backtop

Print 76 comment(s) - last by Penti.. on Nov 6 at 10:53 AM

NVIDIA vs. Intel in a Delaware court  (Source: Engadget)
NVIDIA will halt chip development for Intel's newer technologies

NVIDIA has temporarily halted development of its Nforce chipset line, as the legal issues between the graphics company and Intel continue to turn nasty.

The graphics company plans to "postpone further chipset investments," possibly until a licensing disupte with Intel is settled.  Specifically, Intel claims NVIDIA doesn't have the right to make new chipsets that work with newer Intel CPUs, though NVIDIA says that it does -- under existing licensing agreements -- but will halt production into 2010, at the earliest.

"Because of Intel's improper claims to customers and the market that we aren't licensed to the new DMI bus and its unfair business tactics, it is effectively impossible for us to market chipsets for future CPUs," NVIDIA said in a press statement.  ""So, until we resolve this matter in court next year, we'll postpone further chipset investments for Intel DMI CPUs."

In the mean time, NVIDIA will make products for older Intel CPUs, along with the company's graphic chips.  

In Intel's defense, the company said the current issue has built up for more than two years, and legal action to resolve the problem has been inevitable.  NVIDIA may be feeling the pressure as Intel continues to enter the graphics market, which has cut into the company's bottom line.

"We have a dispute with them over a license," Intel spokesperson Chuck Mulloy said in a release.  "We're still trying to resolve that dispute.  Beyond that, we've got nothing to say."

Even with increased pressure from Intel, NVIDIA remains the industry leader in graphic chips, but it will be interesting to see how the company handles pressure from Intel, ATI, and others as the tech industry continues to rebound.

Comments     Threshold


This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled
Rock and a hard place?
By ChristopherO on 10/8/2009 9:45:17 PM , Rating: 5
There seems to be a fundamental problem here. AMD makes CPUs, they also make chipsets. Intel makes CPUs, they too make chipsets for their CPUs.

If neither one of them want NVidia in the chipset business, well that's sort of a problem for NVidia. Nothing logically keeps either manufacturer from not wanting to play along. And it isn't a monopoly per-se... I don't know if Intel is playing dirty, but even if they aren't, it doesn't seem like the best position to be in. If Nvidia gets Intel upset about the Tegra (competing with the Atom), Intel can easily decide not to renew contracts on their desktop bus.

They both use standardized PCIX busses, so the video business isn't hurt. I know NVidia can do well with the Tegra, but it really seems to me that NVidia needs to create their own desktop CPUs and platform, or else they'll always be at the whim of some other company. Either that, or they convince Intel to buy them, or spin off parts of the business.

Granted Intel would need to license x86, and AMD x64, but that seems more doable than trying to play in someone else's sandbox. I know the Intel/AMD relationship is special, in that they basically have perpetual agreements to share x86/x64, but I would think NVidia could bring some patents to the table that Intel wouldn't mind sharing for a similar arrangement.




RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Smartless on 10/8/2009 10:39:13 PM , Rating: 3
Probably wishful thinking but hopefully the market will switch around again and Nvidia will have some pull. I think its sad that the GPU market is taking the same route as the soundcard. Demand for onboard video may kill Nvidia with only hardcore gamers and CAD users keeping graphics cards alive. Ah the days of my old Riva128 card.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By spartan014 on 10/9/2009 1:22:27 AM , Rating: 2
Intel's move looks more like a pre-emptive strike. I think they are making sure that in order to use their latest CPUs, one will be forced to use Intel chipset motherboards. Another objective will be clearing the way for Larrabee..


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Spivonious on 10/9/2009 8:59:14 AM , Rating: 1
Exactly. Nvidia is trying to hold on to one piece of the market that won't be going away soon.

Once CPUs start getting the graphics on die, the discrete GPU market will be gone. As you said, there's already no need for the general user to have a discrete sound card. Even hardcore gamers don't need one. The only reason I have an X-Fi is for the outboard box with 1/4" connectors. I use it to do some recording.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By mindless1 on 10/9/2009 2:42:37 PM , Rating: 3
Not quite true. A well-performing GPU already takes more silicon than the entire CPU, graphics on CPU die will eat away at the more simple IGP chipsets rather than discrete GPU, and bring Intel closer to a uniform one chip, chipset to accompany mainstream system requirements.

There is a big difference between discrete audio and video, that the processing load is much smaller, the memory requirement much smaller, bandwidth smaller, etc.

I don't quite understand why you feel the need for an X-Fi only to get (RCA?) external connectors, a $2 adapter cable will do that with any typical integrated audio. Typical integrated audio is still lower quality though, despite the paper specs if dealing with analog.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Spivonious on 10/9/2009 4:01:20 PM , Rating: 2
Well, not just the connectors (1/4", although I do use the RCA from time to time), but the ASIO driver support. Way too much latency going through the Windows sound system.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By MikeMurphy on 10/9/2009 11:01:38 PM , Rating: 2
Intel will watch Nvidia get squeezed out of the mainstram. Why would Intel want to provide this access to Nvidia? More competition?

