ATI engineering must be under alot of strain. MS funding?

[Brimstone]

I think people are kind of missing the obvious here: M$ has made its decision relative to what it knows of both companies' upcoming technologies, which presumably is much more than we do.

And you're also seeming to assume that this decision is entirely pragmatic, and entirely motivated by performance/features.

It could be due to a number of things:

1. Possible friction between Microsoft and nVidia over DX9 specification.
2. The price mediation on the original X-Box chipset.
3. nVidia not wanting to do the chip.
4. Other possibilities I have yet to think about...

4. Other possibilites I have yet to think about...

The Humus factor

Dave Orton requests the creation of a demo that would vividly express the power of its future technology. This request results in a specially created Humus demo. The demo had such an impact on Microsoft execs that it tiped the scales in ATI's favor.

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

Just what the hell is all this babble!? You don't run a company on luck. You look at foundry technology, goals, and actual progress to make these decisions. Not luck. TSMC had a very realistic goal of having .13 micron technology ready in time. They thought so and so did Nvidia. Just because it didn't pan out on time doesn't mean they were in any way relying on "luck." Also, I'm tired of this dribble about a "lack of imagination." I don't see how you can say that the N3x architecture is in any way lacking in imagination of design. Perhaps it would be better worded to say that because of an overimaginative design the product was less stellar than expected.

Well putting all your eggs into an unproven and not yet available process, and then doing it for a "overimaginitive design" that turns out to be "less stellar than expected" doesn't seem to be a very good way to run a company either.

You know how Nvidia has been so successful? They persued OEMs agressively with little competition from 3DFX (who mostly ignored the OEM market in favour of retail to their great cost) and ATI (who for many years concentrated on low end OEM only).

Nvidia regulary introduces new tech that is too slow and clumsy to be used for the first couple of generations in order to gain marketing tick boxes for the OEMs they service. They renforce this with reliance on ramping up clockspeeds of both their GPUs and memory technology. In the retail sector they just marketed themselve with a "speed is king" approach and leveraged their dominant position with developers, just as 3DFX did before it.

Nvidia have grown stale and top heavy, thinking they can just market their way to success using faster cores and memory, without having to do any revolutionary thinking. This is why a revitalised ATI managed to come along and scalp Nvidia using the "impossible" .15 R3x0.

EDIT: Of course one of the biggest boosts that Nvidia got to put them in the position they are in today was when 3DFX stopped supplying chips to OEM card manufacturers, which drove virtually all the OEM card maufacturers into Nvidia's arms. I don't think Nvidia is going to luck out get the same sort of massive market shift in their favour because one of the two main chip manufacturers suddenly sends all it's OEM business to Nvidia.

 

[Qroach]

Joe,

Dave has certain inside information and contacts that most of us don't...and such information he is undoubetdly he isn't suppossed to share.

hmmm....

But if SOMEONE ELSE publishes the same or similar info, Dave is of course, free to make reference to it.

Ok I can understand that...

Not that I know his sources or what they tell him...but when Dave does make a post with a reference, that tends to become true. The source may be completely guessing, and they may not. But the point is, Dave made a reference to it. Of course, he won't / can't say that the source agrees with his own...but he probably figured most people should be able to read between the lines and figure it out. Out of frustration....he just dropped you the most blatant hint.

Hmm interesting theory,. I just didn't take his comments as that... I thought he just wanted to point out how he disagreed or didn't like something I said... Which is why I was wondering what the deal was. I honestly though he posted it becuase it was an interesing rumor. I certianly didn't think he had inside info on it. What's been said would fall in line with some strange rumors I've heard from month back about "wouldn't it be nice to see a Mario game on Xbox towards the end of this year" but i certianly didn't beleive it back then.... Wow, cool stuff, Sorry I didn't ge tthe message Dave, this realy is good news...

 

[Joe DeFuria]

I honestly though he posted it becuase it was an interesing rumor. I certianly didn't think he had inside info on it.

I do want to be clear on something, lest people start jumping to false conclusions.

Dave doesn't personally share any inside info with me, so I don't know what he does or doesn't know, or when he knew it. It's just that it's obvious to me that he does have inside information, particularly with certain companies, based on all the "hints" he drops, and even the occaisional "I know something about this but I can't tell" posts.

It doesn't make too much sense for Dave to point out a source that is directly contradictory to other inside sources he has...unless he's a really sadistic pig!

What's been said would fall in line with some strange rumors I've heard from month back about "wouldn't it be nice to see a Mario game on Xbox towards the end of this year" but i certianly didn't beleive it back then.... Wow, cool stuff, Sorry I didn't ge tthe message Dave, this realy is good news...

