End of Intel-Pin-Compatible CPUs?

sonamchauhan writes ""Intel, Via bury the hatchet" proclaims this news.com article. The settlement reportedly allows Via to build Intel-pin-compatible CPUs for three years more, but Via must cease pin-compatibility after that." This settlement apparently closes out 27 existing lawsuits.

Comments

fr1st ps0t #2

[usotsuki]

Woo!

Well, pin compatibility isn't the issue I'd be concerned with, but opcode compatibility.

-uso.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[maan]

I agree that opcode compatibility is crucial (after all, that's what has allowed companies like AMD to strive, and in turn, brought down the prices of mainstream x86 processors). But if there isn't pin compatibility, then this means that you can't use one motherboard designed for Intel with a Via chip.

Now, it's true that this isn't the case anyway: you can't buy single Via processors anyway, and it has essentially always been the case that you have motherboards for AMD procs, and motherboards for Intel procs. But it's really too bad. Think of how convenient it is that you can take an IDE hard-drive and plug it in anywhere (even Macs nowadays!) Why can't you have simple "plug'n play" processors? Then you'd have real competition among all the companies...any processor on any mobo!

Maan

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[drinkypoo]

it has essentially always been the case that you have motherboards for AMD procs, and motherboards for Intel procs

This is not at all true. I personally have owned at least four different Super Socket 7 boards (one is in my posession now) which would run either a K6 series processor, or any Socket 7 Pentium processor. Some of them would also run various Cyrix processors. VIA bought Cyrix. Hence, VIA *does* have the rights to some processors which are pin-compatible with some intel processors.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[JUSTONEMORELATTE]

you can't buy single Via processors anyway

I think you're mistaken

--

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[intermodal]

i saw them just the other day in a store, and for pennies on the dollar to current P4 chips (lets see you find a brand new 1GHz pentium anything in an average retail store these days)

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[Anonymous Coward]

I own a couple VIA C3 systems. You can buy the bare socket370 or just buy them soldered onto the motherboard with an EPIA series motherboard. (quite popular, only 170x170 mm square. AKA miniITX).

http://www.mini-itx.com/

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[Anonymous Coward]

.... so Intel should just "give it all away"? I say screw those companies. Opcode only. Make them do their own R&D or pay Intel handsomely so they can recoup their R&D costs. Intel would not mind if VIA would only pay for it so Intel could remain competitive.

As it is, VIA is just a bunch of theives with a second rate product.

I wouldn't want to spend millions of dollars to come up with a better car tire, then just give away the rubber formula? C'mon, lets put this in perspective eh?

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[GigsVT]

yeah, but once you factor in that C3 1ghz is about the same speed as a PII in the 300Mhz range or so, it's not so great for speed. It is low power though.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[Anonymous Coward]

Wtf...
"The 667MHz VIA Cyrix III is the coolest processor on the market, delivering ultra-low power consumption due to its innovative design and advanc..."

"The 600MHz VIA C3 is the coolest processor on the market, delivering ultra low power consumption derived from its innovative design and advan..."

Is that even possible for two to be the coolest? And do they mean coolest as in 1337est, or coolest as in it runs the least hot?

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[usotsuki]

I rushed to first-post *g* and look, I got modded up to 5 for 50% Funny, 50% Insightful. ROTFLMAO!!!

You can tell I posted in a hurry, so I'll restate this more clearly; an x86 chip is still x86 no matter how it plugs into the mobo. It's not an issue that they're no longer going to be pin-compatible with an x86 - someone else says they make their own mobos, so they can make mobos for their own CPUs. No big deal.

But I have yet to see a *real* push away from x86. Just as well, because I am going to give up my dear old DOS when you pry it from my cold dead hands!!!

-uso.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[poot_rootbeer]

But if there isn't pin compatibility, then this means that you can't use one motherboard designed for Intel with a Via chip.

Unless...

Unless there were some kind of really simple adapter to go between the chip and the socket, that just does some pin remappings and maybe a little voltage conversion...

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[apdt]

Why can't you have simple "plug'n play" processors? Then you'd have real competition among all the companies...any processor on any mobo!

The prolem is that that would require processors to use a standard interface to the chipset on the mobo, which they don't. There's no real open standard for one either. Besides when you start standardising, you nearly always end up compromising somewhere along the line, which will lead to a performance penalty, and I doubt anyone will go for it if that's the case.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[Pharmboy]

I agree with you in theory, but the upgrade path for CPUs has never been very good anyway, unless you were making very minor upgrades. Assuming most people are like me, and don't consider a new cpu until the new is 2x the speed of the old, this has been a problem even if you stuck with Intel. Bought a 300, cant put a 600 in the slot(66 vs 100 bus), same with 400 / 800 coppermine, etc. The upgrade path for MOST people has always required a new motherboard, most of the time.

I personally like my ibm servers, which have a planer board. You upgrade the whole support chip/cpu/socket in one whack, without tearing out the whole system. Of course, its more expensive (and reminiscent of the old S100 bus Northstars ;) ) but it would be the easiest way to upgrade the cpu since the chipset features change so often. Or a similar system that makes leaves the pci slots (and all your adapters) alone.

But this is just my experience: Its easier to replace the whole motherboard anyway, unless you are only marginally upgrading the cpu. My GUESS is that the main reason there is no easy upgrade path for significant jumps in cpu speed is there is no one wanting to make it easy, rather, they want you to buy a whole new system.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[cymen]

Benchmarks:
Via C3 vs Transmeta CPU
Via C3 vs Celeon 1300 Mhz and 667 Mhz

Given that the current market C3 has a slow FPU it holds up pretty well for the amount of power it uses, the cost, and the form factor it allows. It is nowhere near as slow as a PII 300 Mhz in any of the benchmarks I glanced at. Feel free to point out some ultra-FPU bound benchmark that I missed and you're using to backup your comment.

The C3 is in no way a powerhouse but given that it can be easily used in small form factors like mITX and it is cheap ($50-$120 for motherboard and CPU) it deserves a little respect. I don't even own one but I can't wait for the next C3 that is coming out with full speed FPU and other benefits.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[UniverseIsADoughnut]

"" yeah, but once you factor in that C3 1ghz is about the same speed as a PII in the 300Mhz range or so, it's not so great for speed. It is low power though.""

a 1ghz C3 would be about equal to a 750 PII. The accepted approximation is 3/4 of a PIII.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[fireman sam]

This can be compared to ISA/PCI (a standard) and the Micro Channel arch (proprietry). Which one lasted? I say if Intel start shutting off other CPU manufacturers, all the others should create a standard pin config so anyone can Plug and Play all the cpus from the other manufactures. This will leave Intel in the minority.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[zerocool^]

Slockets.

I mean, it's not exactly a slocket, but it's the same concept.

They exist. They work. If you really wanted to take your Socket 370 and put it in a slot 1, you could find a slocket to do it.

The problem was always stability. I don't know much about chip fabrication, but I think it had something to do with the length of the pathways adding some sort of resistance, or feedback, or something.

~Will

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[zerocool^]

Ahh, the planar system...

We were cleaning out old computers at netmar, and we unearthed a Sun 3/160 (check here for pictures of a 3/160). It's not really a computer, in it's present form. It's just a VME backplane with 12 full-height slots for plugging anything you want into it.

We found the origional processor board, which had a 17 Mhz processor and 4MB of ram (1986, folks). But, we found out, you can swap anything into it. When we pulled out another double-decker board, we were thrilled to find a bonanza of upgrades: 2 M-bus slots, each with 2 Ross HyperSparcs (we think they're 40 Mhz, making it 160Mhz total), 64 MB of ram (in 4MB 30pin simms), and onboard scsi.

Must have been nice to buy a computer in 1986, and then swap out the mainboard for 1992 hardware, but keep the same config. Of course, that's the least you should expect when you essentially spend $30,000 on a glorified backplane.

Oh, FYI - 160 Mhz of multi-threaded Sun 4m is still a beast of a machine.

~Will

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[zerocool^]

Quoting from Maximum PC, April 2003, p34, "Let's play... The Price is Wrong!" subtitle: So, what do you get from a $200 Walmart PC?

Ratings based on the Via 800 Mhz C3, 128 MB pc133, 10GB 5400RPM drive.

"To benchmark the curiously frail Walmart box, we wiped Lindows and installed WinXP. The results screamed, 'I just got my buttocks handed to me on a platter, whoopee!'. The rig finished our Premiere test in 38 minutes and 40 seconds - nearly four times as long as our 2Ghz P4 Zero-point system. This came as no surprise, of course, because SiSoft Sandra rated the Via CPU at about Pentium II 300 Mhz levels."

Benchmarks:
Bench - - - - - - - 0-point - - - - - Walmart PC
SYSmark 2002 - - - - 205 - - - Would not run
Premiere 6.01 (sec) -615 - - 2340
Audiograbber (sec) - 151 - - - 428
MusicMatch (sec) - - 227 - - - 1486
Jedi Knight II (fps)-50.3 - - -Couldn't run
3dMark 2001SE (fps) -31.3 - - -Couldn't run

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[evilviper]

I bought one of Walmart's 800MHz C3 systems... It couldn't play a DivX file, or a DVD without serious jumps. That would be less-than-half the performance of a comparable Pentium.

I don't know who is making up this "accepted approximation", but it didn't hold up to my real-world experiences.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[UniverseIsADoughnut]

Yeah but theres also a good chance it's not just your CPU involved with this. Graphics card could come into play as well, or even the mobo. Your using a 200 buck PC, can't expect to much. if you look at mini-itx forums what i said is correct. Also many don't recoment anything under 1ghz for playback such as you were doing. I know my 500 celeron never played dvd's or divX very well either.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[evilviper]

Graphics card could come into play as well, or even the mobo.

