June 29th

Rambus Inc. Hindering New Memory Standards!

An article at EBN states that current IP litigation, in particular the legal action brought by Rambus against several SDRAM makers, is having negative effects on current standards committees. 

According to David Balto, a former policy director at the FTC, "increasing litigation and claims for licensing fees has dramatically increased uncertainty in high-tech standard-setting bodies, undermining the effectiveness of these bodies to facilitate technological change."

So now we can not only thank Rambus Inc. for throwing the whole memory industry into turmoil, but also for suppressing the development of new memory standards in the future.  

Balto suggested that standards committees must adopt much stricter disclosure requirements for all members of the committee.  No more "silent partners" like Rambus Inc., thank you very much.

I'd personally like to see some teeth put into those committees to punish members who break the rules.  But that's not going to happen, because standards committees have no authority over anyone.  So it's always up to the courts to decide these issues.  Hence we can expect long rocky roads for future standards committees of all types, especially if more IP companies adopt the Rambus "business model".

                                Dr. John

June 28th

And What of Rambus?

Fortune.com has posted an article nailing Rambus Inc. to the wall.  Here is a telling excerpt about Rambus' attendance at the JEDEC memory standards committee.

"They listened as their industry colleagues  discussed an element known, in typically impenetrable techno-gibberish, as "programmable CAS latency." A week after the meeting, one of the two Rambus staffers, Richard Crisp, met with a company attorney to talk about amending Rambus' pending patent applications. Among the new technologies that Crisp wanted to add: programmable latency. A few months before, Crisp had recommended adding patent claims for "mode registers"--right after they were debated at the same standards committee. Only a few months before that, it was "low-voltage swing." All those technologies made the same quiet journey from the standards committee agenda into Rambus patent applications."

The article is an excellent read.  Perhaps now that Fortune has come out with this information, making it more widely known, Rambus will have to reconsider it's "business model" if you can call it that.  You may recall that the last company which Rambus took to court, Infineon, not only won the case, but actually had a jury award them damage payments from Rambus.  It is unlikely that Rambus will fare much better in any of their other upcoming court cases.  But at least it keeps the lawyers busy, and well fed.

                                Dr. John

June 26th

TR Reviews GeForce3 

Scott over at The Tech Report has a full review of the GeForce3 card, including a movie demonstration of the vertex and pixel shaders in action.  It's a long article, but well worth the read.

Link: The Tech Report

Will the Acquisition of Alpha by Intel Go Unchallenged?

It seems incomprehensible.  How could Compaq sell it's Alpha 64-bit microprocessor unit to Intel, Compaq's competitor in that arena?  And how can the FTC and Justice Department sit back and watch without even proposing hearings on the acquisition? 

Long time Alpha customers are very unhappy, especially after hearing that new "Alpha" machines would be based on Intel's still-in-the-works Itanium processor. No one who has been using Alpha-based machines is going to want to switch to the Itanium processor as it exists now.  

The big question is, will the FTC step in and order hearings?  My guess is they will if enough public outcry is heard.

                                Dr. John

June 24th

Microsoft Gestapo Alert! 

A story over at ZDnet reports that the Microsoft legal department has sent letters to 5000 mid-sized businesses demanding an audit of their licenses for MS software. The contacted businesses have 30 days to deliver the license audits.  Regardless of whether MS is within it's rights, I have to wonder if this heavy-handed, user-unfriendly tactic may end up backfiring.

Microsoft does not have a particularly good reputation for making rock-solid, ultra-secure operating systems and applications.  Add to that the general feeling that Microsoft has somewhat of an unfair monopoly in a crucial business arena, and there is a significant amount of simmering ill-will directed at Redmond.

Now comes what may be the last straw for some businesses.  Threats, extra auditing work, and unbudgeted audit costs, all just to prevent MS from pursuing possible legal action.  While MS has a near-monopoly, they don't have a total one, and some business might finally opt for some of the competition.  

                                Dr. John

June 22nd

PC Business Woes

You are probably getting tired of reading about it, but the PC business is having more than a little slump.  It's fading fast.  No one is entirely sure what's behind the downturn in the PC market, but here are my top reasons.

Too many PC makers.  Not only that, but almost all of them have opted for the "cheap-as-can-be" PC business model.  They sell junk at the lowest possible price.  But so do 500 other companies, creating an incomprehensible blur for the consumer.

