Intel and AMD will in 2011 raise the stakes when it comes to integrated graphics circuits. The discussions on the “to-be-or-not-to-be” of discrete graphics cards have been unavoidable, but like we’ve stated in the past high-end graphics cards will be here for very long time, now “confirmed” by analysts.
In an interview at X-bit labs analyst Jon Peddie pointed out that the performance and power requirements of the more expensive and powerful graphics card will remain, and in turn result in a very long life.
“The high end, enthusiast and workstation, and probably the upper half of the performance segment will have performance and power requirements such that they cannot be integrated into a CPU”
Exactly where the limit will be for discrete graphics cards is hard to say, but according to Jon Peddie cards costing $200 and up will still have a good chance of surviving for a long time thanks to its performance and value, up until 2020 and further up ahead.
Except from demanding PC gamers the server market is really starting to see the advantages of GPU power, something that we will see a lot more of the coming years when supercomputers and servers will be assisted by the parallel workhorse that is GPUs.
Current budget graphics cards will disappear more and more and be nisched toward upgrading of older systems where the next generation integrated graphics circuits are not available.