Yes, I thought the video card was the problem as well. That's why I plugged-in a top-of-the-line ATI video card. Unfortunately, the performance didn't change one bit.

The system bus was standard 133MHz, so I'm not sure what else could have been a problem.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[AlanS2002]

I agree that opcode compatibility is crucial (after all, that's what has allowed companies like AMD to strive, and in turn, brought down the prices of mainstream x86 processors). But if there isn't pin compatibility, then this means that you can't use one motherboard designed for Intel with a Via chip. Now, it's true that this isn't the case anyway: you can't buy single Via processors anyway, and it has essentially always been the case that you have motherboards for AMD procs, and motherboards for Intel procs. But it's really too bad. Think of how convenient it is that you can take an IDE hard-drive and plug it in anywhere (even Macs nowadays!) Why can't you have simple "plug'n play" processors? Then you'd have real competition among all the companies...any processor on any mobo! It could all be solved by a GPL'ed architecture for Mainboard/Bus/Interfaces. All it would take is someone to engineer it and then GPL it.

Re:fr1st ps0t #2

[cymen]

"...because SiSoft Sandra rated the Via CPU at about Pentium II 300 Mhz levels."

We are going around in circles, aren't we? Furthermore this is for an 800 Mhz CPU. 1 Ghz is out now and 1 Ghz with full speed FPU and enhanced core is out soon.

Given all of that isn't it somewhat amazing that the thing even had the abililty to be 1/4 as fast as a 2 Ghz P4?

umm

[rootofevil]

so what. who uses the c3 anyway?

Re:umm

[subzerohen]

I do.

Having a fanless computer is really nice :)

Re:umm

[drunk_as_in_beer]

I also have a fanless computer.

Re:umm

[sogoodsofarsowhat]

You are correct sir. There are no FANS or even people that like that computing device of yours. :)

Re:umm

[drunk_as_in_beer]

I'm glad you actually got the joke. Do you have a fanless computer too? :P

Re:umm

[paraax]

Oooo, water cooled computing. Definately the way to go!

Re:umm

[RJNFC]

My mp3 box uses one. They're nice chips.

Re:umm

[sogoodsofarsowhat]

Um, I have one, and occasionally I actually use it, although mainly for just playing games. Most of the times i just abuse it! :)

i can only hope...

[intermodal]

just as I was saying the other night that i wished VIA would make C3s that go in AMD-socket boards...

Re:i can only hope...

[Anonymous Coward]

In SOVIET RUSSIA, the Internet logs onto You!

Elsewhere In SOVIET RUSSIA, News finds you!

Re:i can only hope...

[gid]

I was thinking the same thing. This could bite Intel right in the ass if they're not careful. What if all the other chip manufacturers until and settle on a standard socket. Then why should I buy an Intel board when I'd be stuck buying Intel chips. Now if I buy an AMD compat board, I could use an AMD chip, low power and quiet VIA chip, Crusoe (hey, who knows, they might actually release something useful to me), etc.

Re:i can only hope...

[intermodal]

Astro is more likely to do this than Crusoe...there really isnt much incentive for TransMeta to port Crusoe to a new socket when they can just ramp up for it with their newer chips to come when it actually happens.

Re:i can only hope...

[JJahn]

I know I personally don't care. I don't think I've ever upgraded a CPU without doing the mobo too. Since features like FSB, DDR and such keep evolving, and boards aren't that expensive anyway, by the time I get around to an upgrade I do at least the CPU and mobo together.

I would guess most poeple are like this, so I don't forsee much loss of business for Intel (perhaps a little, but probably not)

Irrelevant

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do I have this feeling that Intel, like Microsoft, is going to become more and more irrelevant?

Re:Irrelevant

[intermodal]

because you are correct. Pentium 4 is a lousy chip, the pentium 3 not much better. Pentium II was the last truly respectable chip I have seen coming out of Intel. AMDs may run a bit hot, but their performance IMO is superior. Transmeta should make motherboards for "build yer own" types who want them. VIA has increasingly made more and more respectable chips as time goes on, and for cents on the dollar to the Intel CPU. The only thing keeping Pentium-line procs afloat is marketing at this point.

Re:Irrelevant

[binaryDigit]

Pentium 4 is a lousy chip, the pentium 3 not much better

Please define "lousy". Do you mean that it requires more clock to reach a certain level of performance (which is what many typically mean). If so, how does this make it lousy if what you're measuring is the "complete" performance and not just say "efficiency". Intel made a very concious design choice when they went the super deep pipeline high clock route. Which has more "wow", the fact that you can ramp the clock rates up quicker, or that you can get more done with the clock that you have? Isn't this similar to engines, where you have one camp that likes big cubes and massive torque vs the camp that likes high effiency and high rpms. They both have their plus's and minus's and it really depends on the application?

The only thing keeping Pentium-line procs afloat is marketing at this point.

But don't you think that Intel "plays the market". By this I mean their processors have the price/performance ratio that they currently do because the market allows them to? It would appear that Intel could certainly afford to drop the price of their chips quite considerably if they wanted to, but this would be very damaging to the bottom line in the share holders eyes for no real benefit. So Intel continues to have the price of their chips higher than anyone else, because it makes their pocket books fat. If push came to shove, they could do a LOT of damage to the clones while still being able to survive.

Re:Irrelevant

[UserChrisCanter4]

A year and a half ago, I would've agreed with you. A year ago, I would've agreed with you. Around the release of the the socket 478 P4s with 512K L2 cache, I stopped believing.

I went to build a machine about 4 years ago. Top of the line P3 was $600 or so, so I picked up my 450mhz K6-2 for a little under $100. It wasn't faster by any stetch of the imagination, but it played games just fine coupled with the video card I could afford because of the savings. It wasn't beating Intel by any stretch, but it was cheap and reliable (that machine now resides with my parents, doing everything they want just fine).

I bought a 1ghz Athlon for about $200 or so. The 1ghz P3s cost more than twice as much, and were outperformed in nearly every respect. Those were AMDs glory days (starting there and progressing through to the Northwood P4s). AMD outperformed whatever Intel threw at them for about half as much. It was a no-brainer. The deficit increased even more wih the P4, which was only close when paired with RDRAM. There was an ever-so-brief period a little over a year ago where a lot of retail PC companies (the Compaqs and HPs of the world) were actually shipping their higher-end units with Athlons. I considered that great, because so few Joe Six-Packs knew the AMD name, and seeing that "trusted" companies (and not just screwdriver shops) used them went a good way in spreading the word about AMD

And then Intel got serious. They slashed the prices of their chips and released their 512KB L2 cache processors. I bought a 2.4Ghz P4 a couple of weeks ago for $160. The Athlon 2400+ was $130. These are two processors that would literally be neck-and-neck in almost any situation. If the Intel processor was $250, we'd definitely be talking AMD time, but it wasn't. It was $30 more, a number that could easily be made up for in any number of other areas. Plus, it was nice to forget about VIAs 4-in-1 crap (although the NForce stuff looks pretty nice). Now, I built a 2000+ for my brother about a month ago, and for stuff in that range ($80 for the proc, $70 for the NForce1 Board), AMD still rules, but I honestly hope the hammer seriously kicks ass if AMD wants to stay in this business.

Re:Irrelevant

[intermodal]

I agree with you to a point, but i feel i should clarify. I have a pentium 4 and a pentium 4 Xeon at work. Both are sluggish and fail to meet my expectations consistently when I multitask heavily. However, before my wife switched to linux, her AMD with half the megahertz and half the RAM of my box at work ran considerably smoother, froze up less mid-task (not critical stopping freeze, several seconds of pause), and was over all a more pleasing computer. This may be due to the motherboard chipsets, but overall it has given me a very bad impression of the capability of the respective chips. Perhaps it is the motherboard chipsets, i know not. What I do know is that if my car, regardless of engine, cannot continually run as long as the engine is in order with fuel (or electricity), I will likely not buy another of that car.

Yes, i do think Intel plays the market. They play the market like a chump. And the market falls for it every time. I recall building my friend's box for her, and her mom was initially rather insistent upon a P4 until she found out that AMD was considerably cheaper and that the features of the P4 were not going to make enough of a difference for a box to write reports on for college. She ended up with rather than the $2000 machine that she had initially intended to buy her daughter, but a $1200 computer that surpassed the Pentium 4 she had been eyeing in every way for what she needed it for (more mhz, more ram, a few options she didnt even think of like a NIC, a modem, a cd burner, etc. all of which would have cost more than her initial 2k base price). So its not that the market doesnt care, its just that they dont know any better.

Re:Irrelevant

[intermodal]

You do make a decent point, though my experience with P4 ended with my 1.7 P4 at work. It's a piece of crap. We also have several of our communal machines on other P4s and they are also terrible. Perhaps the latest and greatest P4 chips arent that bad, but if the performance is somewhere similar and the price difference is moot, i would rather support AMD than Intel. They have been more consistent in their quality in the past couple years for me than Intel, so I am more inclined to trust them. Besides. They need the money more, and if they go out of business Intel would go right back to their old shenannigans.

Re:Irrelevant

[0x0d0a]

Pentium 4 is a lousy chip, the pentium 3 not much better.

By what metric are you calling the Pentium 4 a "lousy chip"?

It's a relatively high power usage desktop processor with a heavy reliance on compilers that know about it. Maybe you dislike that *type* of processor, but it doesn't do a bad job of filling that gap. It's hardly lousy. The only real competitor I can think of is the Athlon, which is, I suppose, comparable, but not, to my knowledge, particularly better designed.

