Stefan Mileschin

It turns out that drivers are holding back launch of NVIDIA's GeForce GTX TITAN-Z flagship graphics card. That's not to say that drivers for the card don't exist. When tested with ones that are available, performance numbers yielded by Hong Kong-based tech print magazine E-Zone, reveal that the card trades blows with AMD's R9 295X2 in too many tests to warrant double its price at $2,999; and that it's also slower in some. The only way NVIDIA can sell the GTX TITAN-Z at that price, is by either making it significantly faster, or reducing the price. It looks like NVIDIA is trying the former, and not by tinkering with hardware specifications, but drivers. NVIDIA believes it can yet salvage the $2,999 pricing of the GTX TITAN-Z, by developing drivers that make the card convincingly faster than AMD's $1,499 offering. Retailers and distributors are being told not to sell their GTX TITAN-Z inventory until NVIDIA releases these drivers. The company didn't mention a date to these retailers. Given NVIDIA's track-record with performance-enhancing drivers, one can give NVIDIA the benefit of doubt. NVIDIA may yet prevent a "GTX TITANIC-Z" from happening.

http://www.techpowerup.com/200830/dr...-z-launch.html