1- Intel has AMD hurting right now which has an uncertain future and huge debt. I see the 32nm dual core i3 offerings as engineered to dominate the value market. I understand intel is rushing the i3 with 32nm process to further reduce price and to put more hurt on AMD.

2- Nvidia is a competitor for the future of parallel computing to which Intel is developing Larrabee. Why keep nvidia around when Intel can look the other way and let them disappear from the mainstream.

I respect nvidia but they are in a very difficult position. In 12 years I reluctantly suspect Intel will be the only real show in town for PCs.

Hopefully nvidia can break into the mobile market in a big way.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Mr Perfect on 10/9/2009 2:28:06 PM , Rating: 2
Meh, gameing could get along without a dedicated GPU. If I remember correctly, almost all the games in the 486 days where rendered through software. If a game(Descent!) ran on my 486, it ran on the school's 486, or a friends 486. You didn't have to worry about who had what version of which generation of video card.

If I was nVidia, I'd be scared by the way some game gurus(and Intel in a round-about way with Larrabee) are muttering about software rendering. Didn't John Carmack(or some other bigwig) recently make some post about wanting to get away from restrictive hardware APIs and start doing things through software again?


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By hyvonen on 10/10/2009 12:48:32 AM , Rating: 2
I LOVED Descent! That game was beyond perfect.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Black69ta on 10/10/2009 1:58:17 AM , Rating: 1
Uh nit sure where you and your friends got your 486 PC's but I bought an ACER 486DX2-66Mhz and graphics was a Cirrus logic ISA card and the next was a Pentium I with PCI graphics and I upgraded it to a Matrox Millennium. The first IGP I know of was on a P III with the 82810 Intel graphics chip.

The Millennium was awesome with Descent, Doom II and Duke Nukem...ah the good ol' Days when the next Windows would be out in three months,,,, No sorry next year, Ok here is Windows 95, "but, sir its 1998!" We know we have that covered meanwhile in some smoked up comp lab in Washington state.. Boss Sorry to be the one to tell you this but I drew the Short straw. This version of Windows will be delayed." So they deliver the Windows98 in 2000 then Windows(ME)Millennium in 2001."

I was a true believer in Microsoft by the time Win95 came out. Name one other company that can announce delay after delay and yet the stock price goes up high each time.

they are a mediocre software company but they are a genius Marketing company. Seriously, no one outside of my job and family even knows that I exist but I would bet that with Bill's Gates blessing and Microsoft's backing I could be elected President of the US.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Donovan on 10/12/2009 10:35:38 AM , Rating: 2
They may not have had IGPs but they did have integrated local bus video. The 486DX2-66 with overdrive socket that I bought from Gateway 2000 had Cirrus Logic "local bus" video (probably VLB) built onto the motherboard. This would have been shortly before Windows 95 was released...that computer came with WfW 3.11 and a coupon for a copy of Windows 95. My mother's slightly newer DX2-66 (also from Gateway) had integrated Cirrus Logic "PCI local bus" video according to the driver splash screen.

Both systems also had a PCI slot which would eventually hold a Matrox Mystique, the only "3D accelerator" I tried that worked well and actually accelerated my games (though more because of their 2D performance than the limited proprietary 3D acceleration they offered).

Of course Voodoo 1 was just around the corner...first and only video card to absolutlely floor me with the improvement it gave. Hard to believe it was only 640x480, because at the time it seemed nearly perfect. I remember walking up really close to a floating blue potion in Hexen II and just watching it, amazed at how smooth it looked as it spun around. Now I game at 2560x1600 and still need to turn on AA to cut down on the jaggies.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By aj28 on 10/8/2009 10:40:12 PM , Rating: 5
nVidia has neither license nor the resources to develop an X86 CPU. Tegra is an ARM chip, and entirely different beast, and thus not likely to compete for this marketplace. Their chipset ship is sinking because AMD finally started developing their own platform and Intel isn't going to share IP with anyone it isn't legally bound to do so with.

Long story short, once Intel starts shipping consistently stable, feature-rich, high-performance IGPs, nVidia is pretty much toast. Ion is good and all, but if Intel doesn't want you there, you can't compete real strongly in a market they created. The majority of their chipset share is actually on the AMD OEM end. Acer/Gateway/eMachines has already picked up on AMD chipsets. HP is their last big customer, and the day they walk, it's pretty much over.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By ChristopherO on 10/9/2009 1:56:54 AM , Rating: 2
I wasn't trying to suggest that Tegra could compete on the desktop. Rather that Tegra threatens Atom, and Intel can easily turn around and say, "Nvidia is depriving us of Atom revenue, so we'll deprive them of chipset revenue."

I'd say it's just business... Given that NVidia disables physics processing if ATI cards are present... Well, they know how to play hardball too, so I'd hardly call them a victim. They're just getting outplayed in some ways by much larger firms.

I've owned precisely one NVidia card (TNT2), but of all the 3rd parties who are out there, they have the most engineering knowledge to create a competitive CPU. CPUs are starting to go massively parallel, and GPUs have been there for years. Generally ATI's boards have been more efficient for the graphics space, but NVidia's have more closely resembled a traditional CPU. The core count of a GPU is almost 16x that of the latest CPUs, it's just that each core is simpler without the same transistor count as a general purpose CPU.

