STM pulls the plug on Kyro

[Teasy]

people can debate the nit picky defenitions of slow development all day long. The Bottom line will ALWAYS be products to market.

I don't think anyone disagree's with you there, once again I was replying to someone who I assumed was blaming the lack of cards on slow design, so I asked him why he thought design was the problem.

The truth is Since the Neon 250 design IT has offered nothing even close to turning the heads of the majority of the community.

The truth is no'one has brought an IT design to the table that's turned the heads of the majority of the graphics card community. Your mistaking what STM or NEC bring out in hardware with what IT can design if required by someone like NEC or STM.. of course IT haven't brought anything to the table, thats not there business.

Had IT been able to launch the Neon 250 on time the entire Graphics market would look very different today

Once again I hate to have to keep making the distinction between IT and the company that actually makes the chip and decides on features, speed, cost, and market but I think its a important distinction, IT were not late with there design for Neon 250 and they didn't decide when to bring it to the PC market because it wasn't there product, it was simply based on there design.. NEC decided to make the Dreamcast a priority.

Instead the Emphasis was placed on SEGA. A deal that became fruitless in only 24 months.

I doubt that was fruitless for IMGTEC, NEC sold around 13+ million chips to sega (Dreamcast + Naomi 1 and II), would they have sold 13 million Neon 250's?.. maybe, maybe not.

On top of that they need a Via, Sony, or other big boy to pick up the ball and score a touchdown. What they need is for someone with oodles and oodles of resources who WANTS to dominate the graphics market ro come in and partner with them

Now I do agree with that 100%, if IT were partnerd with a company that wanted to challenge Nvidia and ATI in the PC graphics market they could do very well IMO.

 

[Roger Kohli]

STG4800 its official!

Just got this mail from Hercules PR Department, good news for Hercules owners:
In response to STMicroelectronics' recent announcement to divest its graphics chipset manufacturing interests, we wanted to assure you that Hercules remains strong and committed to bringing you only the best in graphics technology.Hercules 4000 and 4500 series cards will continue to be available to you and your customers as we have secured ample inventory to fulfill everyone's needs. For the future, we will work with selected vendors in developing and marketing advanced, quality Hercules branded products.Our commitment to offering the very best support to our customers, and your customers remains a priority by providing updated drivers, installation, configuration and field application support, as well as phone and online support personnel.Finally, in the coming months we will aggressively move to position our 4000 and 4500 series cards as industry leaders, and reinforce that with the addition of the much anticipated 3D Prophet 4800, thus ensuring the longevity of our '4' series products.

http://www.3dspotlight.com/

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Roger Kohli on 2002-02-08 23:25 ]</font>

 

[Teasy]

As disappointing as this may be, was it really a shock to anybody? It certainly wasn't to me.

STM has not taken any big steps since Early-Mid 2000 with the first Kyro. Unless you've bought into the Kyro III rumors, there was nothing to lead us to believe that it was actually coming.

It was/is coming, thats not a wild guess either. The fact that STM were always interested in very low end priced boards doesn't mean they would decide to leave the graphics industy does it. You say there was nothing to make anyone think they wouldn't do this and so it wasn't a shock.. well, they licenced both PowerVR 4 and 5 so I'd say that was an indication that they weren't going to suddenly leave the industry, obviously something changed there mind though. So yes of course STM leaving was (or should have been given the facts) a suprise to everyone.

. Other than those who have to place their penis in a hotdog bun, who was really surprised by this announcement?

As I said Joe aint won yet :smile: As far as people being suprised, why wouldn't they be? If Kyro III had been late then you could say that might not have been a suprise to some people, but for STM to sell their graphics division and drop out is a suprise considering they were in advanced development with Kyro III and had already licenced PowerVR 5.

What's the possibility of NEC itself retaking its former position and manufacturing the PVR chips again? I'm sure they have the capabilities to do it, IMG just needs to get the ball rolling again.

Possibly, hopefully someone with a bit more ambition in the PC market will come in though, unless they now have more ambition of course.

Well, you talk as if STM had a choice. That given a price target and timing target, STM could have just "brought out" the KyroI with Kyro II specs.

Why wouldn't they have been able too?, 0.18 micron had been available for a while and would have made Kyro II cheaper then the original Kyro (15 million transistors on a 0.18 micron process rather then 12 million on a 0.25 process).

Well, IMO you can't separate the two. In other words, IF the quality of the technology was really a cut above, then STM would have more incentive to make more of the product line, and be "more ambitious" with it

Not everyone wants to go all out in a market, it doesn't matter if a tech has great potential if the company doesn't want to put a load of money into that and risk being up there with the big boys in that industry, its all about ambition. Its like a football player (my sort of football not U.S stylee :smile who gets a great pass and is suddenly one on one with the last defender. In your opinion every player will take on the last defender and shoot, but actually a less ambitious player will look to make a pass to keep the move going. Its less glorious but it keeps your team going forward and there's far less risk of losing the ball to the other team.

