Remember this post by Tommy McClain about XBox2?

Who is Tommy McClain? And eventhough I were personally of the belief that M$ would go with Nvidia I fail to see what is so surprising about them choosing ATI instead.

Anyone can make vague comments and have them fit with reality in some way.
 
I'm Tommy McClain. I'm the owner and founder of Dimension3D.com, the 1st 3D accelerator web site. Plus, I worked for 4+ years for Jon Peddie Associates. They were a PC and console graphics market research firm. Jon Peddie left the company before Penton Media closed the doors in late 2001. He started Jon Peddie Research(www.jonpeddie.com) with some people that worked with him at JPA. Anyway, while working for JPA I ran their website, did their benchmark testing and was an editor for their weekly newsletter where I covered the games industry and benchmarking.

Anyway, my information(from May) was from sources directly in the know and people I've known for years. The information originally stated to me was that I and most investors would be surprised at Microsoft's choice. I've been "off the 'net" for the past week and just heard about the announcement. From little I've read it seems like their was a quite a surprise to investors and a little bit for enthusiasts. Although I never knew who Microsoft actually picked, I had assumed ATI because my source was pretty adamant that NVIDIA did not want it. However, I was still nicely surprised to hear that Microsoft just licensed the IP technology instead of buying a custom chip ala NVIDIA. By going this route they would be responsible for designing and manufacturing the chip themselves. In the long run, it will be much cheaper than having ATI build it and have TMSC or whoever manufacture it. Below is an article from PC World about the news with quotes from Jon Peddie himself:

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/pcworld/20030814/tc_pcworld/112014

Anyway, that's my story. Whether you care who I am or was, or what I knew is up to you. No skin off my nose. But I will say DaveB knows who I am and we've had many personal conversations on the matter. It was a lot of fun speculating on who would finally get the contract. :D

Tommy McClain
 
whoa, I remember Dimension3D.com - I used to read it almost everyday, on my Webtv back in 1997-1998. Did a guy named Nobody's Perfect post there? I seem to recall having discussions with him about 3D chips. Maybe it was another board. That guy was wayyyyyy into Lockheed Martin Real3D, and he made me interested in it too. I read alot of great stuff about 3D in general on Dimension3D.com ^__^
 
Yeah, I remember his nickname, but not much else. Wanna know something else? A whole lot of former Dimension3D forum visitors and posters contribute here now. That's one of the biggest reasons I hang around here, but also for Dave and Rev's sunny disposition and great articles and reviews too. ;)

Tommy McClain
 
Tommy, yeah even though this is THE place nowadays to
discuss 3D, I still shed a tear when i think of the web circa
1997-1998. Dimension3D.com rocked 8)
 
No problem Mfa. Do yourself a favor and do what I did. Subscribe to Yahoo news and have it send you emails of articles with the word "Xbox" in them. I did this and I also created one with the phrase "Jon Peddie". Keeps me from having to actively search them myself. ;)

Tommy McClain
 
Megadrive1988 said:
Tommy, yeah even though this is THE place nowadays to
discuss 3D, I still shed a tear when i think of the web circa
1997-1998. Dimension3D.com rocked 8)

:D Thanks man. It was one of those times in my life that I will never forget and probably will never happen again. But that's OK, I'm now married and have something that I would never give up for the world. If my wife ever reads this, then "I love you sweetie!" ;)

Tommy McClain
 
AzBat said:
Whether you care who I am or was, or what I knew is up to you.
Thanks for the info. I didn't notice your name at the end of the post and when I didn't find a poster by the name of Tommy McClain I thought maybe it was some Spong.com dude (since bbot made this thread).
 
cybamerc said:
AzBat said:
Whether you care who I am or was, or what I knew is up to you.
Thanks for the info. I didn't notice your name at the end of the post and when I didn't find a poster by the name of Tommy McClain I thought maybe it was some Spong.com dude (since bbot made this thread).

I understand, but Spong.com? I take that as an insult! :D

BTW, I always sign my name as below...

Tommy McClain
 
Yeah, I remember Dimension 3D. It was the premiere site for 3d graphics card and tech back in the day. I was just a lurker, but damn that was good stuff.

I also remember Nobody's Perfect, that kid was everywhere on so many different forums.
 
I also remember Nobody's Perfect, that kid was everywhere on so many different forums.

Yes he was, I remember him being virtually everywhere. I think i first read his posts on the BlackBelt HQ forum- the site (or forum) that sprung up around March '97. Not only was Nobody's Perfect on many different forums, he was all over usenet also. he had alot of correct things to say about Sega and Lockheed, even though things didnt...ahem... work out the way he (and i) wanted.
 
Its not that suprising that MS goes with ATI, but its suprising how NV lose it to ATI. Maybe there were some fierce negotiation behind the scene, but NV to lose Xbox2 contract, is a complete fool.
 
I just read on _The_Inquirer_ that a chinese site says that Xbox2 will use a modified Pentium M. Do you know if MS will choose Intel for their cpu, and if so which cpu (I wish they would choose a modified version of "Nehalem", running at 10GHz+)? Will they choose Intel to fab their gpu (that would be good since Intel will be using 65nm process in 2005, meaning that Xbox2 gpu could use a 65nm process, contrary to someone's claim).
 
I don't want them to use another lame cpu, like the Pentium M, especially considering that Sony's Cell "Broadband Engine" will be capable of 1 tflops. Don't you agree, Mr. McClain?
 
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