I also don't understand why you consider the PIII a worse chip than the PII. The PIII has lower power requirements, generally got better clock-for-clock performance, and introduced some nice SIMD instructions.

AMDs may run a bit hot, but their performance IMO is superior.

Obviously, this depends on the application, but generally, current P4s use more wattage and produce more heat than current Athlons but are more powerful. It's pretty much the reverse of what you're arguing.

Transmeta should make motherboards for "build yer own" types who want them.

The big draw of Crusoe is for laptops (not a particularly build-your-own area) and a few very custom projects. In general, you're better off with a C3, given that the Crusoe seems to be marketed primarily as an x86-compatible chip.

The only thing keeping Pentium-line procs afloat is marketing at this point.

I disagree. I agree that Intel charges a premium, but there are a few significant advantages to Intel systems -- you *can* get slightly more powerful systems if you really need it (granted, not that likely), and most importantly, AMD-compatible *motherboards* (not the processors themselves) have a long tradition of flakiness. The boom over the last three or so years in AMD-based systems has also seen a huge increase in the number of hardware problems. The increase in hard freezes or spontaneous reboots over that timeframe among my friends purchasing new computers is quite impressive.

Re:Irrelevant

[TigerTime]

I have a P4 1.7GHz with win2000 at work and this computer sucks. At home I have a P4 1.3GHz and it is much quicker even with winXP.

The differences are too many to name but I can guess why the one at work responds slower.

1. Other hardware (motherboard, ram, hard drive (5400 vs 7200), video card)
2. Running software (networking applications, virus software(mcafee at work vs Norton at home), etc, etc)

In all you shouldn't compare processors of 2 totally different machines that have completely different hardware and software differences.

Heck, just compare the differences of a computer you've used for 2 years and the exact same computer with a clean install of the OS. The performance differences are like night and day.

Re:Irrelevant

[Trogre]

However, before my wife switched to linux, her AMD with half the megahertz and half the RAM of my box at work ran considerably smoother, froze up less mid-task..., and was over all a more pleasing computer.

I'm left wondering, what happened after she switched to Linux?

Re:Irrelevant

[CrazyDuke]

I ran into this today. The brand spanking new Dell 2.4 ghz xeon server that the place I do work at bought freezes repeatedly for several seconds even though its:

1. Almost no software has been installed.
2. Has 1GB of RAM
3. Has almost no software active (except the default services)
4. Taskmanager reports only 0-5% CPU use.
5. Is on an isolated test lan that only has 1 workstation.

Re:Irrelevant

[intermodal]

it stopped freezing to begin with, making it an irrelevant comparison with a win2k box at work.

Re:Irrelevant

[intermodal]

exactly. I am running Win2k on my 1.7 Xeon and it freezes all the time. I have never had frequent freezes like this on AMDs, even my favorite box at home (duron 900) doesnt do this.

Re:Irrelevant

[intermodal]

i find that most AMD users dont know enough to get a strong enough power supply...thats the cause of your friends' problems methinks

Most VIA cpus are in mini-itx's

[dtldl]

and so attatched to the board anyway, making pin compatibility a non-issue.

Re:Most VIA cpus are in mini-itx's

[MikeyO]

and so attatched to the board anyway, making pin compatibility a non-issue.

This doesn't make much sense to me. cpu's can't be mini-itx. That is a motherboard size not a cpu size. Also, what about mini-itx means that the cpu would be attached to the board? Many mini-itx boards are available with no cpu soldered on.

Re:Most VIA cpus are in mini-itx's

[dtldl]

read carefully, "are in mini-itx's", in being the operative word suggesting that VIA cpu's are used on mini-itx boards. Check your not confusing micro-atx or flex-atx since AFAIK (www.mini-itx.com) they all come with permanantly attatched cpu's to lower costs.

Re:Most VIA cpus are in mini-itx's

[Anonymous Coward]

Not to mention, the space savings in using no CPU socket, and BGA packaging.

About these pin-compatible CPUs...

[Can it run Linux]

Can they run Linux?

Re:About these pin-compatible CPUs...

[intermodal]

absolutely. There are a number of the inexpensive Linux boxes sold at walmart.com that run C3 processors

Intel Hate

[Bonker]

Man, I was so happy the day I bought an AMD-compatible mobo. AMD's are not, of course, pin-compatible with Intel. AMD is not a perfect angel, but they're a sight better than Intel, especially when you consider you can get the same power as an Intel chip in an AMD chip for typically half to one-third the price. It was a difficult choice to make since it meant forevermore sacrificing the resuability of intel processors motehrboards I already owned, but I'm glad I did.

My friends who retain Intel compatibility continue to pay top dollar for less power. If I think it's time for a cpu upgrade, I simply go to my local AMD redistributor and pay about the cost of two boxed games for a chip that is more than fast enough than anything I care to do with it.

Re:Intel Hate

[MagPulse]

And 2-3 more boxed games' worth to get a motherboard to go with it, and 2-3 more for new RAM. Otherwise upgrading the CPU probably isn't worth it.

Re:Intel Hate

[jkrise]

The opposite of Intel Hate is not AMD Love.... sometime back, Sanders - the chief of AMD, I believe, testified in support of MS in the anti-trust case. It was linked to the MS support of AMD's Hammer CPU, if I remember.

Intel's recent antics with the Centrino also point to darker designs. I'd rather prefer Intel had competition from Via, Cyrix etc. than from an unreliable AMD.

Re:Intel Hate

[ergo98]

...when you consider you can get the same power as an Intel chip in an AMD chip for typically half to one-third the price

I'm typing this reply on an Athon equipped PC, and historically agree, but AMD had better get their ass in gear quite quickly: Taking a quick look at the place I normally order from (CDN $), a P4 2.4Ghz 533Mhz bus processor (512KB cache) is coming in at $249.99. For just a bit less you can get the Athlon 2400+, or for $30 more you can get the Barton 2500+. In other words power/dollar is pretty much on par now, so AMD has definitely lost that historical advantage.

Re:Intel Hate

[OrenWolf]

Untrue. I took by VIA 133-based mobo w/256 Megs of RAM, which was originally an AMD 750, and, over the period of two years, did the following:

- Upgraded to a 900Mhz Duron
- added 256MB RAM
- Upgraded to a 1.3Ghz Athlon
- Upgraded to a 1.6Ghz Athlon XP

Try doing that with any Intel chip. The socket changed *twice* during the comperable speeds I've listed here. An no new Mobo was purchased, nor was RAM changed (just more bought, for $60 I believe, but it was plain ol' SDRAM, *not* the insanely expensive RAMBUS I'd have been buying at the time if I had been using a P4).

Re:Intel Hate

[Anonymous Coward]

It's in Intel systems that the socket on the motherboard has changed several times in the span where you'd upgrade the processor.

Memory, too. Just try to get ahold of a motherboard that sports both sdram and rdram slots to give you an easy upgrade path. They did try with sdram risers, but they didn't work and had to be recalled. Hell, even a decent price for rambus memory like DDR has would help a little... but no.

Re:Intel Hate

[Anonymous Coward]

No reason to get rambus, asshole. And the boards aren't the expensive.

All of that _used_ to be true, but now AMD is starting to price up. But you wouldn't care, you drooling fanboy.

Re:Intel Hate

[Jeff DeMaagd]

especially when you consider you can get the same power as an Intel chip in an AMD chip for typically half to one-third the price.

That doesn't sound common unless you are at the bottom end of the scale. Just looking through Pricewatch, comparable CPUs are typically within $30 of each other.

$483 Athlon XP 3000
$485 Pentium 4 3.06GHz

$171 Pentium 4 2.53GHz
$163 Athlon XP 2500

The biggest differences were near the bottom of the scale:

$130 - Pentium 4 2.0GHz Sock 478
$67 Athlon XP 2000

Re:Intel Hate

[ergo98]

Yes, I'm dumb. I recently built a media PC with an Intel 533Mhz FSB board with onboard sound and networking...the board cost $99 CDN. The board takes either SDRAM or DDRRAM. Clearly you have such a lack of a point that you're just sputtering like the troglodyte fanboy that you are. I'll buy an AMD any day of the week when it wins the price/performance ratio, and have for the past several years, but currently it is neck and neck and price is no longer an advantage.

Regarding the "coward" thing, I get a real kick out of that, and clearly you're talking about our lack of participation in Iraq. While you're just a dumb troll blathering off, I do feel the urge to reply specifically to this because I see that sort of nonsense from the far right (in papers like the National Post: A paper which I subscribe to because of a couple of great columnists, but the editorial board is a bunch of Bush idolizing, hypocritical morons), anxious to take any pot shot at the government of Canada (be it REFORM!!!! advocates, or the West that simply likes to go against anything and everything that they perceive the East to be for).

You see Canada relies heavily upon the United States for trade (naturally given that we share North America), and it's something that is held over us constantly: Don't want to impose draconian immigration rules to placate a country that currently hosts 10,000,000 illegal immigrants and has rampant gun running and drug problems? Uh oh, the US will shut down trade! Don't want to join the war on Iraq? Uh oh, the US will shut down trade! I find it laughable that anyone could dare to blather about Canadians being cowards when we've put more on the line than just about ANYONE: We put our quality of life entirely on the line saying "no thanks" to the war on Iraq. That's far more than Britain, Australia, or any of the "we'll buddy up to Papa Bush to try to earn props" Eastern European countries offers up. Tell me again how we're cowards you reject. I'm not even commenting on my personal opinion on the war in Iraq (don't presume I'm against it), however the cowardly action we could have taken would be to send troops just to placate the vengeful Bush administration, or to do what countries like Australia did and sail some ships around the area while talking about our support. Even worse are the rest of the "coalition of the willing" countries that have offered nothing more than lip service to ensure they don't get blacklisted. Heroes indeed.