So, IMO, the reason for "lack of ambition" is because of something lacking in PowerVR (either the Technology itself, or the business structure around it), relative to the rest of the market.

Ok thats your opinion, fine, I just don't agree with you :smile:

STG4800 its official!

I hope Videologic make a board based on this chip, Hercules never send me review boards :smile:

 

[Teasy]

Just saw this at Paraknowya:

"OK, I want to say that http://www.clubic.com (French site) contacted Hercules about the Kyro problem.

Hercules answered that they are still confident in their Kyro line of cards and that they won't stop anything. More, they will continue with the one that "could buy what STM sells". Clubic said that Hercules know far more than we do about this strange thing.

You can read between the lines of course but I’ll let you do this.
Frankly, I'm pretty sure Hercules already knows who will take the thing further."

Sounds to me like Hercules knowns who will buy STM's graphics division, knows they will continue making PowerVR chips, and are happy to keep putting those chips in Hercules boards. Hopefully this is the case!

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Teasy on 2002-02-09 00:14 ]</font>

 

[bystander]

Let me understand this.

STM controls or did control, the manufacture of PVR chips. They decide what types of chips to make, (i.e. low, or high end, etc.).

ImgTec develops and designs PVR-Tech, which STM uses as it sees fit.

So ImgTec designs a high-end chip and STM decided to only make a low-end chip, only a low-end chip would get produced.

Is that a correct understanding of this relationship between ImgTec &amp; STM?

 

[Dave B(TotalVR)]

Reverend said:
Oh well, since we're in the mood for nonsense, I'll sell my wife to see a 400MHz DX8 PVR chip.
Hehe...

Can we have some of her 'specs'?

 

[Sonic]

Yes, it seems that's at least somewhat true bystander. It might be time for VL to really start ramping up and asking TSMC or UMC to manufacture the chips themselves. If people think that IMG don't have the capability to actually go back and make their own designs and what not, then they have another thing coming to them. I do think it's time IMG itself stepped up to the plate and offered cards to the consumer that truly are desirable to the rest of the market. They have the best 3d technology there is, why not force there way into the damn market? There's only room for them to grow from the looks of it. If only they had the will to compete and the want for such high success. Maybe SEGA can get another deal with IMG, because that darned Xbox arcade is looking obsolete really soon.

Sonic

 

[Idiot]

Sonic: so who will do the layout then?

Automatic layout aint gonna work here.

From the above posts, i guess PVR supplies STM with VHDL on the register transfer level and STM does the layout and manufacturing.

MfA: any other comment on the issue? BTW Via does have good access to TSMC's flagship processes, even moreso than NV or ATI. (TSMC's final silicon for qualifying their 0,15um and 0.13um processes are Centaur's CPUs)

 

[Entropy]

Something which haven't been made clear is whether STM had an EXCLUSIVE liscense to manufacture the PVR4 and PVR5 designs.

This is important, because if that liscense wasn't exclusive, it implies that ImgTech haven't been able to attract the interest of anyone else. It would also imply that noone would be terribly likely to pick up STMs liscenses, because if anyone was interested, they would have done so already.

Firm info, anyone?

Entropy


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Entropy on 2002-02-09 03:37 ]</font>

 

[Teasy]

Something which haven't been made clear is whether STM had an EXCLUSIVE liscense to manufacture the PVR4 and PVR5 designs.

Yeah I'm pretty sure its exclusive to STM (pretty sure means 99.9% sure).

 

[Shark]

Sounds to me like Hercules knowns who will buy STM's graphics division, knows they will continue making PowerVR chips, and are happy to keep putting those chips in Hercules boards. Hopefully this is the case!

I think they say the opposite:

"Hercules 4000 and 4500 series cards will continue to be available to you and your customers as we have secured ample inventory to fulfill everyone's needs"

In other words they have enough chips stored to ensure delivering cards in the next months. Someone who is sure about the future of Kyro chips production would never say a word about securing an ample inventory.


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Shark on 2002-02-09 06:03 ]</font>

 

[LeStoffer]

Well, no mather what the longterm prospect is for the Kyro (III) this is one more reason not to delay my purchase of a new card (my Geforce DDR is over the hill, you know). I was hoping for a fast mid-priced Kyro III this spring. "Forget a'bout it!" Donnie Brasco-stile...

I'm sorry but right now my eyes are fixed firmly on the GF4 ti4600.

