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Note, first of all, that it is in fact quite true that Intel is (planning on) dropping all new RDRAM-based designs from their x86 chipset lineup soon. The last "new" RDRAM chipset Intel releases will be the upcoming 850E, which is just the 850 but speed bumped to work with the upcoming 533MHz FSB P4s (due in April), and to match them with PC1066 RDRAM. Of course, this is very old news, known from Intel roapmaps obtained by everyone and their mom back in October or November.

But that's not what the article says. It's talking only about chipsets for servers and workstations, where, indeed, the 860 is being replaced by the just introducted dual-channel DDR E-7500 (Plumas) and the upcoming dual-channel DDR Placer (as well as a just-introduced chipset from Broadcom), and where the 850 will be replaced by the dual-channel DDR Granite Bay chipset, due in Q3 or so.

Thing is, dual-channel DDR for the *desktop* won't arrive from Intel until sometime in 2003, with the Springdale chipset. (Dual-channel DDRII, in fact.) VIA and SiS are both trying to get their dual-channel DDR chipsets out in time for the 533 FSB P4s (doubtful, but they should be in full swing by Q3), but, again, if you want the very highest-performing P4 desktop, and you want an Intel chipset, you'll either need to ridiculously overpay for a Granite Bay (workstation oriented) motherboard, or you'll have to use the 850E with PC1066 RDRAM, or you'll have to wait until Springdale in 2003.

So, to reiterate:

1) Yes, RDRAM is gone from all future Intel chipset introductions save the 850E, which is just a speed bump, not a new chipset.

2) But that's not what this article is talking about; it's only talking about servers and workstations.

3) RDRAM won't be completely gone until there is a dual-channel DDR chipset to replace it on the desktop; soon from VIA and SiS, not until 2003 from Intel.

If you just read the headline above and the linked *clipping* of a story, you'd think Intel is dropping RAMBUS completely. That is not the case. Here's the original story that the clipping came from. Intel is dropping *exclusive* support for RDRAM. Here's a relevant quote:

Also, although not new products, the next iterations of its 850 and 860 chipsets, supporting a 533MHz front-side, will support RDRAM when they arrive, probably in the second half of this year.

This ties in perfectly with Tom's Hardware review of a new, pre-release 533MHz RDRAM chipset and the Anandtech review of the new Intel DDR-based chipset linked to by /. earlier this week.

I didn't see any references here, so here it is:

http://www.ebnews.com/story/OEG20020226S0040

First, this is an EBM story. Why link to a 2nd hand report that has a link to the primary source right on the page?

Second, it's spurious: "An Intel workstation roadmap secured by EBN" strongly implies that this is not an official Intel announcement.

Third, while it's not such a huge deal for Intel, it's a huge furry deal for Rambus Inc., the well known firm of lawyers. Rambus Inc. is a public company, and as such has an obligation to announce significant events effecting future earnings. "A spokeswoman for Rambus Inc. said she couldn't comment on new Intel workstation chipsets supporting DDR, and referred all questions to Intel" simply doesn't cut it. Rambus Inc. might be greedy lying parasites, but they're surely not stupid enough to sit on information that they must - must - have known about prior to this (alleged) policy change.

Given that Rambus Inc. share price rose 22% yesterday based on the news that Intel had adopted the 533Mhz FSB to support RDRAM, the SEC will no doubt be having a good, long look at their disclosures and these "yes we will/no we won't" announcements, and asking who exactly is releasing them, and who is benefitting from the share fluctuations.

Let's hold fire on this until it's been confirmed by both Intel and Rambus Inc. Please. Pretty please.

Given the bad performances of RDRAM due in large part to its insanely high latency, and Rambus' dubious business practices based mainly on trying to milk patents to leech on the entire memory industry's back, why on earth should anybody give then the opportunity to make a come-back ?

Please knock it off. I work in the electronics parts industry (Controller of Corp.) and know what I'm talking about. This has been a major problem for years now.

EBN Online has many, many articles on this subject.

Here is a sample. Use their search engine, and you'll find others.

Try The ERAI website for checking the effects this problem has on our industry. It's costing us millions, if not billions.

Before you open up your mouth and spew your "humanitarian" garbage, check facts first.

Well, it's a cool idea. I hope they have better luck than candescent!

If Dell &co want reliability, then why do they put up with stuff like this and this? Your argument just doesn't hold water.

Do I even need to mention the Pentium I floating point flaw, coverup, and recall?

Is this true? Consider this article from Fortune about Rambus, in which they were dinged for not disclosing a patent to a standards committee.

The article mentions that Sun and Dell got in trouble for similar things, and had to license the patents royalty-free. Dell had a patent on VL-BUS technology, and Sun had one on DRAMs for SparcStations that Kingston complained about. The Dell story (from 1996) is summarized here and this is from the FTC, while the Sun case (from this year) is mentioned here and here.

- adam

Is this true? Consider this article from Fortune about Rambus, in which they were dinged for not disclosing a patent to a standards committee.

The article mentions that Sun and Dell got in trouble for similar things, and had to license the patents royalty-free. Dell had a patent on VL-BUS technology, and Sun had one on DRAMs for SparcStations that Kingston complained about. The Dell story (from 1996) is summarized here and this is from the FTC, while the Sun case (from this year) is mentioned here and here.