BTW: Obviously you're not fighting in Iraq, so unless you plan on picking up an M16 and heading over, you're the coward. Just because your administration decided to pursue an action with the lives of other people (currently 100+ American missing or dead) doesn't make you a hero.

Re:Intel Hate

[Anonymous Coward]

We put our quality of life entirely on the line saying "no thanks" to the war on Iraq. That's far more than Britain, Australia, or any of the "we'll buddy up to Papa Bush to try to earn props" Eastern European countries offers up.

What's that? I can't hear you over the Backstreet Boys music pumping out of your Dell Computer speakers.

Also, could you turn down that 80% American TV that you have turned up so loudly? I can't hear your stupid anti-war drivel.

Re:Intel Hate

[Slime-dogg]

Yeah, similar experience here. I have an SiS mobo at home (fully integrated everything, very cheap). It's extremely upgradable though. It came with PC133 DIMM slots, as well as PC266 DDR-DRAM slots. I can upgrade the memory if I want, the processor, it has an AGP slot so I can do the video too.

Socket A is great. Does that kind of upgradability exist for say, the Pentium 2/3 socket? Can you stick a pentium 4 in a pentium 3 socket? No. I can stick a Barton or Mustang or T-bred or T-bird in a socket A. That's a range of 800Mhz to around 3 Ghz... all that's needed is probably a bios flash.

Re:Intel Hate

[Slime-dogg]

Don't get the software politics involved here. Just because AMD doesn't do what you want them to do doesn't mean that they are a bad or unreliable company. In this market, you absolutely need support from MS, otherwise you die on the vine. Think of it... 98% of the desktop share, with the majority of business users only using MS software. As a processor maker, I'm not going to hold to software ideologies of freedom or non-freedom when going to the market. I would absolutely love, however, a release of an NT kernel that's built specifically for a 64bit x86 platform. That's what I would be thinking if I were Mr. Sanders.

Sometimes, you have to accept the nature of business for what it is... mainly business.

Re:Intel Hate

[Rolo Tomasi]

I still have my Asus P2B ('98 vintage, BX chipset), which I successively upgraded from a Celeron 300 to a PIII 800 and now a Tualatin Celeron 1300 (running at 1500). The one thing I needed was a $15 slotket and a bit of soldering for the Tualatin. RAM is maxed out at 768MB. This board was easily my best computer-related investment ever.

Re:Intel Hate

[Anonymous Coward]

"Intel's recent antics with the Centrino also point to darker designs. I'd rather prefer Intel had competition from Via, Cyrix etc. than from an unreliable AMD."

I can see that you don't like AMD in regards to their 'support of MS' blah blah... but then you call them unreliable? Now I'm not sure in which sense you mean, but people are talking about them as a viable upgrade option, regarding their technical features.

I'm assuming your "unreliable" quote refers to them not being reliable on supporting your open-source movement or something retarded to that effect? Man they don't give a shit about you. Really, as long as they keep on making the RELIABLE processors that they have been making, and please their stockholders, they won't have any worries.

Re:Intel Hate

[cymen]

I always buy a the price/performance break. I could care less about the top end Mhz:$ ratio. It doesn't really matter. The hot deals can be about at around 1.7 - 1.8 Ghz where the AMDs weigh in at $50-$65 and the Intels at $100-$130. That is the band that I choose to highlight and it really can be done from either side but in most cases AMD obviously has an advantage.

The funny thing is that I haven't upgraded any of my computers in years. I'm perfectly happy with my Celeron 800 laptop and Celeron 850 desktops. A little more speed would be great but I can't justify the cost when it simply isn't needed. But, if I were to upgraded, I'd definately be buying a 1.7 or 1.8 Ghz AMD cpu at the moment. Maybe spending $200 on a USR 14.4k Sportser or a Mitsumi 4x CD-ROM when I first got into computers has made me a little more jaded about bleeding edge prices.

My 8 cents ;).

Re:Intel Hate

[kfx]

The biggest differences were near the bottom of the scale

And that's where it matters most; the people who are willing and able to shell out the cash for the big guns typically dont care whether they need to pay another $30 or something to get a miniscule amount of extra performance... They're only buying the CPU for bragging rights, as theres no real useful performace advantage in that range. Everything above 100 fps is just gravy. Hell, you don't even need anyhting over your refresh rate to make games run silky-smooth...

Re:Intel Hate

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually Intel CPU are not Intel pin compatible. For every minor generation, they toss in a different socket and packaging anyway...

My old KT133 (pre-DDR chipset)AMD motherboard can still take some of the current XP processors. Try that with Intel.

Re:Intel Hate

[LordSpatula]

Once upon a time it could be done with intel as well. I have a Slot 1 BX chipset based intel motherboard that I upgraded over the course of three years without changing anything but the cpu and the heatsink and adding some memory. It started with a Celeron 266 and 128 Megs of RAM.

-Upgraded to a Celeron 333
-Upgraded to a Celeron 433
-Added 384 MB RAM
-Upgraded to a P3-800

I bought the board in 1998 and it's still in service now. Of course now it's not as easy to do that with anything intel makes, but one upon a time it could be done. And yes, it was plain old PC-133 SDRAM. Nothing wrong with AMD either, got a 1.3GHz Athlon sitting next to my P4 now.

Re:Intel Hate

[Your Login Here]

Everything above 100 fps is just gravy. Hell, you don't even need anyhting over your refresh rate to make games run silky-smooth...

The FPS in the corner of the screen (or your timedemo score) is an average FPS over several frames. Just because it's over your refresh rate now doesn't mean it won't drop below in the heat of the battle. And if a frame takes longer then 1/60th or so of a second then you can see a stutter.

Besides, in 8 months your machine will be barley meeting the minimum requirements to play anything new.

Remember, Doom 3 is coming.

but ..

[Anonymous Coward]

that would mean, there won't be via chipsets for intel cpus in 3 years. simply because, the cpus won't (may not) fit in the boards anymore?

did i get that right?

Lindows pcs

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe the lindows pcs in wallmart uses the via c3 chips. Not exactly a fps gamers dream machine, but does make the machine very affordable. I think the desktops were about 200 dollars minus the monitor.

But, aside from the lower performing chip, it does it's job as a email/web browsing/messaging/word document editing/music playing home workstation.

11 suits (27 patents)

[rbolkey]

From the article, 11 legal suits are involved which reference 27 different patents from either side.

There are pin compatible cpu's now?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't understand, can I buy an AMD Athlon and put it in a P4 motherboard? If not, then what the hell are you talking about?

Re:There are pin compatible cpu's now?

[Anita Coney]

In three years VIA will not be able to sell pin capatible boards for Intel CPUs.

Re:There are pin compatible cpu's now?

[bigmase521]

No you cannot buy an Athlon and put it in a P4 motherboard, they are not pin-compatible (diff pin structure and number of pins on the chip as well as the socket) or bus compatible(bus architecture is completely different). The pin compatibility Via got is so they can make their chips compatible with Intel chipsets on Motherboards. I.E. You coulld buy an Intel-based motherboard, and put a Via chip in it.

Re:There are pin compatible cpu's now?

[Anonymous Coward]

Right, but the headline says "End of Intel-Pin-Compatible CPUs?" as if to imply they are compatible now, and due to some corporate weaseling they will no longer be.

Besides, if I'm going through the trouble to buy a P4 motherboard, why would I want to put one of those Via C3 processors on it? I might as well get a WinChip.

Re:There are pin compatible cpu's now?

[dj_virto]

I still don't understand.

Doesn't it take a surface mount soldering job to change processor chips? I had to do this to change the chipset on my lat Soyo board, I bought the new one but the mounts were different, had to resolder every chip. I didn't even see a processor. Maybe I don't know what that is. Anyway, all I wanted was to run my GEOS based C64 emulator faster, which beats KDE and any other linux GUI hands down in every respect. This might not be true of Windows 95 though. I haven't tried that yet. Does that require soldering?

I just don't get it.

27 Lawsuits?? 3 Years?? Did you READ the article?

[Tesser]

According to the article, "The settlement--which involves 11 cases filed in five countries--will essentially make it far easier for Via to sell processors and chipsets to PC makers."

Where did the 27 come from? Oh, wait: "In total, 27 patents were at issue in the various cases."

Man, reading comprehension must be in short supply these days. There were 11 lawsuits involving 27 patents.

Speaking of reading comprehension, the settlement is for the following:
"For the first three years, Intel has agreed not to sue Via for making processors that come with buses and pin structures that are similar to Intel's products. Similarly, Intel has granted Via a license to make chipsets that are pin- and bus-compatible with Intel products for four years, and has agreed not to sue Via or its customers for using pin- and bus-compatible chipsets for another year beyond that."

So they can essientially get away with selling them for FIVE years, not three.

Geez...

And may the market...

[smittyoneeach]

...continue to buy competing chips that conform to standardized pin-outs, and blow non-conforming hardware right the fsck off.
No whining about businesses trying to control markets through proprietary hardware and software. The logic for so doing is clear.
Just say 'no' to the proprietary pusher-man.

Re:And may the market...

[Anonymous Coward]

Standardized pin-outs? What standard? Intel? AMD? Transmeta? VIA? There are no standards for CPU sockets. Hasn't been for a long, long time.

You need get over that "proprietary" word and say what you really mean "free stuff I'm too cheap to pay for".

Re:And may the market...

[dissy]

> And may the market continue to buy competing chips that conform to standardized
> pin-outs, and blow non-conforming hardware right the fsck off.

