Cebit, SIS and AGP 8x

Lefungus

Regular
See it by yourself ->

http://clubic.com/n/n5365.html



C'est sur le stand ECS qu'il nous a été possible de relever pour la première fois la présence de cartes graphiques exploitant la nouvelle norme AGP : le 8X. Il n'est d'ailleurs pas surprenant de retrouver SiS sur le nom des chips graphiques embarqués sur ces cartes.

Le constructeur taiwanais montre une nouvelle fois qu'il se tient à la pointe du progrès en supplantant même les compagnies les plus importantes. Il faudra tout de même attendre encore un peu pour préciser si ce passage au 8X se reflète sur les performances et si les nouvelles puces SiS sont à même de rivaliser avec ce que l'on trouve chez la concurrence.

En attendant de pouvoir analyser les premiers essais de ces puces, nous nous contenterons donc des spécificités générales, plutôt sympathiques. Le haut de gamme est représenté par le SiS336 : processeur 256bit à 300MHz, conformité aux normes AGP3.0, support de l'AGP8X et de DirectX 8.1. Ce chip est accompagné de 64 ou 128Mo de mémoire DDR à 300MHz ainsi que d'une sortie TV.

Le modèle inférieur, SiS332, reste tout à fait correct avec des spécifications relativement proches puisque seules les fréquences de fonctionnement diffèrent : 250MHz pour le chip et 200MHz pour la mémoire.

Enfin, SiS propose des chips "entrée de gamme", moins intéressants de par leurs spécificités (AGP4X, mémoire SDRAM), ils pourraient cependant tirer leur épingle du jeu avec un prix "plancher".




It appears that Sis have 3d graphics cards with directx 8.1 support. There is pictures of these cards on www.clubic.com.
Your thoughts ?
 
wow!
SiS coming High End?
300Mhz DDR memory (DDR600) and Dx8.1 core plus AGP 8x support.

if core practical speed is where it should be, that thing is competiting against Radeon 8500.

and as we know SiS pricing tactics, it will be pretty cheap.

I can't wait for first tests...
 
Wow....things are reallly getting complicated in this industry!

We have the two big boys of graphics, ATI and nVidia, pushing into the chipset market. Now we was SiS with this part, and possibly VIa (with the STM acquisition), pushing into the maintream graphics market.

The competitive landscape continues to evolve!
 
Nappe1 said:
wow!
SiS coming High End?
300Mhz DDR memory (DDR600) and Dx8.1 core plus AGP 8x support.

I can't wait for first tests...

Only DX8 compatible not complaint so maybe the Pixel-shader is useless, cause it is not good enough, like the RadeonI
 
It's great news but I have to see it work first and how compatible it is, strange that I missed this one ............ :-?
 
well, SiS has two pages about Series 330... I'll show the another one.

their CeBit pages says it has DX8.1 Pixel shader as HW.

http://www.sis.com/cebit2002/

EDIT: you must install that web plugin to see pages right. Otherwise, you will see garbage.

I'll quote from that "screenie":

Product: SiS330 Overview
SiS 330, with high performance and promised graphic solution, demonstrates the first GPU to support AGP8X and DirectX 8.1 among the mainstream competitors. Moreover, its embedded "Pixelizer Engine" will generate the maximum output when operating application software. The outstanding features SiS330 provide would shake the mainstream market and push SiS to the leading position.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Features -
-Power GPU to support AGP8x
- AGP 3.0 compliant
-SiS "Pixelizer" Engine
- SiS H/W Pixel Shader
-DirectX8.1 Compliant
- Supports Volume Texture, Bump Mapping, Cubic Mapping, BRDF, Shadow Mapping.
-High Quality Video Processor
- Supports de-interlaced function for video sources from MPEG decoder
- Hyper FSAA (full scene anti-aliasing)
Display Memory Interface
- Up to 128MB SDR/DDR Memory
Multimedia Solution (using SiS301 series)
- Dual Display - Convenient Solution for Dual-monitor
- 3D Wizard - 3D visual function

don't ask why they have two different pages stating different things.

EDIT: looks like without plugin pages are mixed up. they show specs wrong. (SiS315 specs are under Series 330...)

but to me it looks like that DX7 thingy should be under SiS315 which has been out quite a some time.

I hope that MBoeller and Nexus notice this. :-?
could someone fix Mfa's link, please? because now it shows wrong specs.

thanks! :)
[/b]
 
Nexus: wheeh... good that you noticed that I didn't pull those specs from my *$$ ;)

well, let's think about it... if that chip is fast enough to use whole power of DDR600 memory interface and if SiS prices it as aggressively as they usually do, what that would cause to prices generally? ;)
 
look at the 550 page...

it says...
Fully DirectX 8 Compliant

So i guess SiS do have a Dx8 part in their hands.

If they can provide good drivers (stable, compatible and not too slow)

We'll know what lowend card to get for a few monthes....
 
I've fired off a mail to SiS to see what the possability of getting a review sample of one of these is like....
 
DaveBaumann: Great! :) I haven't been so interested about new GFX chip as I am about this one for a loooooooong time. :)
 
With SiS, there are worlds between the often nice looking specs and the reality. Not working features, slow performance, buggy drivers, ...
 
I found the graph at page 10 slightly amusing :)
The bars indicates that it's beating the GF4 MX (notice they didn't write out "MX") bigtime, but looking at the numbers it's with less than 10%.
 
Humus said:
I found the graph at page 10 slightly amusing :)
The bars indicates that it's beating the GF4 MX (notice they didn't write out "MX") bigtime, but looking at the numbers it's with less than 10%.

Agreed, thats nothing spectecular keeping in mind that is has 70MHz higher core and also the benefit of being DX8 compliant, but at least we have a lower end DX8 compliant card. Lets hope SiS can improve the driver soon..
 
Well if they support Pixel Shaders, it's likely because Nature ran, which IS impressive. But it's all marketing anyway whenever you see something from a videocard manufacturer, they're going to present their cards in the best possible light...
 
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