Technically VIA owns an x86 license. NVidia could acquire them and get the license -- and I don't think AMD would deny an x64 license, because quite frankly they need the royalties. If anything, royalties would have a much higher profit potential than what they've accomplished with their own fabs.

I'm not saying it's going to happen, only that they *could* do it if they tried. It is however riskier than trying to get purchased, so I suspect they would rather find a larger buyer. Something like TI or Motorola could find use in their product portfolio. Tech firms like Apple, Dell, or HP wouldn't have any reason since it would put them at odds with Intel, and generally would benefit from an amicable relationship with them.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By bobvodka on 10/9/2009 4:38:22 AM , Rating: 2
That idea that NV could obtain an x86 license by buying Via has been floated on forums before, however I seem to recall it mentioned that there might be a clause which prevents transferal of ownership basically meaning NV couldn't go that route.

As for AMD, well AMD are in the graphics market, it might be to their advantage to watch NV wither and die to get more of that space themselves.

Right now NV are looking very wonky;
- no DX11 card, maybe still 2+ months out with unknown specs
- rumors of cuts to their high end cards
- PhysX under threat from Havok and Bullet on OpenCL
- CUDA under threat from OpenCL and DirectCompute
- Seemingly no ability to make a chipset for the latest Intel chips

I wouldn't say they are dead and gone, but I can see this being a hard year for them.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Totally on 10/9/2009 5:05:12 AM , Rating: 2
the license is non transferable, for Nvidia to be able to make any use of that license it would have to be some sort of joint venture, pending Intel doesn't have some sort of legal wrench to throw in there should they go that route.

Nvidia practically lube themselves up and assumed the position for this [censored]ing. Playing hardball when the walls comeplete with writing are crumbling around them was not a smart thing to do. Reminds me of one of those kids who hangs out with the neighborhood bully who thinks they're though by association.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By FaaR on 10/9/2009 7:10:17 AM , Rating: 2
Nothing would stop Nvidia from releasing x86 CPUs by keeping the CPU development inside VIA, assuming they do buy of course...

That way, the license stays with the original licensee. :)

Btw, IP as a concept sucks... All it does in the end is grease a lot of lawyers, meh.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By bobvodka on 10/9/2009 8:32:01 AM , Rating: 1
unless the wording of the license agreement states that in the event of the company being brought the license is rescinded, then as soon as NV sign on the dotted line to buy the company they are no longer allowed to use the tech and would have to get a new agreement.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Penti on 11/6/2009 10:12:01 AM , Rating: 2
Technically Via owns a US company which owns a x86 license, the engineers are in the US (Centaur). The S3 engineers are in US too. And yes they are trying a comeback.

Technically theres several companies which still might have x86 licenses. VIA already has AMD64-cpus btw, the Nano has x86-64. Must stuff can be solved through cross licensing agreements. Atom doesn't yet really compete against the Tegra, because they haven't completed their SoC plans yet. VIA is pretty much useless now when we have the Atom though. They are out of the niche. Thin clients, MIDs, POS, other small systems. Intel all has it now.

Eventually I'm sure gaming will be possible on IGPs but for now they are there for light use and video. Any how discrete gpus are on about every consumer laptop right now so I'm sure nVidia can do fine. Laptops are more popular then desktops after all.

Sure cpus with integrated IGPs will take over, but not all the market. Just low end, MID, Netbook, some of notebook, not mainstream. nVidia didn't really make any products for those markets before. I'm sure the world is large enough for them.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By amanojaku on 10/8/2009 10:51:29 PM , Rating: 3
Where does it say AMD doesn't want Nvidia in the chipset business, aside from the generally accepted view that all companies want everyone else out of business? Nvidia has a plethora of chipsets for the Phenom I&II.

http://www.newegg.com/Store/SubCategory.aspx?SubCa...

As to the desktop CPUs... Don't count on it. Nvidia can certainly make a bunch of them, but they would have to fall into one of two major categories: more powerful than any of the Nehalem, Sandy Bridge or Haswell CPUs, or more cost effective than AMD's price/performance ratio that is already in danger of Intel's price cuts. It would take Nvidia about 5 years of dedicated resources to produce something reliable and profitable.

And there's ATI to consider (sorry AMD, but ATI stands out.) ATI has been kickin' ass lately, and I don't see Nvidia being able to tackle GPUs, chipsets, mobile products, "general" purpose CPUs (Tesla) and true general purpose CPUs.

I think Nvidia should just stay the course and focus on improving build quality and performance. That'll force ATI to make better cards, as well, and they'll both be selling them for pennies on the dollar.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By ChristopherO on 10/9/2009 2:14:12 AM , Rating: 1
I didn't say that AMD doesn't want NVidia there, except that NVidia is only there if AMD allows it. It's sort of one-sided. If AMD changes their mind because they want to salvage their chipset business... Well, then NVidia has two partners who don't want to play ball. It's a bad position to be in a market purely because your competitors keep signing contracts letting you stay.