Hehe, the funny part about that is Intel pretty much defined the standard pinouts, so if they choose to change it, guess what, that change is pretty much the standard.

So before and after the change, you think everyone should blow off every CPU maker that isnt Intel?

Well screw that parent poster, im sticking with AMD myself, you can keep your overpriced underpowered DRM enabled 'standard pinout' intel CPUs to yourself!

Re:And may the market...

[smittyoneeach]

Far from it. Paid for an Athlon chip and motherboard.
Paid for a (student) MSDN Universal subscription. Microsoft cures a lot of issues, while arguably raising bigger ones.
As the market demands the capacity to mix products from various vendors, choice and quality improve, and cost migrates where it should, cartels notwithstanding.
The simplicity and transparent nature of Linux is great. The agony of trying to find a PCI NIC, driver and configuration that work with my cable modem belie an accusation of being too cheap to pay for stuff.
Paying myself for the time involved, I could've dropped in a cutting-edge wireless setup. Guess I'm not a representative sample.

Re:And may the market...

[SN74S181]

Just for clarification, what is more DRM enabled about an Intel processor than an AMD processor?

I just want to know. I am not saying there isn't some detail that I am not aware of. Lately with unemployment I have been buying 'new' hardware mostly used off of eBay, and since there's so little AMD stuff out there (the market for AMD is far smaller, so the secondary market is smaller yet) I haven't fooled around with AMD stuff since my horrible mistake of buying a few K6 parts in the past.

Re:And may the market...

[dissy]

> Just for clarification, what is more DRM enabled about an Intel
> processor than an AMD processor?

Intel states publically that they plan to create and use DRM.
A slashdot (or preferably a google) search will turn up info about that.

AMD states they plan to do no such thing unless forced to by law.

The few features intel chips do have that can be used for DRM are not in and of themselfs DRM. But the companys have made it clear what chips will have DRM once it rolls around.

Via C3

[stanmann]

Does this mean they will be producing a C4 which will beat the trousers off the P4, Or will they perhaps begin working on a P4Killer that will only work on a VIA board and will include a RNG and a FPU. Or will they try to take advantage of the Tight integration and Produce a really inexpensive Chipset which will include an off-die FPU like the x87 series.

Re:Via C3

[Anonymous Coward]

Huh? Off-die FPU?

Haven't all x86 CPUs from intel, amd, cyrix/via etc all had integrated FPU since the 486DX days?

Re:Via C3

[Iguanaphobic]

Yes. But the SX series of 386 and 486 processors required an off-die FPU.

Re:Via C3

[Big_Breaker]

Actually the off-die FPU was a full fledged 486DX CPU (ie with FPU unit) and installing it totally disabled the SX CPU.

Re:Via C3

[GigsVT]

The 386SX could take a 387 coprocessor that was not a full replacement of the processor, IIRC.

Re:Via C3

[drinkypoo]

What about the non-intel FPUs? Could they be used with the SX processor?

Re:Via C3

[Anonymous Coward]

386 DX series had an off-die FPU as well.

Re:Via C3

[odie_q]

Not that it matters to your point, but the SX stands for totally different things in the 386 and 486 lines.

A 486DX includes an FPU, while the 486SX doesn't. If I'm not totally mistaken, the "external" 487 FPU was a complete 486DX.

On the 386, it denoted whether it had a 16-bit or 32-bit memory controller (I forget which is which). Both could make use of an external 387 FPU.

Re:Via C3

[Iguanaphobic]

My first real computer (after a used XT) was a 386DX 33mhz with 4MB RAM and a 110MB HD. The 386DX had an integrated FPU and sold for $280 more than the SX chip. Both were 32 bit parts.

Re:Via C3

[stanmann]

I'll just go through the history up to 486 since that makes it easier
8088 16bit/8bit hobble
8086 16bit true
80286 16bit+realmode
386sx 32bit/16bit hobble +realmode +VirtualPC
387 FPU
386DX 32bit true +see above
486sx 32bit Disabled FPU(see 386DX)
I'm not really certain other than instruction set enhancements what the practical difference between the 386DX and 486SX was
487--486DX
486DX 32bit +FPU
Corrections welcome of course.

Re:Via C3

[stanmann]

I know ....Replying to myself

Here is Intel's history not very thorough, but complete.

And here is a much more complete rendition from DDJ

Re:Via C3

[ncc74656]

My first real computer (after a used XT) was a 386DX 33mhz with 4MB RAM and a 110MB HD. The 386DX had an integrated FPU and sold for $280 more than the SX chip. Both were 32 bit parts.

While they both ran the same code and had the same register set, the data-bus and address-bus widths of the 386SX were 16 and 24 bits, respectively. Bus widths on the 386DX were 32 bits each for addresses and data. The smaller bus made a same-clock-speed 386SX a fair bit slower, and it only supported up to 16MB of physical memory.

(My first Linux box was an AMD 386SX-25...nothing like waiting an hour for a kernel compile, and that was for 0.99pl14 with not much hardware support compiled in.)

Re:Via C3

[cadaverous_scribe]

486SX ~ 386DX + 8kB on-chip cache an Am386DX-40 could, in the majority of cases, out-perform a i486SX

Re:Via C3

[adamdeprince]

The SX was the 16 bit bus, the DX was the 32. As the x87 chip operated by snooping the x86's bus, the 387sx and 387dx were seperate creatures.

In fact, the 386sx bus was quite similar to the 286, so similar that a good number of 386sx "upgrade" chips installed into the 286 socket. It was not uncommon to find various unholy combinations such as 386sx with a 287, a 286 with a 387sx and various overclockable 3rd party implementations of the 287 with seperate crystals.

Re:Via C3

[adamdeprince]

Lets not forget the 80188/80187 with the addition of the loadall/saveall register ops making it sufficently real mode compatable with the 286 that it would run Turbo Pascal 5.0 code compiled for the 286. And an honorable mention should go to NEC's Intel 8086 stomping V20/V30 that offered bit manipulation and Z80 emulation oeprations.

Cheap solution for VIA

[mark-t]

No pin compatibility? Fine. Swap a small number of pins, and distribute that. VIA can make its chipsets and make motherboards for its new CPUs.

Of course, what's to stop some clever young upstart from being willing to raise his CPU off the board by an addition 3 to 4 mm, to place a special ceramic enclosure between the CPU and the board? This enclosure would do nothing more than swap the pins back (sorta like a null modem cable). Of course, this would probably also require a slightly different cooling solution, but at least it's doable.

And there you have it. VIA's chipsets can work with Intel's CPUS and Intel's chipsets can work with VIA's CPU's once again. All VIA has to do is *NOT* be the manufacturer of the conversion enclosure.

Re:Cheap solution for VIA

[GigsVT]

Don't know how reliable that would be. At higher speeds, things like lead length are critical, not to mention the added resistance of two pressure connection, resistance is pretty critical when your logic levels are only a couple volts.

Re:Cheap solution for VIA

[Jennifer Ever]

Right. Let me know when the C3 runs on an 800MHz FSB or whatever the hell Intel is using these days.

Fact is, we're past the point of cross-vendor compatiblity on these things. Intel, AMD, and Via all produce chipset/bus/CPU combos. Why change it?

Re:Cheap solution for VIA

[The_K4]

You did read the part about the BUS needing to be different too didn't ya? If the FSB don't also change, they would be violating the agreement.

Re:Cheap solution for VIA

[phriedom]

Well the logic levels may be a couple of volts (1.8v) but aren't the Input/Output signals still 3.3v? Either way I agree with you that sockets are bad. IANAEE, but as I understand it the fast edge rates of the memory interfaces would get reflections at each impedance change, so going through the processor package, an adapter, and then the socket would be significant discontinuity. I'm amazed the high-speed signals work through pins and sockets at all. An adapter would also be relatively expensive and unreliable.

Re:Cheap solution for VIA

[Anonymous Coward]

you've never heard of fcpga to ppga convertors, have you?

Re:Cheap solution for VIA

[haggar]

what's to stop some clever young upstart from being willing to raise his CPU off the board by an addition 3 to 4 mm, to place a special ceramic enclosure between the CPU and the board?

Totally terrible and unnecessary solution. If you swap a couple of pins on the CPU, you can simply have a BIOS setting where you select the CPU, and the circuitry on the motherboard will do the magic (provided that you chose pins that are not delay-sensitive, and you have plenty of such signals on a CPU). You could even have the mobo autodetect the CPU and do the re-routing automatically.

Of course, Intel would not ship a chipset capable of such re-routing, but all the other guys certainly would. VIA expecially.

Re:Cheap solution for VIA

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually you don't want to have extra 3-4mm on the pin leads. The extra inductance does not work too well with high frequence signals from a signal integrity and EMI point of view.

Re:Cheap solution for VIA

[GigsVT]

You are on the right track. Adding extra wire adds capacitance and inductance, which increases signal settling time.

once again the consumer looses out

[jez_f]

Isn't this blatantly anti competitive. Not mercurially illegal but stifling competition.
If there were a standard chip/motherboard interface then you would be able to choose the chip that you want and the board that you want based on your preferences. Once this grace period is over (3 years) you will have less combinations available.
When are businesses going to realise open standards = growth.

Mind you I use mini-itx at home anyway so I shouldn't complain.

Re:once again the consumer looses out

[Anonymous Coward]

Not mercurially illegal but stifling competition.

"mercurially?" I don't see how that term applies here.

"You keep using that word - I do not think it means what you think it means."

