With CeBIT 2011 just around the corner, we can expect to start seeing leaks from every corner of the computing world.
On the NVIDIA front, word has reached VR-Zone that the GPU giant's next mid-range offering - the GeForce GTX 550 Ti - will launch in under a month on March 15.
The rumoured card would slot in below last month's GTX 560 Ti, and with NVIDIA seemingly sticking with its performance-orientated GTX nomenclature, 550 Ti performance should be fairly potent.
According to the leaked information, the card will make use of a new GF116 die and 1GB of GDDR5 memory hooked up to a 128-bit interface. Clock speeds remain unknown, but the GTX 550 Ti's TDP is said to drop to as little as 110W. That's a considerable step down from GTX 560 Ti, but VR-Zone claims the new mid-range card is 35 per cent faster than the ageing AMD Radeon HD 5770, and might just be able to creep up close to GeForce GTX 460 levels.
Without firm details regarding shader count and clock speeds, any performance claims at this point are merely speculation, but one thing's for certain - this will be the cheapest retail GTX 500-series product to date. Something tells us we'll be seeing more of GTX 550 Ti at CeBIT next month.