In all fairness to ATI, they had some nice chipsets prior to being acquired to AMD. Both NVidia's and ATI's chipsets were largely better than the stock AMD versions. The current ATI/AMD mobile chipsets are also really nice. If AMD's CPUs were more power-friendly, they'd be a huge threat to the mobile Core 2 platform. The comparisons on Anand of those nearly matching Gateway laptops tell the story.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Totally on 10/9/2009 5:15:05 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
If AMD changes their mind because they want to salvage their chipset business...


Your talking strictly mobile chipsets right? Their desktop chipsets were very solid last time I checked.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By ChristopherO on 10/9/2009 5:25:38 PM , Rating: 2
Server chipsets were solid. Desktop ones were "solid" from a stability perspective, but before they bought ATI they were out-classed by everyone else on features (at least in regards to *when* they were released).

AMD chipsets are really good now, largely because they used the ATI ones for themselves or integrated their technology.

Realistically though, the only brick-ish chipsets I've used have been Intel ones. A few years ago they weren't always the fastest, but they were close and never needed a "driver update" to keep the machine from crashing. Now, it sort of goes without saying that Intel CPU buyers want an Intel chipset. Now, the only real drawback with Intel chipsets is that the integrated-video ones are slow compared to every single other chip. Then again, if you're buying one of those, it probably doesn't matter since it's just a work machine.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Taft12 on 10/9/2009 7:55:45 PM , Rating: 2
I don't recall AMD ever making desktop chipsets in the pre-ATI merger days. Are you sure they ever produced desktop chipsets for their own CPUs? (servers are another story, and their own chipsets were generally the best.)


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By silverblue on 10/10/2009 9:59:18 AM , Rating: 2
I once had a Duron 750 on a Gigabyte GA-7IXE4 motherboard. It used an AMD-751 Irongate chipset; in fact, this was an early socket A board.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_AMD_chi...

I think they quickly realised that VIA, SiS and, later nVidia, were making more than good enough chipsets for the Athlon series.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Penti on 11/6/2009 10:14:54 AM , Rating: 2
AMD 760 where the first DDR board for Athlons. That's where they did stop.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By bupkus on 10/9/2009 2:20:25 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
and they'll both be selling them for pennies on the dollar.

Wow, great idea. I'm sure Nvidia's gonna jump on that one.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Totally on 10/9/2009 5:25:05 AM , Rating: 2
Those are all budget range ATX and mATX boards can pretty much consider them leftovers. Nothing mainstream or enthusiast to compete with X58, P55, 790FX, or 790X.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By amanojaku on 10/9/2009 8:51:22 AM , Rating: 1
I think you are WAAAAAAAAY off. You seem to have forgotten the nForce 780 chipsets and the recently introduced nForce 900 series. Anyway, the AMD 790 isn't THAT special as the enthusiast motherboard segment is a shrinking market. To begin with, no "enthusiast" uses an IGP. Secondly, with most of the peripherals built into today's MB the definition of an "enthusiast" motherboard is blurry. I think all boards come with 5.1 audio, at least one NIC, and support the latest sockets and DDR3. Overclocking and craploads of PCIe lanes are pretty much the only "enthusiast" features today and that's board/chipset specific.

My pre-AM2+ Shuttle SN27P2 has many of the "enthusiast" features, including 8GB of RAM and overclocking, and it's running an nForce 570!


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Pastuch on 10/9/2009 2:53:38 PM , Rating: 3
"To begin with, no "enthusiast" uses an IGP. Secondly, with most of the peripherals built into today's MB the definition of an "enthusiast" motherboard is blurry."

This is completely incorrect. The number of people buying integrated graphics is increasing because the home theater market is growing exponentially. If people with 10 hard drives and $10000 theaters don't qualify as enthusiasts I don't know who does. Many of those enthusiasts PREFER integrated graphics because gaming is of no concern to them at ALL. At the moment, we the HTPC enthusiasts are forced to buy ATI video cards to bitstream our high-def audio. New integrated video chipsets with bitstreaming capability are slated for release in the next month or two. The real problem there is on the software side though.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By amanojaku on 10/11/2009 6:04:44 PM , Rating: 2
I don't mean to sound like a douche, but I know I do, so I apologize for correcting you.

A home theater PC is NOT synonymous with an enthusiast platform. Enthusiasts are individuals who build or buy (god forbid) a high performance platform. The typical enthusiast is a gamer, whose liquid-cooled dual-CPU heatsinked 4GB RAM fan-cooled chipset RAID 1 Cheetahs gigabit NIC neon-lit rig was the awe of all who were forced to listen to that crap back in high school. While not all enthusiasts are gamers, the majority have some involvement, be it online or solo. Additionally, enthusiasts in general push their boxes, be it encoding, decoding, or running multiple tasks.

A home theater PC isn't exactly getting pushed.