Def. of mercurial

Re:once again the consumer looses out

[drinkypoo]

It might be stifling competition but on the other hand, intel chose the pinout. That is a design issue, placing pins in the best possible locations. Well, probably not, since it's intel, but the point is that it is arguably patentable. Of course, you shouldn't be able to patent pin locations unless you have come up with something truly new, similarly, bus protocols.

Re:once again the consumer looses out

[Jennifer Ever]

If there were a standard chip/motherboard interface then you would be able to choose the chip that you want and the board that you want based on your preferences.

Good lord. The chip is the board. I mean, look, once upon a time you had a relatively standard interface. Socket 5 (maybe earlier, too), Socket 7, and even Socket 370, to an extent. Standard interface, standard bus speeds, etc, because, for the most part, there was only really the one way to do things because nobody but Intel was in a position to dictate motherboard design. But the fact of the matter is, modern processors derive performance, value, and utility as much from chipset and bus design as they do from processor design. Via's CPUs largely suck on a regular Socket 370 motherboard, but they really do have certain advantages over anything else on the market when they're integrated into Via motherboards designed specifically for that processor.

Frankly, I'm happy to see the market going in different directions. I'm happy that AMD has broken away from producing clone chips for Intel motherboards and produced their own end-to-end solutions, forcing Intel to develop new technologies to compete. I'm happy that Via has carved out a niche for itself with the ITX market. You force a standard and you force us back to where we were a decade ago.

Re:once again the consumer looses out

[swordgeek]

AMD saves this from being anti-competitive behaviour. They have a competing and compatible chip line which uses different pinouts. That not only provides competition, but provides proof of VIA's (theoretical) ability to compete.

So no, it's not. It may not be great, but it's allowed under competition laws.

Re:once again the consumer looses out

[cheezedawg]

How is this anti-competitive? VIA can still compete with Intel- look at how AMD has done with incompatible pinouts.

Intel spends lots of money developing the bus protocols and pin outs, and that is largely responsible for Intel's slight performance edge. I see no reason why they should blindly give that technology away.

Re:once again the consumer looses out

[Anonymous Coward]

yea no shit. (look at the synonyms)

let's try:

"mutably illegal" nope.
"inconstantly illegal" nope.
"capriciously illegal" nope.
"waveringly illegal" nope.
"fitfully illegal" nope.
"vacillatingly illegal" nope.

you are right...that dumbshit has no clue what he is spouting off about.

MUTABLE: Given to frequent change in nature, mood, or form - mutable in mood as a spring wind.

Synonyms:vacillating, fickle, inconstant, fitful, mercurial, wavering, capricious

Antonyms:constant, steady

Re:CPU's??? Just processors, right?

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.viaarena.com/?PageID=15

Via makes a number of low-power (as in Watts) CPU's.

They also make chipsets for, among other things, P-IV. The chipsets don't really contain any processors as such, just memory/IDE/USB controllers etc.

The Register article, chipsets

[Spider[DAC]]

The Register has an article about it as well.
Now this brings up the question on what teh chipset clause means for the industry. I know I have via chipsets on my Athlon boards, and it seems likely that VIA will keep producing theese, but what about the Intel market? Does this mean that there will be a player less in that market in five years? Its a rather long time, perhaps the current hardware model is obsoleted by then? MiniATX + integrated systems + Palladium (TPC, was that what it was called?).

Intel likes doing this

[MentlFlos]

Intel pulled this with AMD back in the day.

I'm too lazy to google or anything, but why do you think we have a non intel-socket compatable AMD system?

(Granted I love the alpha bus... yum. Thats a whole different can of worms)

Tualatin owned.

[MsGeek]

The Tualatin (and to some extent, Coppermine) PIIIs and Celerons were incredibly good...clock for clock better than PIV. The "dirty little secret" about Banias/Centrino is that it is not based on the PIV core, but the PIII. This is why they talk about Centrino and Pentium-M, not about where in the Intel continuum the Pentium-M actually belongs.

I want to see the Centrino platform on the desktop. But we never will see it, because it would embarrass Intel and point up how failed the PIV architecture is.

Oh yeah, one more thing. VIA has been selling the CIII as part of the EPIA Mini-ITX platform, not really as a separate chip, and I suspect the tight connection between CIII and EPIA will be even tighter by the time this injunction takes effect three years from now.

Re:Tualatin owned.

[Salamander]

VIA has been selling the CIII as part of the EPIA Mini-ITX platform

The CPU component of the Eden Platform is referred to as ESP. C3 is the name of a processor family that's sold quite separately from the Eden Platform; I have one in an SV24 at home. There's no doubt that the C3 and ESP are very similar technologically, but they really are different products packaged and marketed differently and I'm sure VIA would like to continue selling both.

Re:Tualatin owned.

[Anonymous Coward]

The P4 was designed to be highly scalable to high clockspeeds, which is something it does well. Not to mention the design that saw the light of day is missing a lot of the features the engineers originally envisioned for it, such as a L3 cache.

The Centrino would likely not scale as well as the P4. It's also got shared heritage with the P4 in some ways, and makes several consessions to speed in the name of lowering power usage.

Still, the P4's the fastest thing out there right now, lousy design or not.

Re:Tualatin owned.

[mst76]

VIA has been selling the CIII as part of the EPIA Mini-ITX platform The CPU component of the Eden Platform is referred to as ESP. C3 is the name of a processor family that's sold quite separately from the Eden Platform; I have one in an SV24 at home. There's no doubt that the C3 and ESP are very similar technologically, but they really are different products packaged and marketed differently and I'm sure VIA would like to continue selling both.

VIA's marketing is not as clear as it could be, but the parent poster is right. EPIA is the name of VIA's mini-itx boards. They are offered with C3 or Eden ESP processors. The difference is that the ESP boards run fanless. Apparently you can also run the C3 fanless if you replace the original heatsink+fan with a better/larger heatsink, but this is not endorsed by VIA.

Re:Tualatin owned.

[intermodal]

two things

Centrino is based off P3

P4 may be fastest at factory clock but i will bet an overclocked Athlon could beat it without frying

Re:Tualatin owned.

[Anonymous Coward]

OK dude, I'm not sure what PIV is, I assume you mean P4? That is:

Pentium
Pentium II
Pentium III
Pentium 4.

VIA, not Via...

[gormanly]

To be slightly pedantic, can't anyone get the name of the company right?

It's even written on all their press releases, including the one linked to from Slashdot earlier today:
Note to reporters, editors and writers: VIA is written in ALL CAPS!

Re:VIA, not Via...

[Jungle guy]

Reporters must follow editorials rules. Generally, these rules make them use Via and Nvidia instead of VIA and NVIDIA. The use of ALL CAPS in a news story makes it look like a marketing piece.

Re:VIA, not Via...

[ckaminski]

Yes, but they don't write Ibm, now do they?

Re:VIA, not Via...

[b1t r0t]

So I should start using Ibm instead of IBM? :-)

Re:VIA, not Via...

[mattdm]

Yeah -- "If you want your name to stand out, buy an ad".

This is just common sense on the part of journalists -- if they could get away with it, companies would insist that their name must always be in inch-high distinctive letters in bright colors. And all of their products, too.

Re:VIA, not Via...

[TKinias]

scripsit Jungle guy:

Reporters must follow editorials rules. Generally, these rules make them use Via and Nvidia instead of VIA and NVIDIA. The use of ALL CAPS in a news story makes it look like a marketing piece.

There's a trend toward downcasing all acronyms which are actually pronounced as words (and not letter-by-letter); BBC has wholeheartedly embraced this, writing `Nasa' for NASA, `Nato' for NATO, and now `sars' for SARS.

Of course, AFAIK Via and Nvidia aren't acronyms at all, so there's really no justification for using all caps. PriceWaterhouse Cooper could decide to write their name in all caps, too, but they shouldn't expect Reuters to start writing PRICEWATERHOUSE COOPER...

Re:VIA, not Via...

[_xeno_]

Yep. It's Ibm, Dec, At&t, Sgi, Wpi, Osdn...

:)

Re:VIA, not Via...

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a trend toward downcasing all acronyms which are actually pronounced as words (and not letter-by-letter)

Acronyms by definition are pronounced as words. If an abbreviation is pronounced as separate letters then it is an initialism, not an acronym.

Re:VIA, not Via...

[0x0d0a]

Please tell me that you're joking.

Re:VIA, not Via...

[Jungle guy]

Exactly. It is not only BBC - press all over the world tend to follow this rule. IBM, AMD and BBC are writen ALL CAPS because their names are not pronounced as words.

Re:27 Lawsuits?? 3 Years?? Did you READ the articl

[fobbman]

Ewwww! You read the ARTICLE? How could you possibly have a traditional /. kneejerk response after reading the article?

Cmon, we have a tradition to uphold here. Say it with me now:

Damn that Intel! Yay AMD! Yay Cyrix! Yay Via!

Re:27 Lawsuits?? 3 Years?? Did you READ the articl

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps you should re-read it yourself. They can make pin-compatible CPUs for 3 years and chipsets for 4 (with an additional year for usage - so they can sell off/use the remaining stock but not make any more).

Re:Corroborating Christ

[Iguanaphobic]

It wasn't on CNN, therefore it is either:

1. Not True.
2. Propoganda from the other side.

Re:Corroborating Christ

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be a miracle if someone would have a camera at that time. The fact that they didn't have one proves that jesus was a fake !!!!!

Transmeta is horrible.

[Anonymous Coward]

The chips out of transmeta are junk. It's a gimmick that nobody bought into. A VIA C3 runs 8W max, and has MUCH higher performance per watt than transmeta. If you need portable windoze compatibility then you go with VIA C3, if you don't need windows then you obviously just go with one of the MIPS or ARM solutions out there. (NEC and Intel both make good low-powered chips)

Re:CPU's??? Just processors, right?

