AMD-ATI Merger First Consequence: Ati to Be Renamed AMD

[Arty]

if someone is winning someone has to be losing

Intel losing in either scenarios.

 

[Razor1]

That has much more to do with the graphics choice than the actual chipset choice, if they could get a Intel chipset that did SLI than they would have gone with it. But Nvidia forces SLI with the chipset.

yeah that too but you can't get crossfire at all from Alienware anymore which up till last week was an option. Add ATi cards to that also.

 

[Nelsieus]

Unlike many of the other computers announced today, the FX510 (Gateway) will have ATI Radeon X1900 CrossFire graphics, instead of Nvidia SLI.
http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/07/27/core2duo_newcomputer_announcements/

Global system builders now offering NVIDIA SLI technology-based Intel Core 2 Duo systems include: ABS, Alienware, Alternate, Amax/Ajump, Atelco, Carri, Casper, CyberPower, Everest, Evesham, Falcon Northwest, FDC, HCL Infosystems, Hyrican, iBuyPower, Infinity, Komplete, Kraftway, Levi, Maingear, Mesh, Monarch, Next, NTT, Paradigit, PC Club, Polywell, Quiet PC, Sahara Computers, Scan, SHG, Starmaster, Systemax, Tarox, Topnotch, Velocity Micro, Vicious PC, Vigor Gaming, Vobis, Voodoo PC, and others.
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/060727/sfth004.html?.v=58

Wasn't Core 2 Duo supposed to be Crossfire's big break?

But I still wouldn't associate this with a so called "spiteful Intel." Surely Intel doesn't have that magnitude of presence in the market, right?

 

[Tahir2]

With Conroe Intel will have a massive presence in the consumer retail market. Would have been very good for ATI and I guess the artwork for most of the motherboards being released now is done with Crossfire Ready plastered all over them anyway.

 

[Razor1]

Voodoo pc has crossfire with Core due's as well.

 

[Sxotty]

I was gone while all this went down, and I must say I am saddened by the possibility, and will be further disenheartened if this actually goes through.

This will only hurt the consumer IMO.

The more companies there are fighting it out, the better the prices and innovation. Every merger is a loss when it moves the market closer to a monopoly. And yes obviously AMD is not at that point atm, but it is not a good thing anyway. I would be happy however if it opened the door up for one of the others contenders in the graphics market to gain in marketshare.

 

[ANova]

Wasn't Core 2 Duo supposed to be Crossfire's big break?

But I still wouldn't associate this with a so called "spiteful Intel." Surely Intel doesn't have that magnitude of presence in the market, right?

Despite what some claim, Intel and ATI were becoming more than just a stopgap relationship. If AMD had not bought ATI crossfire would have grown as well as ATI's marketshare. I saw it happening. Now that Intel wants as little to do with ATI as possible you're going to see nvidia's presense dominate furthur, especially considering nvidia has been the favorite of almost all those companies you listed for awhile now.

 

[IgnorancePersonified]

Is thier any direct proof that ATI-Intel are having a Mills McCartney style breakup or is this just speculation?

 

[DudeMiester]

I was gone while all this went down, and I must say I am saddened by the possibility, and will be further disenheartened if this actually goes through.

This will only hurt the consumer IMO.

The more companies there are fighting it out, the better the prices and innovation. Every merger is a loss when it moves the market closer to a monopoly. And yes obviously AMD is not at that point atm, but it is not a good thing anyway. I would be happy however if it opened the door up for one of the others contenders in the graphics market to gain in marketshare.

You contradict yourself. This merger moves the CPU market farther from a monopoly, not closer. GPUs are a much smaller and more varied market already. You've still got AMD, Nvidia, S3, Intel, PowerVR, 3DLabs, and more all able to do something interesting in the mainstream GPU market should they desire. It's far easier to get into then GPUs, imho.

EDIT: Changed CPUs to GPUs.

 

[Fox5]

You contradict yourself. This merger moves the CPU market farther from a monopoly, not closer. GPUs are a much smaller and more varied market already. You've still got AMD, Nvidia, S3, Intel, PowerVR, 3DLabs, and more all able to do something interesting in the mainstream GPU market should they desire. It's far easier to get into then CPUs, imho.