In today's world it's hard to define an enthusiast platform since the systems are generally powerful as heck. To start we have multi-core in every new system (I think,) rendering dual-socket all but obsolete for anything but servers. The extra space on the motherboard was long ago filled with things like 5.1 audio, networking and software-assisted RAID. You can even get quad-core, and six and eight are around the corner. 64-bit is here to stay, and hell you can get 8GB of RAM for $150-$250!

Enthusiast storage is not about capacity, it's about performance. While a little slower on the writes RAID 1 makes those reads fly, which is good for gamers or someone running a DB at home. Storage freaks would have many spindles in a RAID 1+0 config as that's the fastest. Parity RAID like 5 and 6 are slower. A video doesn't need RAID; sequential reads don't stress storage.

Gamers rarely use the IGP, unless the game is that old. And THAT good. The most powerful cards have a hard enough time rendering the 10 bagillion frames/sec we want, so why would an IGP with less circuitry and generally no dedicated RAM even compete? The typical IGP is best at office productivity, web browsing, and video playback, in many cases HD. Sure, I can play WoW on my laptop and desktop's IGPs, but they're not really cut out for stuff like Batman: Arkham Asylum at HD resolutions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enthusiast_computing


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By mindless1 on 10/9/2009 3:33:55 PM , Rating: 2
I'd consider myself at least an "enthusiast" and use IGPs in all systems but my gaming rig. Really no reason to put a video card in for another purpose these days unless the integrated output options aren't sufficient for your connectivity needs.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By crystal clear on 10/9/2009 10:32:36 AM , Rating: 2
AMD plans on making its own chipsets for its next generation of Opteron products, code-named Sao Paolo and Magny-Cours scheduled for release in early 2010.

Sooner or later come 2010 onwards - No motherboard manufacturers will touch "Nvidia" when it comes to Intel & AMD based motherboard.

Even the "Ion platform" is in for a dirty surprise !

Intel's System-on-Chip (SoC) designs that would integrate graphics functionality onto the central processor die itself, Nvidia's products might not have a role to play on Atom-based systems anyway,which would essentially lead Nvidia to VIA Technologies -- the only notable manufacturer of low-power x86 microprocessors that compete with Atom.

Sooner or later Nvidia will close down its chipset business-

thats exactly what those motherboard manufacturers told him a year ago.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By BernardP on 10/9/2009 1:28:04 PM , Rating: 2
NVidia is still offering only the 8200 chipset for AMD. It would be easy for Nvidia to offer a more powerful Ion aka GF9400 (and eventuelly Ion 2) chipset for AMD processors. But apparently, they don't plan to:

http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/15852/37/

I'm wondering if all this talk about postponing new Intel chipsets and not wanting to developp new chipsets for AMD isn't a smokescreen for simply going into cash-preservation mode: Months of hard times are ahead for NVidia because they are lagging behing ATI in 40nm DX11 GPU release.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By mindless1 on 10/9/2009 3:37:36 PM , Rating: 2
Really? Most customers buying OEM systems with integrated video don't even know what DirectX is.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Penti on 11/6/2009 10:53:14 AM , Rating: 2
Won't do much I think.

Also they won't compete with AMD in the business section as long as they don't support DASH or some other management technology.

SB700-SB750 already supports DASH 1.0. Although the manufacturers have to implement support for it like they do in the business computers. They need this to compete against Intels vPro. They can't just make consumer crap if they want to sell.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By MatthiasF on 10/8/2009 11:33:06 PM , Rating: 2
This could backfire for Intel, in that if ARM or MIPS had a decent partner to ramp up GPU resources for their low-cost solutions, they could take a chunk of the netbook/cloud-terminal market for themselves. The only thing holding back an ARM or MIPS solution is Windows support. If Linux starts taking a larger hold of the lower end computers, this wouldn't be a hindrance anymore.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Dribble on 10/9/2009 5:44:27 AM , Rating: 2
Not linux, google chrome OS. That will start to invade the netbooks and work it's way upwards. It runs on arm's as well as x86. If nvidia can ride that wave (arm cpu's are weak - they need the nvidia compute to work well) then they have a chance.
If google can make an os that really starts to compete with windows then that also breaks the x86 stranglehold on the PC market. At that point all bets are off.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By theapparition on 10/9/2009 8:33:40 AM , Rating: 2
I'm pretty sure that Chrome OS will only run on x86. Android runs on ARM.
They are two separate developments, similar to Windows and Windows mobile.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Dribble on 10/9/2009 11:33:34 AM , Rating: 2
Runs on ARM and x86, as a quick google would have told you.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By MatthiasF on 10/9/2009 8:07:47 PM , Rating: 2
Google Chrome OS is Linux, so in theory they could make a version for MIPS as well if it was to their advantage.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By jonmcc33 on 10/8/09, Rating: 0
RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Flunk on 10/9/09, Rating: 0
RE: Rock and a hard place?
By jonmcc33 on 10/9/2009 10:34:41 AM , Rating: 2
LOL! My post was rated down...probably by nVIDIA fanatics.

Actually, it has been that way even since Windows XP. My old AMD rig with an nForce4 Ultra chipset constantly crashed whether I had Windows XP and even when I put Vista on it.