The only thing that could change this is a spring release of the ever elusive Matrox-part or an *early* summer release of ATI R300.

Regards, LeStoffer

 

[bystander]

Is it a exclusive licence?

http://www.powervr.com/Release.asp?ID=26

Kings Langley, England and Geneva, Switzerland, 26 June 2001 - Imagination Technologies Group (LSE: IMG), the leading provider of human computer interface intellectual property (IP), and STMicroelectronics (NYSE:STM), a world leading supplier of system-on-chip solutions, today announced that they have extended their successful partnership to include the development and manufacture of a range of high performance PC graphics and video accelerators based on PowerVR Series4 and Series5 technology designed by Imagination Technologies’ PowerVR Technologies division

AFIAK it just looks like a partnership to me. It doesn't say any about exclusive licences. Could someone clear this up, whether STM has the only licences to produce PVR series 4 and 5?

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: bystander on 2002-02-09 12:13 ]</font>

 

[Dave Baumann]

I actually asked Dave Harold at ECTS whether they were actively seeking any other licensee's for the desktop parts, and he said something olong the lines of "we're happy with ST, its safe to say we are not looking".

 

[roninja]

Well I personally think STM pulling out of the PC Graphics card business could be the making of IMG, they have all to often been the small partner to a very large company, and there for readily expendible, last year it was Sega... IMG need to either go it alone or go with a company that needs its technology and can use it aggresively, after all Kyro has an impressive price performance ratio, and the cards were award winning, but as been said many times, it is the high end which a card needs to be noticed. So what now for Kyro3, maybe Videologic should initially go it alone, then perhaps team up with Via to develop an integrated solution as they have often stated they desire to get into.

Fortunately for imagination tech, not all their eggs are in one basket, and it is comforting to see Hercules still backing the Kyro range.

 

[king_iron_fist]

So generally speaking we can expect to see the 4800 ultra at cebit as hercules already seem ready to manufacture it but the kyro III will be put on hold until a partner comes in who's got the drive to manufacture. However, if it doesn't get released until august/september then there will surely be better cards around for price/performance. Will powervr have to up the specs to allow for the extra downtime.

 

[Teasy]

I think they say the opposite:

"Hercules 4000 and 4500 series cards will continue to be available to you and your customers as we have secured ample inventory to fulfill everyone's needs"

That was a different quote, it wasn't the one I was refering to. The one I was refering to was from an email to Clubic.com. As far as I can gather they basically said (basically as in not a great translation from French) "we will continue with the company that buys what STM sell".

So generally speaking we can expect to see the 4800 ultra at cebit as hercules already seem ready to manufacture it but the kyro III will be put on hold until a partner comes in who's got the drive to manufacture

Thats if STM aren't already negotiating with someone for their graphics division. For all we know they could have already found the company to take over were STM left off (which is a point thats strenghened by what Hercules have said), so Kyro III might not be put on hold at all.

 

[king_iron_fist]

However someone at paraknowya forums gave the cryptic clue that the card we've all been waiting for definitely won't be shown at cebit but a lesser one will be unveiled.

Methinks even if you look optimisticly the kyro III won't be out until at least june. I'm hoping I can get it before U2 comes out though :smile:

 

[bystander]

From Gamespot: BTW that's a great headline...

Kyro II nears end of the road

ST, the struggling semiconductor giant responsible for producing the Kyro and Kyro II, announces it's leaving the PC graphics business.

STMicroelectronics will withdraw from the PC graphics chip market, and is currently looking for a buyer for that part of its business, which produced and sold the Kyro and Kyro II graphics chips. Kyro II graphics cards were announced by ST and Hercules last spring and quickly gained some attention for providing a surprisingly high level of game performance at a low price point. The Kyro chips are based on an PowerVR's efficient tile-based architecture, which was also at the heart of the Dreamcast's graphics.

In North America, Hercules has been the primary producer of Kyro and Kyro II cards, which were marketed under the names 3D Prophet 4000 and 3D Prophet 4500. The company issued a statement assuring continuing supplies of the cards: "Hercules 4000 and 4500 series cards will continue to be available to you and your customers as we have secured ample inventory to fulfill everyone's needs. For the future, we will work with selected vendors in developing and marketing advanced, quality Hercules branded products."

Hercules went on to mention that there's an additional Kyro II product on the way, the 3D Prophet 4800, which would likely use stored- up supplies of the ST chip. We'll have information on this new card as it becomes available.

http://gamespot.com/gamespot/stories/news/0,10870,2846688,00.html

 

[Geeforcer]

Finally, in the coming months we will aggressively move to position our 4000 and 4500 series cards as industry leaders...

Am I the only one who can't see Hercules Kyro I and II cards becoming "industry leaders" in "coming months"?