The x86 license alone keeps other companies out of the cpu market, though I don't think any company could design cpus similar to AMD and Intel and beat them. (But you could see specialized processors, like you see in the PowerPC market, processors which are made to excel at certain types of processing)

S3 and Intel are pretty much exclusively integrated graphics, though S3 does hype themselves up as an extreme gamer's card. I feel sorry for their sponsored Chrome team that has to use their graphics cards in games like Quake 4.
I thought 3dLabs pulled out of the 3d market? Even if they didn't, they're only at the professional level.
PowerVR is the only one I see maybe entering into the mainstream GPU market. Perhaps Intel will sell discrete PowerVR cards.

 

[Kaotik]

The x86 license alone keeps other companies out of the cpu market, though I don't think any company could design cpus similar to AMD and Intel and beat them. (But you could see specialized processors, like you see in the PowerPC market, processors which are made to excel at certain types of processing)

S3 and Intel are pretty much exclusively integrated graphics, though S3 does hype themselves up as an extreme gamer's card. I feel sorry for their sponsored Chrome team that has to use their graphics cards in games like Quake 4.
I thought 3dLabs pulled out of the 3d market? Even if they didn't, they're only at the professional level.
PowerVR is the only one I see maybe entering into the mainstream GPU market. Perhaps Intel will sell discrete PowerVR cards.

Yes, 3DLabs pulled out of PC 3D markets, including professional level.

 

[Fox5]

So is 3dlabs gone? What else did they do besides 3d cards?

 

[Sxotty]

You contradict yourself. This merger moves the CPU market farther from a monopoly, not closer. GPUs are a much smaller and more varied market already. You've still got AMD, Nvidia, S3, Intel, PowerVR, 3DLabs, and more all able to do something interesting in the mainstream GPU market should they desire. It's far easier to get into then CPUs, imho.

There will be one less company after the merger that is closer to a monopoly.

The others you listed in the discrete market make up a few percentage points at most.

 

[Kaotik]

So is 3dlabs gone? What else did they do besides 3d cards?

From 3Dlabs.com

24 Feb 2006
3Dlabs To Refocus Its 3D Graphics Business On Portable Handheld Device Market

 

[Fox5]

From 3Dlabs.com

Another one?! The mobile market has got to be getting overcrowded at this point. Maybe it's just a sign that the PC market's equilibrium point is to have one company producing all the products.

 

[DudeMiester]

The x86 license alone keeps other companies out of the cpu market, though I don't think any company could design cpus similar to AMD and Intel and beat them. (But you could see specialized processors, like you see in the PowerPC market, processors which are made to excel at certain types of processing)

S3 and Intel are pretty much exclusively integrated graphics, though S3 does hype themselves up as an extreme gamer's card. I feel sorry for their sponsored Chrome team that has to use their graphics cards in games like Quake 4.
I thought 3dLabs pulled out of the 3d market? Even if they didn't, they're only at the professional level.
PowerVR is the only one I see maybe entering into the mainstream GPU market. Perhaps Intel will sell discrete PowerVR cards.

I meant GPUs, lol. It's a lot easier to get into the GPU market was my point.

 

[Fox5]

I meant GPUs, lol. It's a lot easier to get into the GPU market was my point.

I dunno if it's really that hard to get into the cpu market. There are lots of DSPs and lower end cpus around, and on the PowerPC side there's several different fairly high end options available.

 

[DudeMiester]

Perhaps, but none of those are mass market devices. Well, apart from their use in consoles and cell phones. In terms of the PC market, I think is far easier for a company to make a new mass market GPU then a CPU. Still hard, but not as much.

 

[Fox5]

Perhaps, but none of those are mass market devices. Well, apart from their use in consoles and cell phones. In terms of the PC market, I think is far easier for a company to make a new mass market GPU then a CPU. Still hard, but not as much.

That's mainly due to a standardized add in and the requirements needed. CPU performance generally has to be near cutting edge, even the lowest end celeron may only be 1/2 to 1/3 the performance of the top end cpu, whereas you can produce a gpu 100x less powerful than others on the market and still find a place for it.
There was a time when there were many cpu manufactuers as well, though there was still the requirement that they had to keep up fairly well in cpu performance. Even Cyrix chips weren't that much slower than the Pentium Pro as the lowest end integrated graphics is to a top end graphics card.

 

[DudeMiester]

Regardless of why the sitation exists, the fact that it does is proof that improving competition in the CPU space at the expense of the GPU space is a good thing for the industry overall. Especially in this case, since the loss on the GPU side of things should be fairly minimal, assuming AMD hasn't reversed their longstanding PR policies overnight and started blatently lying to everyone.