can be streamed using the GRID on-demand game-streaming service. This NVIDIA 1080p worldwide GRID game-streaming service was recently launched, making some great new games from AAA games, remastered classics, family games and indie hits only available on the NVIDIA SHIELD Android TV.
NVIDIA SHIELD Android TV is powered by the NVIDIA Tegra X1 processor with a 256-core Maxwell GPU and 3GB RAM, with video support being 4K Ultra-HD Ready with 4K playback and capture up to 60 fps (VP9, H265, H264).
Conclusion
Living up to the hype and anticipation of the market leading up to Computex, NVIDIA promises to deliver on all fronts when it comes to gaming at this year's Computex show, from PC gaming to mobile gaming to taking the gaming experience into the living room. The variety of offerings and wide range of support was explained by Petersen, who noted that when it comes to gaming, everything NVIDIA does leads back to enabling as many different exciting use cases on as many different platforms as possible.
No wonder the company continues to drive the increasingly large gaming market forward.
NVIDIA G-SYNC powered notebook will eliminate tearing and screen stuttering on gaming notebooks
NVIDIA GTX 980 Ti GPU brings impressive and vivid visual experience to gamers with Maxwell architecture and unmatched performance