VIA's New PT Chipsets

TheTechLounge writes "Today VIA is announcing their new PT series of chipsets to the masses. The chipsets that make up the PT series represent the first real alternatives to Intel's chipsets for the Pentium 4 platform and aim to ease the transition to PCI-Express and DDR-II. All of VIA's PT products are covered under a ten-year cross license agreement between VIA and Intel. As expected, the majority of motherboard manufacturers will be using the PT chipsets in upcoming boards. Some of these companies include Abit, Asus, Chaintech, Biostar, DFI, EPoX, Gigabyte, MSI and Soltek. The PT chipsets cover a wide range of PCI-Express, AGP and IGP solutions for the Intel platform. VIA's new PT chipsets include the PT880 Pro, the PT894 and the PT894 Pro."

Comments

Yeah, but...

[Goronmon]

As for pricing, the PT880 Pro will be priced competitively with the current Intel 865 solutions on the market while the PT894 will be priced to compete with the current Intel 915 boards and the PT894 Pro competing with 915/925 boards.

The fact that they don't mention price until the end and in such a lackluster way it makes it tough for me to get excited about this. I really would like to see a less expensive alternative to Intel, not just "priced competitively".

Plus, the fact that the benchmarks don't show anything too exciting doesn't help either.

But competition is always a good thing, I just wish the only selling point didn't seem like "We aren't Intel".

Where not Intel is not a selling point.

[LWATCDR]

At least now that Intel has gotten over that whole RAMBUS stupidity.
Intel chip sets tend to be very stable. I have to admit that for a server I was thinking of building I am thinking very hard about an Intel motherboard with an Intel CPU. Unless the VIA is faster or cheaper what is the benefit?

Re:Where not Intel is not a selling point.

[LWATCDR]

Intel does not have a stigma because for years and years their was little choice but Intel. Even AMD where just faster or cheaper versions of Intel chips until the Athlon64. I think AMD is missing the boat by not making Athlon/Opteron motherboards. It would help eliminate finger pointing. It is the CPU, not it is the chip set, no it is the mother board. If you buy a motherboard from Asus for the Opteron using a Via chip set you now have no less than three companies involved in one major part of your system. You can get an Intel motherboard that uses an Intel chip set with an Intel CPU then you only have one place to look for answers. Of course they will probably blame the ram. All in all Intel has the reputation for very stable motherboards.