[h2odragon]

what did they do with the nforce2? crappy integrated everything ... and AGP that only works with their "unified" drivers.

Computers aren't quite to the point where the throwaway engineering is going to lead to market success, i hope.

This is ridiculous

[Anonymous Coward]

This is equivalent to if GE dictated terms to any manufacturer who wanted to make lightbulbs that run on 120V. Antitrust laws should strictly forbid all CPU manufacturers from imposing any restrictions or licensing fees for developing/selling instruction set compatible and pin compatible competitors.

OT: Centrino Linux Support

[asv108]

This is kinda off topic but related to Intel compatibility, all the centrino branded laptops are being sold with the Intel 2100 Pro mini-pci wireless adaptor. This adaptor does not currently work on Linux. Intel has announced tentative plans to support this adaptor on Linux. The are still deciding whether or not to release it as open source or binary only. Considering the large amount of laptops being sold with the 2100 Pro adaptor, I urge anyone, to contact Intel and let them know that you would like to see an open source wireless driver for linux, as soon as possible. You can also send them an e-mail too. We don't want this to turn in to another winmodem situation.

Re:OT: Centrino Linux Support

[Anonymous Coward]

From: centrino.support@mailbox.cps.intel.com
Reply-To: randall v <centrino.support@mailbox.cps.intel.com>
To: Me <address@omitted>
Subject: Intel(R) Centrino(TM) - Linux & 2100 Pro Mini-PCI Wireless Adaptor
Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2003 16:36:22 GMT

Hello Dear Customer,

Thank you for contacting Intel(R) Technical Support.

At this time there are no Linux device drivers available.
Currently there are no plans for the development of Linux device drivers for the Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 2100 LAN MiniPCI Adapters .

For current and future driver posting on Intel(R) Centrino(TM) drivers, please visit the following link: http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df/Product _Filter.asp?ProductID=955
For additional information, please reply and we will try to assist you further.

Sincerely,
Randall V.
Intel(R) Technical Support

Intel is a registered trademark of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries.
*Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.

A representative of Intel may subsequently contact you (via email) in order to obtain your feedback on the quality of the support you received.
If you do not wish to participate, simply delete the survey email.

Re:OT: Centrino Linux Support

[asv108]

That's interesting, but there are about a 100 articles that say otherwise, here was my reply:

Hello Alex,

Thank you for contacting Intel(R) Technical Support.

Linux will run on any IA based PC. Intel(R) Centrino(Tm) Mobile Technology-based systems include integrated 802.11b wireless LAN capability, requiring particular drivers which currently do not run on Linux.

For additional information, please reply and we will try to assist you further.

Sincerely, Randall V. Intel(R) Technical Support http://support.intel.com/

"open standards equals growth"

[thornfield]

When are companies going to realise that open standards equals growth? How about when it starts to be TRUE!

I Will

[turgid]

I'll define lousy for you.
We are hiring, and for our five new people I was asked to spec out and procure some x86 "workstation" and for the money, we'd thought we'd get some intel kit and try out this newfangled hyper-threading stuff. So I ordered 5 dual Pentium IV Xeon 2.8GHz machines with 1GB RAM and 120GB hard drives. We've only fired up one so far. The poor guy who uses it is going mad. When it's idling, the thing sounds like a hoover because of the processor fans. When any load goes on the CPUs, the fans spin up and it sounds like an F15 taking off. This is supposed to be a workstation for use in an office. I call that lousy.

Re:I Will

[binaryDigit]

What does that have to do with the cpu? I have some machines that are fairly quiet and others that would make you go deaf faster than a MOAB, the processor makes no difference in this case, just because your oem decided to tack on noisy fans. The fan on my Athlon 1.4ghz is incredibly annoying, luckily it gets drowned out by the fans required to cool the 10000rpm scsi drives and the drone of the portable ac unit that is required to keep the room from spontaneously combusting ;)

Re:I Will

[turgid]

The point is, these were brand name machines bought from a reputable company. It shows that intel has had to hack the processor cooling pretty severely to make the darned thing work at high clock frequencies. Every one else (AMD, plus non-x86 makers) can get similar performance at a lower clock frequency without this insane kludgery.

Re:I Will

[binaryDigit]

It shows that intel has had to hack the processor cooling pretty severely to make the darned thing work at high clock frequencies.

How does a noisy fan equate to Intel kludging anything? All cpu's require cooling, AMD's, esp earlier Athlons, put out insane amounts of heat even at relatively (for nowdays) low clock rates. Do you have any links showing that Intel has had to go to outrageous extremes to cool their faster processors? The P4 I have sitting on the floor next to me is no noiser than any other computer I've heard. And the reputability of the company has very little to do with this issue. One of the biggest complaints about the Apple PowerMac line is the noise of the fans they use.

Re:I Will

[Troed]

I have a Compaq P4 2.4GHz workstation at work. It's in a small desktop formfactor, and almost dead silent.

I've had a P4 2.0GHz Xeon before (I _think_ it was Compaq, but I'm not sure) - and while that was called a workstation - there was no way you really could stand the extreme noise the fans put out.

Re:I Will

[Anonymous Coward]

Look here. I think you will find that on average, Intel P4s consume more wattage per Mhz. The P4 wattage/perormance ratio is off the charts. If you bother to look around, and compare some benchmark ratings, and do some math with wattage consumed/score, I can assure you that you will find that this is the case.

More wattage consumed=more wattage put out in heat.

Re:I Will

[jawtheshark]

You should hear my Dual AMD 2400+MP. Hey, I'm probably even deaf by now ;-)

Re:I Will

[turgid]

I've been putting off upgrading for years now. One reason is fan noise. I've still got an AMD K6-2/500 which is acceptably fast and not too loud. I hear that athlon-64's will not need processor fans when they move on to the 90 nanometre process. :-)

Re:I Will

[jawtheshark]

Other PC's under my custody are a P-III 800 and a AMD K6-2/333. Both are really silent. These machines stand at my parents and I needed a x86 platform with some strength. I thought going the Dual way to have acceptable performance for the next 5 years (I don't like buying PC's every 2 years). I really underestimated the noise these things make.
I didn't want to wait for the Opteron. I don't think it will get cheap when it comes out. So, even if it comes out this year, it won't be affordable untile two or three years.
I also have a P166 running as NAT/firewall.... that one is virtually silent. :-)

Troll

[Anonymous Coward]

> My friends who retain Intel compatibility continue to pay top dollar for less power. If I think it's time for a cpu upgrade, I simply go to my local AMD redistributor and pay about the cost of two boxed games for a chip that is more than fast enough than anything I care to do with it.

Less power? Come over to my place sometime. Bring your machine. Maybe your friends don't want their machines locking up ever 7 minutes... Intel is compatible, reliable, and fast. AMD is for those who care more about saving money than the performance of their equipment.

Related Link

[msaulters]

This Link gives a little info from the Centaur side of the issue.

Re:CPU's??? Just processors, right?

[Anonymous Coward]

what did they do with the nforce2? crappy integrated everything

It also happens to be the best performing chipset for the Athlon XP processor. Go check out the ASUS A7n8x

So?

[WegianWarrior]

The only VIA-cpu's I've taken a serious interest in is soldered onto their cute little EPIA-mobos. As it is soldered in - and designed to be a cool, low-power (watt) solution - I honestly could care less wether it's pincompatible with Intel, AMD or anyone else.

Any project that can get away with it

[0x0d0a]

If you don't need the extra cycles a P4 or Athlon can put out, you're often better off with a c3 -- they're cooler and, by virtue of that, silent.

Mechanical parts are the weak link in computer reliability.

If you're building an largish embedded device, maybe a car MP3 player or a home theater DVD player or something, you want reliability, you need a certain amount of power but not more than that, and you don't want noise.

And many people don't need the extra cycles. I use a PII/266, which is significantly less powerful than a c3, and I'm happy. Having a silent box would be nice.

Re:Any project that can get away with it

[Anonymous Coward]

US Innocent, Iraq Evil? [deoxy.org]

Claiming GWB is a war criminal disrespects those who were murdered by real war criminals.

Re:Any project that can get away with it

[evilviper]

Mechanical parts are the weak link in computer reliability.

Really? Could have fooled me, and I've got several years of professional experience with computer hardware.

The #1 component I see fail... WinModems. No moving parts that I can see. Power supplies (not the fans in them) fail quite often. As do motherboards, and cheaper NICs.

Although I've had some bad experiences with hard drives and cooling fans (which fail regularly too), they pale in comparison to the numerous failures of the other components I've listed. In fact, I would have to say that hard drives are, in general, the most reliable devices in average computers. It may be that manufacturers are simply lowering the quality on all other components, but whatever the case, moving parts are not an inherent weak point.

Weird.

[Anonymous Coward]

The company also makes microprocessors for the Linux-based PCs sold by Wal-Mart.

Sure. It's designed just for Wal-Mart computers that run Linux.

But which one is "coolest"?

[missing000]

you can't buy single Via processors anyway

I think you're mistaken



From that page:
The 667MHz VIA Cyrix III is the coolest processor on the market

and

The 600MHz VIA C3 is the coolest processor on the market

I'm confused.

Re:But which one is "coolest"?

[paraax]

If I were to guess, I'd bet they mean coolest for its speed.

Otherwise they'd be competing with chips that have entirely different purposes than to provide processing power. (embedded controllers etc)

Re:But which one is "coolest"?

[timbck2]

No, the question is which one is k00l357?

What a sad day this is...

[wheany]

What a sad day this is when a post repeating stuff from the article is modded "informative."

