Welcome to the end of Moore's Law. 7nm is as expensive as 14nm was. Sure, you gained double the density, but it costs twice as much to make. So you only get improved performance / watt. Cost per transistor stayed equal in this 7nm generation.
NVidia's 2080 (roughly equivalent to the 1080 Ti) is also $699 to $799, depending on which model you get. Its the nature of how the process nodes work now.
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Rumor is that the lower-end of the market will get price/performance upgrades, as maybe small-7nm chips will have enough yield to actually give cost-savings. But that's a bit of "hopes and dreams" leaking in, as opposed to any hard data.
For now, it is clear that 300mm^2 7nm chips (like the Radeon VII) are going to be costly. Probably due to low yields, but its hard to know for sure. Note that Zen2 and Apple chips are all at around 100mm^2 or so (which seems to indicate that yields are fine for small chips... but even then, Apple's Phones definitely increased in price as they hit 7nm)
NVidia's 2080 (roughly equivalent to the 1080 Ti) is also $699 to $799, depending on which model you get. Its the nature of how the process nodes work now.
-----------
Rumor is that the lower-end of the market will get price/performance upgrades, as maybe small-7nm chips will have enough yield to actually give cost-savings. But that's a bit of "hopes and dreams" leaking in, as opposed to any hard data.
For now, it is clear that 300mm^2 7nm chips (like the Radeon VII) are going to be costly. Probably due to low yields, but its hard to know for sure. Note that Zen2 and Apple chips are all at around 100mm^2 or so (which seems to indicate that yields are fine for small chips... but even then, Apple's Phones definitely increased in price as they hit 7nm)