I notice that the price of the nVidia FX5900 128Meg has dropped
to $249 on-line today ( www.gameve.com - eVGA FX5900 ) having
dropped to $279 a few days ago.

The Ati fan-folk will say that this is because of the 9800 "superior
performance" with magnifying glass in hand......... . However,
I believe that this is part of an overall nVidia plan, since the other

members of the FX family are also dropping in price............
Goliath is finally flexing muscle.............

The full-production piece-part price of the NV35 to the board
manufacturers can be set much lower by nVidia (and with good
profit margin) than the R350 can be set by Ati, since the
transistor-count is similar but the die is far smaller (0.13u vs
0.15u) and the 0.13u process is now finally sufficiently
"mature" for industry-standard yields.

John Lewis