I switched to an Intel P35 chipset with a Core 2 Duo and haven't seen a single BSOD since.

I'll never touch another nVIDIA product again. Horrible product quality and QA.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By mindless1 on 10/9/2009 3:40:52 PM , Rating: 2
You are a good example of someone incompetent that randomly blames a part because you don't know what was wrong, then through dumb luck and replacing major components, happened to get rid of the problem.

If you were a bit scientific about it you would have observed millions of users of the same chipset didn't have the problem so it wasn't the variable between your instable system and their stable one.

Way to go even more overboard though, thinking if someone disagrees they /must/ be a fanatic.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By hyvonen on 10/10/2009 12:43:18 AM , Rating: 2
What a weak argument. His point was clear - statistics show that most crashes are caused by NVidia hardware/software. I don't know how you concluded that he said most NVidia hardware/software causes crashes... Go back to school and take some logic classes, mkay?

I remember seeing a similar statistic somewhere, except that it said Nvidia was the #1 source of crashes, but wasn't responsible for most of them. Regardless, I second his view that Core2Duo + Intel chipset doesn't seem to crash much. I don't remember the last time I had BSOD... no wait, I do: it was back then when I was trying to pair an AMD CPU with a Via chipset.


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By ExarKun333 on 10/9/2009 10:01:12 AM , Rating: 2
Nvidia makes crap chipsets anyway for Intel. If I was Intel, I probably wouldn't want my chips asscoiated with sub-par third party boards either. Nvidia hasn't been relavent in chipsets for years. The only reason they were in the last 3-4 years is because they had exclusivity on SLI until recently; once that disappeared, they were toast. The last "great" chipsets from them were the nForce series for 939 and early AM2. How many great Intel chipsets since then? A WHOLE lot! :)


RE: Rock and a hard place?
By Golgatha on 10/9/2009 10:51:27 AM , Rating: 2
The sad truth is there is no room in my box for a nVidia chipset when my Intel one supports SLI and Crossfire simultaneously. Consumers like choice. Not to mention nVidia doesn't have as good of a stability track record when compared to Intel chipsets IMO.


amd pc
By farmboyz on 10/9/2009 12:30:34 AM , Rating: 2
So my next pc will be AMD with the latest nvidia motherboard.. Good bye intel




RE: amd pc
By SiliconAddict on 10/9/2009 1:07:32 AM , Rating: 2
LOL. Yah because AMD has anything that isn't vaporware that will complete with Intel's wares. Face facts. AMD is at minimum a generation behind Intel at this point. Possibly a generation and a half. And no matter how many announcements AMD makes about "next year" that isn't going to change until their start really kicking it into gear.


RE: amd pc
By cyriene on 10/9/2009 6:52:12 AM , Rating: 5
Intel owns the high end true, but AMD is very competetive in the mid and low end which is where most PC sales are.
Intel puts out better benchmark numbers, but the 955 can game just as well as i7.

I've been eyeing the 620 to use in my new server just to test out the $99 quadcore. Intel has nothing in that price range to compete.


RE: amd pc
By slunkius on 10/9/2009 7:23:11 AM , Rating: 2
so true, i built several mid range pc's for my friends, and i can say that after release of second generation phenom/athlon, AMD is still in the game. If bragging rights for the fastest computer is not your thing, AMD is a viable alternative.


RE: amd pc
By Pirks on 10/9/2009 6:38:25 PM , Rating: 2
I'm only considering assembling AMD 780G/785G systems with latest Athlon X2's for my relatives who need cheapo silent mATX home PC for work/inet/multimedia/movies/light gaming (Sims etc). They always work fast with Vista and have no problems with stability. My latest build with new 45nm Athlon II/785G/4GB DDR3 is a sight to behold, beautiful, small black stylish mATX box, cheapo as I don't know what, real real fast with Win7 RTM, etc etc - I won't touch Intel with 10-foot pole for building PCs like these, although I have Intel/nVidia desktop as my main gaming rig, because I needed fastest dual core CPU and AMD had nothing at the time (in 2007). So AMD still pwns Intel for mainstream cheapo sub-$500 PCs, with the opposite situation in ultra high end segment where nothing beats i7 so far. It's a wash wash in high end where Phenom II X4 successfully defends itself against Intel quads, but the situation will turn to worse for AMD when i5 prices drop in a few months. The next cycle of war will begin then :)


RE: amd pc
By MamiyaOtaru on 10/10/2009 2:34:03 AM , Rating: 2
too bad nVidia isn't planning on making any more AMD chipsets http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/15852/37/


unfair
By lane42 on 10/8/2009 9:34:27 PM , Rating: 4
Did i see the words intel and unfair business tactics in the same story, can't be.




RE: unfair
By dragunover on 10/8/2009 10:49:12 PM , Rating: 1
Naw, it can't be true!


RE: unfair
By dubyadubya on 10/8/2009 11:00:58 PM , Rating: 2
I'd like to see Nvidia spend their time fixing their video drivers! It seems each new release is more bugged than the last.


