So, what do you guys think about Nvidia's new "SFF-Ready"
It's a missed opportunity to set things straight. The whole problem of not informing end user what the actual measurements are with a proper product spec sheet is missed, so still if you have a case that is not exactly those dimensions and thus certified, you will still need to ask someone who has the card physically to check the measurements for it.
We should be angry about this because it's nvidia treating the SFF community as idiots by forming the communication of this SFF-ready as idiotproofing for newbies that can't figure things out for themselves while even I who made the whole compatibility spreadsheets of cards can't be 100% sure until I have a specific card in my hands.
But there is a reason for not providing the spec sheet with exact dimensions - kind of like security by obscurity - if you get a drawing with dimensions and you get a card that doesn't match the measurements on the drawing, in some countries you can return the card including the seller having to pay you back for the shipping because product wasn't as advertised. If they don't provide this, along other details in other hardware, like for example exact memory chips in the card, in SSDs, in RAM sticks etc, they can switch suppliers, change the cooler size on the card and so on, and it won't have effect on returns because of mismatched spec if they don't provide that.
Will you be designing with that in mind?
We would be fitting perfectly the cards within 304mm limit, except for the stupid new
Nvidia Fire-Hazard [TM] connector and the space required for it.
Overall whole situation with how the cables are handled in GPUs is simply stupid, especially with the trend for hiding the cables, where Quadro cards have had for ages the power connectors at the far edge from the pci-e slot which makes it so that it fits slim HP/DELL workstations. Nvidia having the amount of control they have over the board partners could simply force everyone to comply with one setup of the power connector at that end, and then it would mean everyone is designing cases around similar requirements. And also they could have, I don't know, maybe say that SFF-Ready cards require spec sheet with dimensions marked on a drawing of the card?
It's larger than I'd like, but it'd sure be easier to get more people onboard with small form factor computers if all they had to do was look for a little badge, rather than comparing dimensions and hoping the numbers are accurate.
Well, for one, the cards with 8-pin power connector can have those dimensions and still use some low profile connector, or simply be a pci-e spec reference sized card, so they simply can plug 8-pin and 6-pin connectors without problem into the card from the side. Also this means that cards above RTX 4070 are not going to fit into Sentry 2.0 because of that plug, but there are RTX 4070 cards which are a perfect fit for Sentry 2.0, exactly as we designed with the proper TDP for such case.
Also I think we shouldn't be conforming to to a bad standard like this 12(+4) pin connector that nvidia is forcing because they want to squeeze more power draw into the card because they have to have constant performance grow to make investors throw money at their buble, while also wanting the card to look clean when showed on the stage, while also not caring about the tri or quad headed hydra dongle sagging off the card in our cases.
So the GPU compartment will actually be the same size with same compatibility as per drawing on our website for the 2.0. Also we'll have to see if we're going to be officially supporting 2.5 slot cards because again, if we don't have proper dimensions shown, just saying the card is 50mm thick doesn't mean it's within 2.5 slot card outline. Technically there can be a 50mm card that is sticking out 5 mm outside of 2.5 slot outline if there's nothing sticking out at the back of PCB.