Constantly dropping prices.  Primarily due to overproduction, the constant economic deflation in the PC business means that consumers have learned to wait.  Far fewer consumers buy new equipment when it first comes out, because they know it will be at half price in a couple months.

Too many, constantly changing platforms.  Well, do you want a Pentium 4? an Athlon? a Duron? a Pentium III? a Tualatin Pentium III? a Palomino Athlon? or maybe a dual-CPU rig? or perhaps you are waiting for an AMD Clawhammer? The list goes on, and grows every month.  Then there are the memory choices.  SDRAM? DDR DRAM? Rambus DRAM?  It's enough to confuse even the most tech savvy consumer.

PC Alternatives.  There's the Playstation2, the upcoming X-box, and other computer-like devices that are less expensive than PCs, and yet have many of their functions.  This also adds to consumer uncertainty about where to spend their hard earned cash.

PC Problems.  Unlike toasters and TVs, PCs are high-maintenance devices.  Indeed, PCs are clearly the most problem-prone electronics devices on the market today, and that turns away many less technical consumers.  Unless clear standards are created and adhered to by all manufacturers and software developers (oh sure!), PCs will remain problematic appliances at best.  Bill Gates and his minions haven't helped either, which leads us to our final cause of PC business woes.

Windows.  We couldn't talk about what's wrong with PC sales without mentioning that Microsoft Windows has a near-monopoly. And yet it's the source of many of the problems that PC owners encounter in their day-to-day struggles with their computers. As long as Bill uses Windows as a platform to crush the software competition by bundling everything plus the kitchen sink into his operating systems, Windows will never be as stable as consumers would like. That adds to the fear and uncertainty about buying a new computer.

All in all, it's a wonder anyone is buying PCs at all. If cars and dishwashers were this difficult to decipher, and this problem prone, more people would use bicycles and dish scrubbies.  Our business model of selling high-end gaming machines seems to be protecting us from some of the downturn, probably because there are far fewer "performance PC" vendors to choose from. But even here, profits are low, and will no doubt stay that way for the foreseeable future.

                                Dr. John

June 20th

Chip Makers Reducing Output

I've been waiting for this to happen.  When prices on overproduced items start to drop below manufacturing costs, something's got to give.  Toshiba announced they would begin reducing microchip and memory chip production.  The desired effect will be to reduce supply, and therefore stabilize prices.  If they, in concert with other chip makers, can generate an artificial shortage of memory chips, the price will eventually rise again, like a Phoenix from the ashes.

We all knew it couldn't go on this way much longer.  If the demand for chips of various types remains soft, producers will have no choice but to limit production voluntarily.  Expect SDRAM prices to stay low for at least a few more months, as inventory is cleared out.  By Fall, DDR DRAM will probably be taking SDRAM's place in performance Pentium III and Athlon machines, while Rambus DRAM will remain relegated to Pentium 4 and Playstation 2.

I expect prices for memory will need to stabilize, and rise somewhat in the future, if memory makers are to remain profitable.

                                Dr. John  

Link: EBN

June 19th

Well? Where's Tualatin?

Everybody and their Uncle has a story out today about Intel's release of the new (0.13 micron) Tualatin Pentium III processor.  But the stories continue to confuse and confound.  First off is Xbit Lab's announcement that a server version of Tualatin with 512KB of L2 cache will be released today. They also state that the 512KB "server" version will have multiprocessor support, but that the 256KB L2 model will NOT support dual processor configurations. 

Apparently, The Register agrees, and suggests that the 512KB L2 version will be released today.

And then there is the report at The Inquirer that says that instead, the 256KB L2 cache model will be released today, and that IT will be the only model that has multiprocessor support enabled. The logic there being that Intel doesn't want the server version of the Tualatin to cut into Xeon and P4 sales.

And just to clear things up from the consumers perspective, no Tualatin PIIIs have shown up at any of our distributors, and Dell is still not offering a "Tualatin" (1.13GHz) system on their web site.  So the "release" of the Tualatin is not nearly as evident at Intel distributors as it is on news sites.

Finally, The Inquirer has another story which says that companies like Dell have had the OEM Tualatin CPUs since May, and that they are the 256KB cache version, and they are multiprocessor-ready.

Now, doesn't that just clear up the situation nicely?