RE: unfair
By NCC1701QUAD12 on 10/8/2009 11:37:57 PM , Rating: 2
I think Nvidia should focus on Vid cards for now and improve drivers to go along with it. I've owned cards from both camps, red & green. I currently own one from the green team and I'm very happy with it! Right now Nvidia needs to focus on their bread and butter!


RE: unfair
By Ralos on 10/9/2009 12:40:47 AM , Rating: 2
I'd say that's a direct consequence of the Ion platform (being too good). Intel plays fair so long as it produces better products.

Of course you can produce chipset for the Intel platform, but if you're getting too good at it, then they'll tell you that your chipset license doesn't license you to use this bus or interface using that technology. That's all bull.

Also, I don't know who's going to be fooled by this "temporarily halt" in chipset development. I took years to companies like nVidia, ATI, ALi, ... to make solid chipsets for Intel and AMD processors. You just don't take your chipset design team and put them in storage and take them out in a year or two and bang, start producing quality chipset again.

This is as definitive a it's going to get.

Maybe somebody will learn at some point...

http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=64206...


RE: unfair
By crystal clear on 10/9/2009 11:16:28 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
I don't know who's going to be fooled by this "temporarily halt" in chipset development.


Motherboard manufacturers dont get fooled-they simply dont invest in R&D/manufacture or produce boards that could one day could become a liabilty & pile up in their warehouses/inventory (the risks are very serious).

Hey, they do not know how(in whose favour) this Intel/Nvidia case will end & WHEN.

They dont bet/speculate on such matters-they simply STOP R&D/manufacture for this line & allocate resources to other product designs(mobo) that SELL.

So the message they give is "Sorry No motherboards"


The Douche Strikes Back.
By SiliconAddict on 10/9/2009 1:00:28 AM , Rating: 4
Ahhh Intel. Why do you have to be such a douche?




RE: The Douche Strikes Back.
By amanojaku on 10/9/2009 8:22:24 AM , Rating: 3
Intel: "Because we don't like dirty competitors!"


RE: The Douche Strikes Back.
By Taft12 on 10/9/2009 8:02:38 PM , Rating: 2
They don't like themselves?


So what?
By Griswold on 10/9/2009 4:08:00 AM , Rating: 2
Nobody with a sane mind (or the absolute desperate need for SLI?) wants to have a nvidia chipset in their box - its aged garbage.




RE: So what?
By icanhascpu on 10/12/2009 6:40:34 AM , Rating: 2
CHOICE SUCKS!


RE: So what?
By Pirks on 10/13/2009 1:26:33 PM , Rating: 2
(C) Steve Jobs


PR Spinning Merely Clouds That Nvidia is Toast
By burpnrun on 10/9/2009 12:40:26 PM , Rating: 4
Nvidia can spin it anyway they like, but they are out of the new AMD and Intel chipset business. The "suspended" spin is so that their common shares don't tank overnight on the stock exchanges.

They are in the process of getting eaten alive by AMD in the discrete (add-in) graphics card business. The 58xx, 57xx, etc., new products from AMD mean Nvidia can't produce competing chipsets profitably ... a sure way to lose money quickly. But the discrete card business isn't that big anyways, the volumes are in the integrated chipset (with on-board GPU) business. Nvidia is getting eaten alive by both Intel and AMD there too, with both moving to put more of the integrated GPU functionality into the CPU.

Nvidia doesn't make CPUs and VIA's not an option. Shipments of Nvidia's ION can only be measured with an electron microscope. The new Nvidia Fermi chipset is humungously huge, expensive to make and price competitively, and isn't an x86-compatible processor if one want's to look at it that way. There's no software for it. Remember, applications drive adoption (or why else would everyone write for Windows which is pure x86.32&64?).

Nvidia has massively alienated the OEM and AIB (add-in board) partners through seriously flawed 8xxx and 9xxx (and some 2xx) series cards, including mobile chipsets. Apple, Sony, HP, Dell ... and more ... all hit by massive customer dissatisfaction & high return/repair rates. If you want to see the grisly details, surf over to semiaccurate.com and search on "bumpgate".

No, Nvidia is in a world of hurt, shortly to be joined in hurt world by their stock shareholders. All they can do is spin, spin, spin. The upcoming GT21x series are merely shrunk rebadges of 9500 - 9800's. Wow. What development prowess, eh? "Just wait until GT3xx days", cry fanbois? What, more re-labelled 9800 and 9600 chips? Bummer.

Lousy management, "whoop-ass" testosterone (and hugely misguided) postures of the CEO, and an unfortunate series of setbacks at the chipset foundry have finally reduced this mouthy, technology-leading, profit-milking company to "also ran" status in the period of two years. Quite a record of "accomplishment". Quite a "temporary suspension". No wonder they have been trying to shop the company for some time now (i.e., "for sale").