- adam

After this one, Intel will probably announce their DDR chipset very soon! Who wouldn't, after finding out that the Rambus RIMMs were all part of one huge orchestrated lie?

They've already advanced the release date for Brookdale, their DDR SDRAM chipset for the P4. It was originally due in 1Q 2002, but now it's been changed to this October. They don't want to see AMD continue grabbing their market share, and P4s won't sell as long as the Rambus millstone is around their necks. (Personally, even without Rambus, I doubt that the P4 is all that, given the benchmarks that have been released to date. I plan on replacing the K6-III in my main computer with an Athlon sometime in the near future.)

Way back in December, AMD, Samsung and Compaq announced a co-operative to design and manufacture a chipset codenamed "Caspian".

"Caspian will support both the Alpha and Athlon processors using the Alpha EV6 bus architecture common to both devices."

See the story on EBNEWS

But, since then I have yet to see any other news about this partnership.

Going from an Athlon to an Alpha would definately be a sweet upgrade! ;) - Although I doubt that it would be as easy as swapping a chip (seeing as the Athlon and the Alpha use seperate Slot/Socket combos). Enjoy; Dave

According to an EBNews article, "...A board using a single VSA-100 chip -- branded under the Voodoo4 name -- is functioning normally."

The V4 (Which has not yet shipped), is basically meant to be a rival for the TNT-Ultra. According to Anandtech's 3dfx Voodoo4 4500 & Voodoo5 5500 Preview, the V4 (with Beta drivers) does pretty good against the TNT-Ultra. It's a little slower at 640x480, a little faster at higher resolutions. At the same time, it offers some extra goodies like 2x FSAA, improved 16-bit color quality, and (possibly) a lower price.

AMD is working on the next generation Athlon chipset, known as the AMD 760. Following shortly after this chipset will be the AMD 770, which will be the same as the 760, but with SMP. What I have read puts these chipsets coming out next year. Via, Ali, etc may come up with something sooner, but it is doubtful.

Intel uses a proprietary "standard" for their SMP implementation. This forced AMD, Cyrix, etc. to invent an open standard, OpenPIC(?). OS's have written SMP drives for Intel's standard, but since there has never been an OpenPIC SMP motherboard, there are no drivers for OpenPIC.

So, before SMP Athlons, you need a chipset, a motherboard, then drivers. Sound like a long, sad road to me. I want one too...

Now if Intel did actually have a legal agreement that prevented Via from shipping a faster chipset and they broke the agreement, then I am on Intels side.

From my limited understanding, there was no such agreement as such, but the lack of one. Intel has patented the 133Mhz FSB format as well as 4X AGP format, and had NOT cross-licensed these with VIA. VIA then cooperated with National Semiconductor (which did have the correct licenses from Intel) to manufacture the chip set. Intel is upset because these two small competitors pooled their respective Intel licenses. In my uneducated opinion, if intel is going to micromanage the lives of their licensees, I don't see why they made the agreements in the first place.

This article refers to VIA's ploy with Nat Semi. And this one tells of a similar situation, this time between Acer and Nat Semi. "Not a valid loophole," says an Intel's top legal ballbuster, referring to the co-operation between its rivals. But that's up to the court to decide, and I'll bet that VIA's mantra is going to be "monopoly-monopoly-monopoly"

Now if Intel did actually have a legal agreement that prevented Via from shipping a faster chipset and they broke the agreement, then I am on Intels side.

From my limited understanding, there was no such agreement as such, but the lack of one. Intel has patented the 133Mhz FSB format as well as 4X AGP format, and had NOT cross-licensed these with VIA. VIA then cooperated with National Semiconductor (which did have the correct licenses from Intel) to manufacture the chip set. Intel is upset because these two small competitors pooled their respective Intel licenses. In my uneducated opinion, if intel is going to micromanage the lives of their licensees, I don't see why they made the agreements in the first place.

This article refers to VIA's ploy with Nat Semi. And this one tells of a similar situation, this time between Acer and Nat Semi. "Not a valid loophole," says an Intel's top legal ballbuster, referring to the co-operation between its rivals. But that's up to the court to decide, and I'll bet that VIA's mantra is going to be "monopoly-monopoly-monopoly"

I'm not sure I understand the concept. Company A patents a valuable design, then licenses it to Company B. B then improves A's design further with B's own IP (I presume) and sells a competing product. In what way can this violate the original license?

What exactly did Via license--the right to productize an unalterable design or the IP itself? What are the limits? Can VIA fix bugs in the P6 core, or do they need permission? Is the agreement available on the web?

My left pinky aches from all those question marks... Maybe I should check Google.

This article from last October says that VIA used Intel's IP for the 133Mhz front side bus and 4X AGP, then tried to protect itself by having National Semi make the chipset, as they have the correct cross-licensing agreements w/ Intel. That raises one more "?". Does intel have the right to stop its cross-licensees from cooperating with each other, as Via did with National Semi?

My original guess that VIA improved the design with its own IP seems to be wrong, but I'm still disturbed that Intel can use its clout to launch new PC standards and lock them down with patents. No wonder intel is so afraid of the "m" word!