                                Dr. John  

PS, The answer to the question, "Where's Tualatin" is, it's a town and a river in Oregon, southwest of Portland.

June 18th

Please, Call it Something Besides "Tualatin"!

If The Register has it right, Intel is about to release the "Tualatin" Pentium III to the world.  There is still no sign of them at our Intel distributors, but then again, how are they going to be labeled?  Are they going to be listed as "Tualatin" Pentium IIIs? I sure hope Intel comes up with something better, because everyone is getting tired of using the code-name for the new CPU line.  Maybe something like the Pentium III plus, or PIII Ultra?  

But unless they come up with a distinguishing name, it's going to be mighty tough to tell a Coppermine PIII from the 256KB cache version of the Tualatin PIII on a distributor's web site.  They will both be PIIIs, they will have the same amount of cache, and will come in the same packaging format.

So here's hoping that Intel will give the new Pentium III a real name, so we don't have to keep using the code-name forever.

                                Dr. John

June 15th

NVidia Card Shortages

I have noticed over the last few weeks that many NVidia graphics cards were starting to become hard to find.  In particular, the GeForce3 cards, and GeForce2 cards are in very short supply at distributors.  Now a report has appeared at The Inquirer which confirms that NVidia is having problems producing enough chips to meet demand. NVidia is spread fairly thin between the GeForce, X-box, and the nForce chipset.

Intel Hobbles Tualatin PIII

Many confusing reports have been coming out about the release date of the "Tualatin" Pentium III, and what size L2 cache it will sport.  While the "when" question has still not been answered, the "how much cache" question has.  Intel will produce the Tualatin with 512KB of L2 cache, twice that of the current Coppermine-core PIII.

However, in classic Intel tradition (and opposite to what you'd expect from AMD), Intel will be physically disabling half the cache on many Tualatins, and then selling the 512KB cache version at a significant price premium. So you will have a choice of a lower-cost 256KB cache chip, or a more expensive 512KB cache chip.

Part of the reason for doing this is that a PIII with that much cache will probably beat Xeon and Pentium 4 processors in many benchmarks. Therefore Intel needs to price them high to avoid cutting into their more expensive processor's sales.

Bush Starting to Learn What It's Like to be Clinton

During the 1990's, the Republican Congress pressured the Justice Department to appoint more Special Prosecutors to investigate the Clinton Administration than any other Administration in US history. And remember that all the investigations came up empty-handed until they hit on Ms. Lewinsky, which was a matter unrelated to any of the investigations. Well now the Bush Administration may end up getting a taste of the Republicans favorite medicine.  A senior Bush advisor, Karl Rove, owned $100,000 worth of Intel stock while he was apparently involved in advising the White House about whether to allow a corporate merger that Intel was in favor of.

I wrote about that merger and the Bush Administration's involvement back in April. The only remaining microprocessor lithography tool maker left in the US, SVG, was attempting to merge with a larger European lithography tool company called ASML. The two companies needed approval from the Bush administration because of the military's connection with the chip-tool maker SVG.

Intel was lobbying for the merger to take place, which would help them make the move to newer fabrication equipment for 0.13 micron chip production.  As I reported last month, the approval from the Bush Administration was forthcoming, and the merger is now ongoing.  

So the big question is, will the Congress demand that Attorney General Ashcroft appoint a Special Prosecutor like they did every time Clinton sneezed?  My guess is no.  I expect the rules have changed now that another Bush is back in the White House.

Link: The Register

                                Dr. John

June 13th

Tu-alatin, or Not Tu-alatin

That is the question: Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of AMD's fortune, or to take arms against a sea of paltry processors, and by opposing, end them: 

Sorry William, I couldn't resist. Several web sites, including The Inquirer, have posted articles recently which stated that the desktop version of "Tualatin" Pentium III (0.13 micron process) would not be put on the market until this Fall.  Well now the Inquirer has a story that these babies have just tipped up in Singapore. If true, Intel may have decided to go ahead and release them.

This comes one day after Tom's Hardware Guide published the first benchmarks of a Tualatin PIII, and he showed that when overclocked to 1.4GHz, this perky little chip outperformed Intel's flagship Pentium 4 processor running at 1.7GHz. So the big question for Intel recently has been: Tualatin?, or not Tualatin?  If these reported sightings of "Tualatin-in-the-wild" aren't just a fluke, then Intel may be preparing for the new Pentium III debut.

