The latest story on the GeForce FX is that nVidia plans to scrap it altogether and focus on the NV-35. According to the same stories only 100,000 GFX units will see the light of day and those are expected to disappear by May. The next cards should surface sometime in June.
nVidia have not yet commented on these stories so they are far from being official. If the discontinuation of the GFX becomes a reality, it may be the sign that ATI's pressure is finally getting to nVidia. Dropping GFX and focusing on the NV-35 is a real indication that the company will try to reclaim the fastest card throne, by a clear margin, since GFX was shown to be only marginally faster than ATI's Radeon 9700 Pro. As one user commented on the x-3DFX board If a chip which is working at 500 Mhz barely beats another chip working at only 325 Mhz, there must be something wrong with this chip.
What is certain is that if this story is officially confirmed, nVidia will stand to lose a great deal of money and quite a bit of prestige. The birth of GFX has been continually plagued by problems and delays, this may be the final blow.
Things however, may not be as tragic for nVidia as the news may suggest. Granted, ATI will increase their time advantage by the, more than likely, shortage of nVidia high-end boards. A good replacement card by nVidia however, one that would hand them back the fastest chip throne, would do lots to reinstate the company as the graphics leader. NV-31 is expected to launch at CeBit in Germany, this March while NV-34 and NV-35 will probably appear in June. NV-31 GeForce FX MX and NV-34 GeForce FX Go, both NV-30 based boards, will still appear and will attempt to do battle with ATI's mainstream offerings while NV-35 will be the flagship chip which will fight for the throne.