No, I'm not that new here.

other headlines: 2002 dodge cummins diesel

[Anonymous Coward]

doesn't fit in a ford explorer.

millions rioted against ford's latest actions.

video at noon.

Stupid argument over old processors :)

[odie_q]

After a bit of afterthought, I'm not sure the 386 had an integrated memory controller, but the DX denoted a 32-bit FSB in any case.

I took a quick look around the web, but was unable to find any authorative reference (eg Intel tech docs), but I did come up with the following:

http://cma.zdnet.com/book/upgraderepair/ch06/ch0 6. htm#Heading13
Which is from the book Upgrading & Repairing PCs.

Perhaps your CPU was a clone? As far as I know, Intel never made any 386 class CPU with an integrated FPU.

See the forest?

[Erris]

The priciple, that Intel can keep others from pin compatibility, is important. Intel has done everyting in its power to avoid direct competition. They have changed their own pinout frequently and threatened others who would follow. AMD has had longer lasting pinouts! The result is 5 or 6 types of i386 motherboards. While, thankfully, instruction set compatibility has been maitained, there is less competition in the motherboard and chip market because of this. Oh well.

Pin compatibility is not for end-users

[Rolman]

As someone who has been involved in development of computer boards (not just PCs), I can say pin compatibility is not aimed for the end-user's benefit, VIA C3 is not just intended to be a "replacement CPU". Although it could be used as such, it is not the biggest benefit of pin compatibility.

The main reason why it's desirable for Via to have a pin-compatible CPU with Intel's specification is because it shortens the development time and cost of a motherboard. It's easier and cheaper for the M/B manufacturer to design the board's layout if the signals are in the same place, because a re-layout of a M/B is very expensive in both time and money. (in some cases the full development can go upwards to several hundred thousand dollars)

Additionally, there are chipsets that can support both Intel and Via CPUs, (most notably some SIS SOC designs) making it even easier to make a M/B, but this fact it's not necessarily related to having interchangeable CPUs with a socket. Having a socket is of little to no use because Intel and Via CPU's are aimed at different market segments, anyway.

Remember the whole Slot-1/Slot-A fiasco? Intel developed the PII with a slot connector, and used patents/copyrights/trademarks/whatever to prevent AMD or any other CPU manufacturer to make pin-compatible CPUs. AMD then developed the Athlon to use exactly the same connector, although with different electrical specifications and pin definition. This move was aimed to facilitate the manufacturers' development and time-to-market efforts, never to give power to the end-user.

I can't believe nobody has mentioned this and everybody is easily misleaded into thinking this issue is not a important one. Maybe this shows just how few hardware development we have in the West.

Re:CPU's??? Just processors, right?

[Anonymous Coward]

> I mean, the Pentium IV, *that's* the CPU, and VIA doesn't make those, right?

Correct, they do not make Pentium 4 processors, but they do make their own. Have you been in a cave?

Nasa

[yerricde]

BBC ... writing `Nasa' for NASA

They're crazy.

In fact, the word for "crazy" in the Toki Pona language is nasa.

Yeah, but that's a good thing

[Anonymous Coward]

once again the consumer looses out

We can't have consumers that are tight. They need to be loose.

Its not about upgrades! Its about $$$$money!

[lcsjk]

Even if every slashdot reader bought a new processor to upgrade their motherboard, it would not put a dent in the decision of any large company to be compatible. More than 99.9 percent (estimate) of systems have never been upgraded to a faster processor, and never will be. With millions of systems sold every year, 30-60 thousand upgrades barely get attention. Motherboards made in "Intel" and "AMD" quantities are cheap. VIA needs a low cost place to put their chips. $1.00 cost reduction in a system will get the attention of any company making 50 thousand to a million systems per year. Four years ago I tried to buy a thousand motherboards from the largest motherboard company in the US at the time (Huntsville AL with offshore mfg - believe or not!)and the only spec they would send was a copy of a copy from a brochure they send to their "real" customers. [For your reading pleasure: At the time they said that if I live in the USA and have a computer, I have one of their motherboards! But just in case I didn't, then I had a plug-in card ISA or PCI made by them!]

Cost of licensing a bus?

[BigFootApe]

One of the features of the Athlon which has been toted for a long time is that AMD had licensed the very fast EV6 bus from Digital (I guess Alpha Processor, now). The result was that companies like Microway were building Alpha systems utilizing the UP1000 chipset which was really AMD Irongate based.

My question is, how much did this cost, and how much would licensing the socket 370 bus and packaging from Intel cost (assuming they were willing)?

Failing that, how difficult would it be to move to a socket 370+i (where i is enough extra pins and other foobar for the lawyers to leave VIA alone) bus when VIA tools up for their next core?

I am assuming of course that it's not just the S370 packaging that's forbidden, but the whole bus, and hence VIA will need a replacement for EPIA.

Re:Cost of licensing a bus?

[Anonymous Coward]

how much would licensing the socket 370 bus and packaging from Intel cost (assuming they were willing)?

$4 per chip.

Disagree: pin compatibility matters a lot

[Alderete]

Here's an annecdote. Earlier this year, I was building two new computers from components, for a new server and a desktop Linux system. I initially set out to make low-power, totally silent systems, based around the VIA C3 CPU.

But after doing research into cooling solutions, etc., I decided I could stand a tiny bit of noise, in exchange for greater processing power (I want to run Java web sites off the server box). So I upgraded the CPU to a Pentium III. This was possible, not just because the processors are opcode compatible, but because they were both Socket 370 compatible. Just swapped them out.

I would not have purchased an Intel CPU for the server system if I had made a commitment to a different socket format. So Intel would have lost.

More importantly, as a consumer, I won big time, by having a far more flexible system, that let me make an initial investment based on one set of requirements, and then upgrade the box later, when my requirements changed.

It's a shame that Intel doesn't want to keep this. After all, the C3 processor doesn't really compete with Intel's products -- there's quite a difference in processing power, at similar clock speeds. So let VIA have the low-power low end for us SilentPC enthusiasts, and own the rest. It's basic market segmentation, and Intel knows how to do that, profitably, very well.

Re:Disagree: pin compatibility matters a lot

[bluGill]

I find that I have no need for op-code compatability, so long as I have source code compatability. GCC can take the same source file, and make it run on nearly any processor. (Any reasonable processor really, but if I don't qualify it someone will ask about 6502 support)

I care about how fast the processor is running my apps. x86, Sparc, MIPS, alpha, come to mind as reasonable processors to consider, all will meet my needs just fine.

Well, there is an exception, I have wine installed so in theory I can run some programs only if I have binary compatability. In practice I rarely do that. Rarely enough that the few times I want to do it I can just ssh over to an x86 machine that I can pick up dirt cheap, and magicly the program will run on my other machine. (And most people won't know that I had to do a little magic to make it work)

3 years...

[Duncan3]

In all seriousness, in 3 years if things continue... falling prices, endusers not buying into the upgrade cycle, AMD and Intel undercutting each other, video cards outpacing CPU's...

3 years may be about the right time to bail from the PC (meaning intel) market and focus strictly on the exploding embedded markets...

Re:CPU's??? Just processors, right?

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you been in a cave?

You are an idiot.

The wild card: the S3/Sonicblue bus license

[MarkRH]

Frankly, I'm surprised that this entire story hasn't received more attention. On one hand, the premise of the story is correct--the terms of the license allow Via to develop its own pinouts and architecture, similar to AMD--that's Intel's intent in signing the deal, according to insiders at the company. The Via platform will indeed be a platform.

The most interesting bit in my mind, however, is what happens to this rogue bus license owned by S3. Recall that S3 Inc. signed a patent cross-license with Intel, then exited the graphics business, became Sonicblue, and sold off its assets to a joint venture with Via called S3 Graphics. That's why the current deal excludes S3 Graphics.

However, Sonicblue is also auctioning off its assets. That means there's going to be an Intel bus license up for grabs, possibly. However, as we wrote here, Sonicblue's legal team says the license can't be transferred without Intel's permission. That should make the auction more interesting, certainly...

Intel Too...

[Jerrry]

Hell, most Intel CPUs are not pin compatible with other Intel CPUs.

-
In Soviet Russia, all your spam are belong to us.

In that case

[floydman]

I think in that case we should be ready for a new source tree which is "Via Compaitable"????
well, what the hell, its just another new direcotry..!!!

Re:CPU's??? Just processors, right?

[h2odragon]

own one; wouldnt have bought it had i known about the AGP funkiness beforehand.

simple solution

[the_2nd_coming]

get pin compatable with AMD....AMD wpon't mind since they have a great price/performance ratio any way.

Via C3 in AMD board

[dpilot]

I'm not sure this could work, legally.

Part of the bru-ha-ha back at the intro of the K7 was that it used "Slot-A", where "A" stood for Athlon... or Alpha. AMD licensed the Alpha bus (EV6, or was it EV4?) for use with the Athlon. At the time, there was hope that this move would bring forth Athlon motherboards that could be loaded up with an Alpha by changing CPU and BIOS chips. It was hoped to bring the Alpha much closer to affordability. Had the Alpha marketing not been fumbled so badly, this could have been a nightmare scenario for Intel.

Anyway, I have no idea what the licensing agreement between AMD and DEC (or was it Compaq, by then?) was for the bus. I've no doubt AMD can use it as much as they want, but no idea whether they can then license it to others.

Last Post!

[alpg]

Various documentation updates and bugfixes (the best way to know that a
stable kernel is approaching is to notice that somebody starts to
spellcheck the kernel - it has so far never failed)
-- Linus Torvalds in the annoucement for pre-2.1.99-3

- this post brought to you by the Automated Last Post Generator...