TECH TALK
Nvidia drops an AI bombshell with Blackwell
IT’S BEEN TWO YEARS since Nvidia revealed its Hopper H100 GPU architecture, currently one of the most sought-after processors for AI workloads. In fact, it’s in such high demand that individual H100 accelerators can cost $30,000–$40,000. It has also been banned from export to China.
Jarred Walton
© NVIDIA
The mid-cycle refresh H200 has just started shipping. This means it’s time for Nvidia to reveal its post-Hopper data center GPU plans.
Meet Blackwell. As we mentioned on page 8, the work of its namesake, David Blackwell, has had an impact on the research and development of ar tificial intelligence. That’s fitting, considering the new GB200 GPU is set to power the next generation of massive AI supercomputers. Nvidia hasn’t spilled all the beans, so we don’t know the die size or number of processing units. However, we know that Blackwell has 208 billion transistors, and will be built on TSMC’s N4P 4nm node.