And to be clear, I don't recall Dave actually pointing out sources that push the rumor that MS and Nintendo are considering some type of really close and complimentary console development. (He may have, I just don't recall it.)

If he has, then I'd wager that it probably agrees with whatever sources he has. And one last disclaimer...even if Dave does have sources, and they agree with other rumors...that still just makes them un-official, and are subject to change before any public info becomes available.

 

[Qroach]

Joe, so you're basically saying that he has inside sources, but you don't know for certain that he's thinking what you are thinking? If you don't know what dave is thinking, then it' pretty tough to read "between the lines" as looking for a hidden meaning in everything someone says can be a real waste of time.

Perhaps it'd be best to let dave attempt to answer the questions in his own way? Since he did post two ruimors and I'm not sureif he's thinking both are valid or only one...

There as been lot's of websites that have reported ATI as being the next to go into xbox, but I seriously doubted MS would choose this so early on, but that was just my opinion. It is pretty interesting that the decision has been made now, at a time so close to nintendo talking abut thier next generation system. Just speculation on my part, but I've said for a while, the only chance of anyone taking number one spot from Sony is for Nintendo and MS to team up. I'd honestly look forward to something like that...

 

[Joe DeFuria]

Joe, so you're basically saying that he has inside sources,

Right...

but you don't know for certain that he's thinking what you are thinking?

How can anyone be "certain?" You asked what he meant by "Regarless of where it was coming from, perhaps you should have been looking at who was posting it..." It's certainly obvious to me exactly what he meant, considering that he has inside souces, and yet obviously he can't divuldge directly what he knows.

It's like being under NDA. You can't reveal what you know under the NDA, but you can certainly point to other sources in the public domain that claim to have the inside story. (You just can't absolutely confirm or deny them.)

If you don't know what dave is thinking, then it' pretty tough to read "between the lines" as looking for a hidden meaning in everything someone says can be a real waste of time.

What hidden meaning? Dave posted a source, Spong, which by the way was the earliest known "source" that "confirmed" ATI had the x-box.

Perhaps it'd be best to let dave attempt to answer the questions in his own way?

Sure, but he of course can't directly answer this. So you'll have to "read into it...despite your distaste for it.

There as been lot's of websites that have reported ATI as being the next to go into xbox,

Spong was the first one that claimed it with authority. The Market reactoed to Spong's news.

but I seriously doubted MS would choose this so early on, but that was just my opinion.

About 2 years before a potential launch (fall '05) is hardly early on by any stretch of the imagination. I'd say it's actually pretty late, actually.

 

[Ailuros]

I would agree that that's probable, but is not the only reason. The register usage issue is the one glaring problem, I think, of the NV3x architecture. That problem may have been there on paper to begin with, we just don't know. What is sure is that that part of nVidia's problem is independent of the DX9 specs.

It's the other major problem the NV3x is having that I'm talking about here: the necessity of the NV30-34 to use integer types for reasonable shader performance. Microsoft totally shut this avenue down (for developers who use Direct3D). It seems to me such a simple thing to add integer types.

I'm not going to further elaborate on it for the moment. I'm just patiently waiting someone to expose more than the few details I could possibly know.

Isn't NV35 supposed to not to have all the integer stuff present in NV30? How does shader performance look like now?

I would like to ask how many, ( and which) vastly experienced people retired some time ago and how it could affected the whole process, but that one might be going too deep into a company's internals, I'm not willing to discuss anyway.

Bottomline is that IHVs make their own design decisions and since Microsoft calls them all to define future DX specs, the responsibility of each architecture lies exclusively at each IHV and how well they were able to predict future API incarnations and their tidbits.

I think those rumors were based on what people saw in the Radeon 9700 Pro, not on anything close to real knowledge. The actual deal was, almost certainly, not settled until just before the announcement (1-2 weeks tops). If anything, nVidia representatives may have been doubtful about getting the deal due to their relationship with Microsoft at the time. I don't believe there was anything in the way of concrete information to be had.

ROFL ok

They didn't stand a chance and they knew it.

 

[Qroach]

Joe,

It's like being under NDA. You can't reveal what you know under the NDA, but you can certainly point to other sources in the public domain that claim to have the inside story. (You just can't absolutely confirm or deny them.)

yeah I can understand that, I've been in the same situation at times (nothing recently).

What hidden meaning? Dave posted a source, Spong, which by the way was the earliest known "source" that "confirmed" ATI had the x-box.

