Nvidia has had six months to flesh out the GeForce family, which is now capped by the 8800 Ultra, whose $800 price tag essentially limits it to hardcore gamers who don't blink at spending as much on a PC as other people would spend on a car.

     "That's for the guy who has everything. Amazingly enough, we sell a ton of them. It's a lot like the car industry—you've got to have the fastest hot rod," said Derek Perez, head of public relations for Nvidia.

     At the other end of the spectrum is the 8400, which goes for well under $100 and puts next-gen gaming within reach of the mass market, albeit with images that are less sharp and motions less smooth than pricier cards produce.

     All that has helped Nvidia grab market share from AMD. In the market for standalone graphics cards—rather than the low-powered integrated graphics chips in many inexpensive PCs—Nvidia saw its share rise to 59 percent in the first quarter, up from 47 percent a year ago.

     "Nvidia's 8 series is competing against AMD's prior generation right now. The competition will likely heat up in the second half as AMD fleshes out its 2000-series product line," said Dean McCarron, head of market research firm Mercury Research.

     AMD promises midrange and low-end Radeons will be coming out in time for the crucial back-to-school PC buying season.

     "Right now what we're focusing on is getting our mainstream products to market. These are the big-volume sellers for us and will drive mainstream adoption of DirectX 10," Mr. Carvill said.