Kelvin is the codename for a GPU microarchitecture developed by Nvidia, and released in 2001, as the successor to the Celsius microarchitecture. It was named with reference to William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin and used with the GeForce 3 and 4 series.
While Kelvin was not used as a marketing name at the time of the GeForce3's launch in 2001, the public name was first used by the nouveau Linux driver, and later on the Nvidia website.
Graphics features DirectX 8.0 (8.1 in the original Xbox) OpenGL 1.2 (1.5; 1.4 in the original Xbox) Shader Model 1.3 Vertex Shader 1.1 Max VRAM size bumped to 128MB New memory controller with Z compression
Chips
GeForce 3 (3xxx) series
NV20, 57 million transistor
GeForce 4 (4xxx) series
Crush11, 20 million transistor NV17, 29 million transistor NV18, 29 million transistor NV25, 63 million transistor NV28, 63 million transistor NV2A (Xbox GPU), 57 million transistor
GPU list
GeForce 3 (3xxx) series ModelLaunchCode nameFab (nm)Bus interfaceCore clock (MHz)Memory clock (MHz)Core config1FillrateMemoryMOperations/sMPixels/sMTexels/sMVertices/sSize (MB)Bandwidth (GB/s)Bus typeBus width (bit)GeForce3 Ti2001 October 2001NV20TSMC 150 nmAGP 4× PCI1752004:1:8:4700700140042.7564 1286.4DDR128GeForce327 February 2001200230800800160050647.36GeForce3 Ti5001 October 20012402509609601920608
GeForce 4 (4xxx) series ModelLaunchCode nameFab (nm)Bus interfaceCore clock (MHz)Memory clock (MHz)Core config1FillrateMemorySupported API versionMOperations/sMPixels/sMTexels/sMVertices/sSize (MB)Bandwidth (GB/s)Bus typeBus width (bit)Direct3DOpenGLGeForce4 MX IGP + nForce21 October 2002NV1FTSMC 150 nmFSB250133 2002:0:4:250050010000Up to 128 system RAM2.128 6.4DDR64 1287.01.2GeForce4 MX4206 February 2002NV17AGP 4× PCI166642.656SDR DDR128 (SDR) 64 (DDR)GeForce4 MX440 SE200264 1285.312DDR128GeForce MX400014 December 2003NV18BAGP 8× PCI2.65664GeForce PCX430019 February 2004PCIe ×16128GeForce4 MX4406 February 2002NV17AGP 4× PCI275200550550110064 1286.4128GeForce4 MX440 8x25 September 2002NV18AGP 8× PCI2508GeForce4 MX4606 February 2002NV17AGP 4× PCI3002756006001200GeForce4 Ti420016 April 2002NV25AGP 4×250222 (128 MB) 250 (64 MB)4:2:8:41000100020001257.104 (128 MB) 8 (64 MB)8.0a1.3GeForce4 Ti4200 8x25 September 2002NV28AGP 8×2501288GeForce4 Ti44006 February 2002NV25AGP 4×275275110011002200137.58.8GeForce4 Ti4400 8x (Ti4800SE2)20 January 2003NV28AGP 8×GeForce4 Ti46006 February 2002NV25AGP 4×30032512001200240015010.4GeForce4 Ti4600 8x (Ti48003)20 January 2003NV28AGP 8×ModelLaunchCode nameFab (nm)Bus interfaceCore clock (MHz)Memory clock (MHz)Core config1FillrateMemorySupported API versionMOperations/sMPixels/sMTexels/sMVertices/sSize (MB)Bandwidth (GB/s)Bus typeBus width (bit)Direct3DOpenGL
Model Features nFiniteFX II Engine Video Processing Engine (VPE) GeForce4 MX420 GeForce4 MX440 SE GeForce4 MX4000 GeForce4 PCX4300 GeForce4 MX440 GeForce4 MX440 8X GeForce4 MX460 GeForce4 Ti4200 GeForce4 Ti4200 8x GeForce4 Ti4400 GeForce4 Ti4400 8x GeForce4 Ti4600 GeForce4 Ti4600 8x
Console GPUs ModelLaunchCode nameFab (nm)Bus interfaceCore clock (MHz)Memory clock (MHz)Core config1,2,3FillrateMemoryLatest supported API versionMOperations/sMTexels/sMPixels/sMTri/sSize (MB)Bandwidth (GB/s)Bus typeBus width (bit)Direct3DOpenGLXGPU (Xbox)November 15, 2001NV2ATSMC 150nmIntegrated2332004:2:8:415,8001,864932116.5646.4DDR1288.11.4
See also List of eponyms of Nvidia GPU microarchitectures List of Nvidia graphics processing units Qualcomm Adreno Scalable Link Interface (SLI)
Notes
References