Earliest known source? Well certianly not the earliest souce to say ATI was looking to go into xbox 2... They were the earliest source to go out on a limb and say that it was a done deal. The link below shows an article (from another website that is not to be trusted on a regular basis) The Inquirer. They posted an article about ATi going into Xbox in January...

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=7204

source" that "confirmed" ATI had the x-box.

Confirmed now, not until the official annoucement htis week. You can't confirm something without having proof, correct? Well how can you say that spong "cofirmed" this and still say the satement below?

"Joe wrote: even if Dave does have sources, and they agree with other rumors...that still just makes them un-official, and are subject to change before any public info becomes available."

So based on your statment above, I'm sure you'd agree that Spong posted a unconfirmed, "un-official" rumor even if Dave's sources backed it up befor ewe had public info. Spong may have been the first to go out on a limb and say that it was decided... However it couldn't be considered anything more than a un-confirmed/un-official rumor until we actually had REAL confirmation this week.

Sure, but he of course can't directly answer this. So you'll have to "read into it...despite your distaste for it.

As I said, perhaps you should leave Dave to answer it in his own way. Even if he didn't answer my question, it would be better that fueling more speculation about what he could have possibly meant. Even if you are right about what you say, since there's even more questions that have come from what you're telling me...

Spong was the first one that claimed it with authority. The Market reactoed to Spong's news.

The market did react to spongs news, yes... but was that really a stretch from all the other rumors posted about ATI being the the front runner for the next Xbox? I'd say a firm "No" to that. Spong had no authority to claim that anyway. They typically take a rumor and then throw their own spin on it to make it feel like they have inside information. They were the first to claim they had authority on the entire Megaton nonsense and talks about Sega getting sold to MS. They tend to claim having authority on a number of matters, but that doens't make it "true" or "confirmed" or "official" until we have real proof. It just makes it another unconfirmed un-official rumor. Agreed?

About 2 years before a potential launch (fall '05) is hardly early on by any stretch of the imagination. I'd say it's actually pretty late, actually.

Possibly, but MS hasn't done too horrible with less time in the past. Also what you say might be true IF the consoles launch in 2005. it could easily happen in 2006 which would make a final decision now IMO too early. This is really up to Sony...

 

[bdmosky]

According to the information I saw, TSMC was adamant in expressing its reservations to ATi and to nVidia about the state of its .13 micron process early last year--or, I should say, the immaturity of the process.

Source?

Imaginative? Sorry--I see nothing remotely imaginative about overvolting your chips so that you can overclock them on 12-layer pcbs, with giant heatsinks and fans, along with double-wide backplanes, just in an attempt to compete by ramping up MHz in the higher-end market segments. I'm not sure what word I'd use--but it wouldn't be "imaginative." Now, I will admit they've employed quite a bit of imaginative PR in the last year.... Most definitely.

You referred to a lack of imagination in the core architecture design... the packaging in which it was delivered is a whole new matter in itself. Nothing you mention above is at all related to the core design of the entire NV3x architecture.

I really can't understand what your point is, as nVidia just a week or so ago was quoted widely in saying its .13 micron yield problems have been solved and that it looked forward to shipping nv35 in quantity, for the first time, next month (September.)

My point, is that you constantly throw out FUD about Nvidia and do little to back it up. I never said there weren't problems with the .13 micron yields Nvidia has been getting... that's fairly obvious. What I'm saying is that when the decision was made to use the process, all of it's future problems weren't apparent and I will stick by that stance until you can show me where this isn't so. I've also never seen anything that specifically states ATI chose .15 over .13 because of these problems. Just because ATI went with .15 over .13 doesn't mean this decision was made because they foresaw problems with it. Please show me where it says this because I haven't read it... AND I don't want something recent either because marketing would have already put a spin on it. I want to see something from a couple years ago that says we (ATI) made this decision because...

 

[bdmosky]

Well putting all your eggs into an unproven and not yet available process, and then doing it for a "overimaginitive design" that turns out to be "less stellar than expected" doesn't seem to be a very good way to run a company either.

Because all their "eggs" went in one basket... I see few products they are shipping using .13 micron technology... not all of them. It's easy to say this in light of problems we see now, but no one was bitching at them for making these decisions a couple years ago.

Nvidia have grown stale and top heavy, thinking they can just market their way to success using faster cores and memory, without having to do any revolutionary thinking. This is why a revitalised ATI managed to come along and scalp Nvidia using the "impossible" .15 R3x0.

ATI rose from the ashes to slaughter the horrible enemy giant and bring freedom to all the mindless drones who were trapped by the spell cast by the evil one. It's such a touching tale don't you think?

