NVIDIA teases 'Ultimate Countdown' for Ampere GeForce RTX 30 series

NVIDIA has officially kicked off the marketing hype train for its next-gen Ampere-based GeForce RTX 30 series graphics cards with a simple teaser on Twitter.

All the tweet says is #UltimateCountdown which has got me personally thinking that NVIDIA could change the nomenclature like I've wanted for the new GeForce RTX graphics cards -- I wanted the GeForce RTX 3090 ULTRA, for the return of ULTRA -- but maybe we're looking at the GeForce RTX 3090 ULTIMATE?

ULTIMATE is an important branding for NVIDIA right now, and I'm sure even more so going forward -- they have their G-SYNC ULTIMATE monitors and TVs, so it makes sense to have the "Ultimate Countdown" being a countdown to something Ultimate-related, right?

It seems NVIDIA is going to celebrate the 21st anniversary of the GeForce 256 graphics card -- the world's first GPU, and world's first GeForce card -- in a really, really big way.

Or this is the Ultimate Countdown?

NVIDIA, please... please hire Will Arnett for your GeForce RTX 30 series marketing campaign.

More reading:

• Traversal coprocessor: We have had more leaks on NVIDIA's next-gen GeForce RTX 3000 series than any family of graphics cards before it, with an interesting "traversal coprocessor" on the new GeForce RTX 3080 and GeForce RTX 3090 graphics cards. You can read more on that here.
• NVCache: Ampere is meant to have something called NVCache, which would be NVIDIA's own form of AMD's HBCC (High Bandwidth Cache Controller, more on that here). NVCache would use your system RAM and SSD to super-speed game load times, as well as optimizing VRAM usage. You can read more on NVCache here.
• Tensor Memory Compression: NVCache is interesting, but Tensor Memory Compression will be on Ampere, and will reportedly use Tensor Cores to both compress and decompress items that are stored in VRAM. This could see a 20-40% reduction in VRAM usage, or more VRAM usage with higher textures in next-gen games and Tensor Memory Compression decreasing that VRAM footprint by 20-40%.
• How fast is the GeForce RTX 3090? Freaking fast according to rumors, with 60-90% more performance than the current Turing-based flagship GeForce RTX 2080 Ti. We could see this huge performance leap in ray tracing titles, but we'll have to wait a little while longer to see how much graphical power NVIDIA crams into these new cards. You can read more on those rumors here.
• Power hungry: As for power consumption, GA102 reportedly uses 230W -- while 24GB of GDDR6X (which we should see on the new Ampere-based TITAN RTX) consumes 60W of power. You can read more on that here.
• Production begins soon: NVIDIA is reportedly in the DVT (or Design Validation Test) range of its new GeForce RTX 3000 series graphics cards. Mass production reportedly kicks off in August 2020, with a media event, benchmarks, and more in September 2020 as I predicted many months ago. More on that here.

I've already written about rumors that NVIDIA's next-gen Ampere GPU architecture would be up to 75% faster than current-gen GPUs such as the Turing architecture, right after rumors that Ampere would offer 50% more performance at half the power of Turing. This is pretty crazy stuff right there.

Not only that, but we've got some rumored specs on the purported GeForce RTX 3080 and GeForce RTX 3070 graphics cards, which will both be powered by NVIDIA's new Ampere GPU architecture.

We've already heard that Ampere would offer 50% more performance at half the power of Turing, which sent the hairs on my neck standing up. Better yet, you can read about the leaked specs on the purported Ampere-based GeForce RTX 3080 and GeForce RTX 3070 right here.

Even more reading:

• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3000 series announcement rumored for September 9
• NVIDIA reportedly discontinues GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER graphics card
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti: rumored launch of September 17
• AMD Big Navi: 5120 stream processors teased for RDNA 2 flagship again
• AMD Radeon Instinct MI100 Acturus teased, NVIDIA Ampere destroyer?!
• GeForce RTX 3090: 50% faster than RTX 2080 Ti in early benchmarks
• NVIDIA A100 Ampere benchmarked, is now the 'fastest GPU ever recorded'
• Yeah, NVIDIA should unleash GeForce RTX 3000 series in September
• AMD Big Navi 'NVIDIA Killer' flagship card has 16GB of memory
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 rumor: 20% faster than GeForce RTX 2080 Ti
• NVIDIA's next-gen Ampere DLSS 3.0 could work on ANY game that uses TAA
• AMD aims Big Navi launch for November as 'show of strength' for RDNA 2
• NVIDIA's next-gen Ampere GeForce RTX 30 series: new 12-pin PCIe power
• AMD's next-gen RDNA 2 rumor: 40-50% faster than GeForce RTX 2080 Ti
• NVIDIA stops making RTX 20 series, ramps to GeForce RTX 30 series
• GeForce RTX 3060 should cost $300-$400, here's some leaked specs
• NVIDIA bundles Death Stranding with GeForce RTX graphics cards
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti, RTX 3070 rumored specs: two sub $500 cards
• Want NVIDIA's next-gen Ampere GPU now? You can have it... for $12,500
• NVIDIA's Ampere GeForce RTX rumor: built on Samsung 8nm, not TSMC 7nm
• Say hello to the ASUS GeForce RTX 3080 Ti ROG STRIX, maybe
• NVIDIA's new A100 PCIe accelerator: 40GB HBM2e memory, PCIe 4.0 tech
• This new GeForce RTX 3090 leak has it at 26% faster than RTX 2080 Ti
• New GeForce RTX 3090 leaks: 12GB GDDR6X at insane 21Gbps
• GeForce RTX 3080 and RTX 3090 rumored to pack 'traversal coprocessor'
• NVIDIA's next-gen GeForce RTX 3080, RTX 3090 to enter production soon
• GeForce RTX 3090: GA102 consumes 230W, 24GB GDDR6 consumes 60W power
• NVIDIA rumored to use HUGE cooling block on GeForce RTX 3080
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 cooler: rumored to cost $150 on its own
• GeForce RTX 3090 rumor: 24GB GDDR6X, would annihilate RTX 2080 Ti
• NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 rumors: up to 60-90% faster than RTX 2080 Ti
• Check out these awesome renders of NVIDIA's next-gen GeForce RTX 3080
• This could be our first picture of the GeForce RTX 3080 graphics card
• AMD and NVIDIA to both launch next-gen GPUs in September 2020
• NVIDIA reportedly drops Tesla brand, too close to Elon Musk's Tesla
• NVIDIA amps up fight against COVID-19 with Ampere-based supercomputer
• NVIDIA DGX A100: 8 x A100 Ampere GPUs, AMD CPU, 15TB NVMe SSD
• NVIDIA Ampere A100 specs: 54 billion transistors, 40GB HBM2, 7nm TSMC