By PrinceGaz on 10/9/2009 8:29:38 PM , Rating: 2
It does look a bit like nVidia is trying to follow the example 3dfx set. They produced great products, but started setting their sights too high which resulted in ever spiralling costly delays and costly products when they were finally ready which failed to be competitive with more nimble competition (3dfx vs nVidia back then, nVidia vs AMD now roughly ten years later).

nVidia really need to pull their finger out now and focus on their core market (graphics) because their chipset business is all but finished. Otherwise their graphics business and nVidia as a whole will be finished as well, with either Intel or AMD buying up whatever remains which is of value.


MISSING....
By Amiga500 on 10/9/2009 4:10:21 AM , Rating: 5
One can of whoop-ass.

If anyone has seen this can of whoop-ass, could they please get in contact with:

Jen-Hsun Huang
NVIDIA Corporate Office
2701 San Tomas Expressway
Santa Clara, CA 95050




What happens to Apple now?
By Pneumothorax on 10/8/2009 10:56:55 PM , Rating: 2
Is Apple going to use Intel integrated in their next gen i7-based laptops? It would be interesting if Apple is able to use leverage to force intel to allow Nvidia chipsets on their i5/i7 series.




RE: What happens to Apple now?
By Flunk on 10/9/2009 12:21:20 AM , Rating: 2
This announcement means that there will be no other integrated graphics option. But since the graphics is on the CPU with the i7/i5 laptop chips Intel graphics is a pretty good bet. You're stuck with Intel or getting one big enough to fit in a discrete chip.


Really?
By kjboughton on 10/9/2009 1:46:40 AM , Rating: 3
What? It sounds like Intel may pull an "NVidia" on NVidia and create a new closed-source, proprietary GPU-to-GPU-to-CPU technology featuring a second-generation, matured P55+ chipset, DMI (2.0), and a pair or more of Larabee-based graphics adapters. I'm shocked I tell ya! Shocked! It's not like anyone's every set precedent for such a move! (ahem, SLI, ahem)

*snicker* Pay backs a *itch isn't it?




By crystal clear on 10/9/2009 10:14:54 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
The graphics company plans to "postpone further chipset investments," possibly until a licensing disupte with Intel is settled.


Well thats exactly what motherboard manufacturers in Taiwan told Nvidia's CEO recently -

Sorry NO motherboards !




By tviceman on 10/9/2009 10:25:40 AM , Rating: 2
And damn have they made some great processors since the core 2 line, but I hope larabee flops worse than a fish on dry land. The more control they get of this industry, the more we consumers will have to pay.




Once upon a time...
By gstrickler on 10/9/2009 11:20:17 AM , Rating: 2
... large buyers (large corporations and governments) required a second source for major components such as CPUs, that's how many of the cross licensing agreements with AMD and VIA began. Hopefully, someone will step up and demand a second source for chipsets. If that were to happen, Nvidia or VIA would be the natural choice for both Intel and AMD.

While Intel has made some excellent chipsets in the past 10 years, they've also made some real duds. And of course, Intel's IGP has completely sucked until the X4500HD, which makes it all the way up to barely acceptable. I would love to see continued competition in the chipset business, competition drives them to give the comsumer better (faster, more stable, lower power, etc) products.

So, Intel and Nvidia, knock off the BS and work out a licensing deal. Frankly, I don't much care who is causing the problem, I just want to see a deal. I'm not an insider and I don't know who is actually holding things up, but everything I've read suggests that Intel is being stingy and trying to cut Nvidia out of the chipset market, in which case, Nvidia might have a valid anti-trust complaint against Intel. Intel, you're big enough that you need to be very careful in your dealings.

And Intel, x86 everywhere is a really bad idea. Atom sucks, Larrabee isn't looking very interesting or promising. Get your focus back on mainstream CPUs for servers, desktops, and laptops and on developing new technologies (as you did with PCI, PCIe, USB, Flash, etc) and forget about trying to steal away existing markets. You're an excellent innovator, when you focus your attention. Put your attention on something that will benefit the market (rather than hurt your competitors) and you'll reap the rewards as you have done many times before.




A Much better idea.
By scrapsma54 on 10/9/2009 12:04:44 PM , Rating: 2
Since a motherboard has all these different chips manufactured by so many different companies, then shouldn't the motherboard manufacturer get the say who comes in and who cannot?




And then some...
By The0ne on 10/9/2009 12:18:43 PM , Rating: 2
"This week I got an iPhone. This weekend I got four chargers so I can keep it charged everywhere I go and a land line so I can actually make phone calls." -- Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg

Latest Headlines
2/10/2012 Daily Hardware Reviews
February 10, 2012, 5:50 PM
2/9/2012 Daily Hardware Reviews
February 9, 2012, 11:54 AM
2/8/2012 Daily Hardware Reviews
February 8, 2012, 1:11 PM
Ex-Acer CEO Slapped With Lawsuit for Joining Lenovo
February 7, 2012, 5:38 PM
2/7/2012 Daily Hardware Reviews
February 7, 2012, 12:23 PM
2/6/2012 Daily Hardware Reviews -- Intel 520 240GB SSD Edition
February 6, 2012, 12:04 PM
botimage
Copyright 2012 DailyTech LLC. - RSS Feed | Advertise | About Us | Ethics | FAQ | Terms, Conditions & Privacy Information | Kristopher Kubicki