I think it's a little bit too early to be calling Nvidia stale and top heavy...

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

Because all their "eggs" went in one basket... I see few products they are shipping using .13 micron technology... not all of them. It's easy to say this in light of problems we see now, but no one was bitching at them for making these decisions a couple years ago.

Nvidia decided to go with unproven technology. They knew it was risky, took that risk and paid the price. You keep making out that it was a reasonable decision for Nvidia to go with .13 . It is never a reasonable decision to put all your eggs into one unproven basket. The complete and utter failure of NV30 cost Nvidia a *lot* of money and proved that it was a poor decison. Nvidia jumped that way because they mistakenly belived that .15 was not up to the task. ATI proved Nvdia wrong, and built a better product.

ATI rose from the ashes to slaughter the horrible enemy giant and bring freedom to all the mindless drones who were trapped by the spell cast by the evil one. It's such a touching tale don't you think?

If you want to romanticise corporate competition, go ahead. It's not like companies in general arn't described as "arch-rivals" or other such adverserial language. Companies are in economic combat with one another, and they are fighting over the spoils of the wars they engage in. Fact is, ATI's recent performance has hurt the reputation and bottom line of Nvidia.

I think it's a little bit too early to be calling Nvidia stale and top heavy...

Just look at the lack of innovation and execution in their products over the last couple of years. Or a company run by it's marketing while not delivering on the products, and lying to the public at the same time. Or the crippling of future markets with the likes of Gforce 4 MX. Cheating on benchmarks rather than making faster chips. Trying to own the API with CG. Looks like a stale and top heavy company to me.

 

[bdmosky]

Nvidia decided to go with unproven technology. They knew it was risky, took that risk and paid the price. You keep making out that it was a reasonable decision to make for Nvidia to go woth .13 . It is never a reasonable decision to put all your eggs into one unproven basket. The complete and utter failure of NV30 cost Nvidia a *lot* of money and proved that it was a poor decison. Nvidia jumped that way because they mistakenly belived that .15 was not up to the task. ATI proved Nvdia wrong.

*sigh* All I am asking is where I can find it stated several years ago, that moving to .13 micron technology was going to be a huge or unreasonable risk!!! Obviously Nvidia thought it was reasonable or they wouldn't have done it. I also think it's incorrect to say ATI proved Nvidia wrong... they didn't design the NV30, perhaps it isn't possible on .15. For one, it has quite a sizable difference in size to the r300 and r350 and I've yet to see a comparably sized product from ATI come out at .15.

Just look at the lack of innovation and execution in their products over the last couple of years. Or a company run by it's marketing while not delivering on the products, and lying to the public at the same time. Or the crippling of future markets with the likes of Gforce 4 MX. Looks like a stale and top heavy company to me.

You're right... first to the market with descent speed 32 bit color, first to market with workable T&L, first to the market with DX8 hardware... obviously they've been lacking in innovation for quite a few years now. Or how about those "crippling" ATI products like the 9000 or 9200 series... You know what, I didn't like the feature set of the Geforce 4MX either, so I didn't buy one... but guess what? They have low cost DX9 hardware now... does ATI? Would I even buy those? No, I think they're utter crap, but you gotta start somewhere. I can pick apart the products on both sides of the line, but I'll tell you something, they all have their niche and it's nice that both companies are offering them.

 

[Unit01]

300mhz+ on a .15 chip is impossible
just look at the parhelia
Nvidia wont openly state that i think. But they did in aftermath say that Nv30 wasn't the greatest.
But you can't honestly expect a press release saying something along "We're now moving to .13 fabrication and it will be a big risk for our company." Does that put fate in the company?

 

[bdmosky]

But you can't honestly expect a press release saying something along "We're now moving to .13 fabrication and it will be a big risk for our company." Does that put fate in the company?

No, but I can expect industry analyst comments from the timeframe.

 

[Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.]

*sigh* All I am asking is where I can find it stated several years ago, that moving to .13 micron technology was going to be a huge or unreasonable risk!!! Obviously Nvidia thought it was reasonable or they wouldn't have done it. I also think it's incorrect to say ATI proved Nvidia wrong... they didn't design the NV30, perhaps it isn't possible on .15. For one, it has quite a sizable difference in size to the r300 and r350 and I've yet to see a comparably sized product from ATI come out at .15.

