NVIDIA is bringing the flagship gaming back to China with the soon-to-launch GeForce RTX 4090 D GPU which fully complies with US export policies.
Chinese Gamers Rejoice! NVIDIA's Bringing Its Flagship Gaming GPU Back With The GeForce RTX 4090 D
Update: According to MEGAsizeGPU, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 D graphics cards will make use of the AD102-250 GPU. The RTX 4090 uses the AD102-300-A1 GPU.
From exclusive information gathered by our sources, it seems like NVIDIA has a new GPU on the block. This particular GPU is a gaming-first product and will be known as the GeForce RTX 4090 D (‘D’ likely for the year of the Dragon) which is a China-exclusive design meant to be offered as a replacement for the GeForce RTX 4090 which has been banned from the country due to its TPP (Total Processing Performance) rating of over 4800 points.
As you might be aware, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 was amongst the list of several other GPUs that had been banned from export to China under the new US government export controls. The graphics card has since seen a huge price hike due to panics related to foreseeable shortages which led to prices of around $8000 US. Furthermore, the existing stock of NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 4090 has become so expensive for gamers to get their hands on that Chinese factories are using the same chips and converting them into AI solutions.
From the information that we have gathered, NVIDIA now plans to introduce a brand new GPU known as the GeForce RTX 4090 D. This new GPU is designed exclusively for the Chinese market and is targeted at the consumer segment so no, it won't officially target the AI space and for good reason too.
To comply with the US policies, the GPU would obviously have a lower TPP which means that we are looking at a new SKU with fewer cores to comply with the new regulations. This means that the GeForce RTX 4090 D will have somewhat less gaming performance and AI capabilities than the standard "GeForce RTX 4090". We are referring to the compute capabilities here & not the software/feature level support as those AI capabilities will still be intact.
In terms of availability, the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 D will be offered by AIC partners in China in the same way as the GeForce RTX 4090. Boxes and packages will clearly mention the new "D" label and prices are said to be similar to the GeForce RTX 4090 Non-D GPUs which retail at an MSRP of $1599 US or 12,999 RMB in China. The good thing is that NVIDIA's flagship gaming GPU is coming back to China which is great for gamers. In addition to the RTX 4090 D, NVIDIA is also prepping several other AI-specific GPUs for China which are expected to launch in early 2024 so stay tuned for more information on those.