It was always risky because no one had done it. At the time, Intel had only just managed it with some of the best fabs in the world, AMD were having problems, and TMSC & UMC had not got it working with decent yields. I'm not denying that Nvidia thought it was reasonable, but they knew it was a gamble. They knew they were relying on advanced processes that had yet to be developed - and that is always a risk because there are always delays in developing new tech. Nvida were wrong, and ATI proved that *better* levels of performance could be had from .15 with a good design. Where ATI used innovation with R300, Nvdia relied on a die shrink and DDR2 to increase clock speed on NV30 - no innovation there.

You're right... first to the market with descent speed 32 bit color, first to market with workable T&L, first to the market with DX8 hardware... obviously they've been lacking in innovation for quite a few years now. Or how about those "crippling" ATI products like the 9000 or 9200 series... You know what, I didn't like the feature set of the Geforce 4MX either, so I didn't buy one... but guess what? They have low cost DX9 hardware now... does ATI? Would I even buy those? No, I think they're utter crap, but you gotta start somewhere. I can pick apart the products on both sides of the line, but I'll tell you something, they all have their niche and it's nice that both companies are offering them.

I was there. Those "first to market" features were only tickboxes so that OEM marketing would find Nvidia products more attractive. Unplayable framerates using 32bit colour, large texture support or AA? The Nvidia answer was to turn those features off. Oh, and lets not talk about the Nvidia T&L that was known as the "3D Decelerator".

Nvidia does have low cost DX9 hardware, but is it useful? It runs DX9 so slowly and with limited hardware support and loads of Microsoft compliancy wavers, that it is, as with previous low end Nvidia products like the MX, it's simply marketing BS. They call the part DX9 in order to sell more of them, knowing that no DX9 game will be able to use those advertised features in a satisfactory way. Nvidia did the same with 32bit colour, large texture, AA, etc - PS/VS support for DX9 is being handled in the same way.

 

[Joe DeFuria]

Quincy,

Earliest known source?

Yes, the earliest source that had enough apparent credibility to impact the stock market. (As I said.)

Confirmed now, not until the official annoucement htis week. You can't confirm something without having proof, correct? Well how can you say that spong "cofirmed" this and still say the satement below?

I said "confirmed" in "quotes" (understand my usage of quotes?) Obviously, nothing was official until this past week.

So based on your statment above, I'm sure you'd agree that Spong posted a unconfirmed, "un-official" rumor...

Correct.

... even if Dave's sources backed it up befor ewe had public info. Spong may have been the first to go out on a limb and say that it was decided... However it couldn't be considered anything more than a un-confirmed/un-official rumor until we actually had REAL confirmation this week.

Um, correct. Do you not understand my position at all?

Spong was a simply a public source that Dave could reference for the information.

As I said, perhaps you should leave Dave to answer it in his own way.

As I said, if what I'm saying is correct, then Dave can't answer it in any way that would be definitive.

The market did react to spongs news, yes... but was that really a stretch from all the other rumors posted about ATI being the the front runner for the next Xbox? I'd say a firm "No" to that.

So what is your point?

My only point is that Spong's story was different from all the other stories up to that point, because the street took it seriously. For whatever reason.

Possibly, but MS hasn't done too horrible with less time in the past.

How far in advance did Microsoft announce nVidia for the X-Box 1?

Also what you say might be true IF the consoles launch in 2005.

True. And every report I've seen so far is either 2005 or 2006.

it could easily happen in 2006 which would make a final decision now IMO too early. This is really up to Sony...

So, how long is MS supposed to "wait" until Sony officially annouces the release date of it's new console before it schedules it's own?

It's not up to Sony. It's up to Microsoft.

 

[bdmosky]

I was there. Those "first to market" features were only tickboxes so that OEM marketing would find Nvidia products more attractive. Unplayable framerates using 32bit colour, large texture support or AA? The Nvidia answer was to turn those features off. Oh, and lets not talk about the Nvidia T&L that was known as the "3D Decelerator".

You're still holding Nvidia to a double standard. You complain about the MX holding back DX8 technology, yet they were in their own right decent performers. Now you complain about the low-end FX line because they can't perform? You've got to start somewhere. Many of these features may need turned off for DX9 games, but at least developers will code in DX9 features because a larger user base exists.

 

[RussSchultz]

Oh, and lets not talk about the Nvidia T&L that was known as the "3D Decelerator".

Um, you're not confusing something with the S3 Virge are you?

I have NEVER heard term used to describe the GF2.

 

[martrox]

bdmosky.....
Spend some time reading my take on this.....which, BTW, was posted on Jan 29th!

http://www.beyond3d.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4080&highlight=

 

[Nexiss]

Um, you're not confusing something with the S3 Virge are you?

I have NEVER heard term used to describe the GF2.

I think he is prolly referring to the original GF.