                                Dr. John  

Links:
The Inquirer
The Inquirer
Tom's

June 12th

Tualatin Pentium III Beats the Pentium 4!!!

Tom of Tom's Hardware has done it again. He got a hold of a 1.13GHz Tualatin PIII and put it though it's paces.  The result?  When overclocked to 1.4GHz, it beats Intel's flagship 1.7GHz Pentium 4 CPU!  I agree with Tom that this may in part explain Intel's hesitance to release a lower end chip that is faster than it's flagship chip ("no more Celeron A debacles" they must be thinking).

Tom is not certain exactly what chip he got in for testing (it apparently didn't come straight from Intel).  But based on it's performance, chipset requirements, and voltage characteristics, it seems clear that it is a 0.13 micron fabricated, 1.5 volt Tualatin PIII.

Here is Tom's SiSoft Sandra CPU test result:

Oops! While the 1.4GHz Tualatin PIII moves ahead of the Athlon at 1.33GHz, it unfortunately also beats the P4 at 1.7GHz.  This is the kind of thing that gets the Engineering department arguing with the Marketing department at Intel. As we all know, the Marketing department always wins. So despite their existence, don't expect to see any Tualatin PIIIs for sale until mid-Fall of this year.

                                Dr. John  

Link: Tom's

June 11th

Corporate Takeover of the Internet?

Van Smith is a hardware reviewer at a web site called InQuest who achieved a place in Intel's book of infamy with his Pentium 4 clock throttling revelations.  He just resigned in disgust for various reasons, but the major thrust is that certain large corporations (that have gotten negative reviews of their products) want to eliminate independent hardware review sites.  Here is an excerpt:

"While the power and influence of independent computer hardware sites is unquestioned, these same qualities have made them enemies of the companies who have suffered from their honest criticism. These companies would like nothing more than to see the Internet hardware review community collapse and disband."

"And this is happening at this very moment. Have you noticed the decline in decisive, comprehensive, and hard hitting articles? Worse yet, have you noticed an about face in the editorial flavor of a few of your favorite sites?"

Van goes on to discuss the "corporate-ization" of hardware review sites, and how they will either become main-stream entertainment entities with reviews-turned-advertisment, or they will just wither and die.  Indeed, as the amount of money web sites can garner for ad banners diminishes, the size and number of ad banners increases proportionately.  Soon, there will only be room for a small blurb in the bottom corner of your screen, surrounded by dozens of flashing ad banners.

You can read Van Smith's article here (but watch out for those flashing Alienware ads, they may suck you in:)

                                Dr. John

June 9th

Coolbits in Detonator 12.41

OK, so you've got a shiny new GeForce3 card (and your credit card is now maxed out), but you want the latest WHQL (Windows Hardware Quality Labs) certified NVidia drivers with GeForce3 support. You install them, and immediately a little voice begins singing in your head "Where have all the Coolbits gone?"

Not to worry!  Head over to my Coolbits Overclock page and get Coolbits up and running again! :)

                                Dr. John  

Link: Enabling Coolbits

"Media" Gone Mad

This is really off topic, but when I heard it on the News Hour last night, I was flabbergasted. Remember all those reports when Clinton left office that his staff had destroyed property and scrawled graffiti all over Air Force One, The White House and the Executive Office Building? These accusations came from the Bush White House staff.  They were reported as fact in every major news source for almost a week (including the News Hour).

Well, now it turns out that the General Accounting Office report on the accusations has come out, and the results were that absolutely no damage was done anywhere. None. But do the news organizations jump on it and admit their erroneous reporting?  For the most part, no.  Rumors and lies are worth reporting, but the truth is far too dull.

The people in modern news organizations in America sit in front of their computer screens watching the AP wire roll along.  No investigations, no corroborating evidence.  They just spin their favorite AP wire story the way they like. That's not reporting, and they know it.

The Bush White House is not guilt free either.  They started the rumors , and they need to be held accountable for making accusations they knew were false.  Apparently, they have very little interest in "bringing honor and dignity back to the White House" like they said they would. They would rather play hardball politics, and then hope the News Media will blindly spread the rumors for them.

                                Dr. John

June 8th

The Return of Voodoo!? PartII

As I suggested at the end of my news post yesterday, the rumor about the return of Voodoo (Rampage) was just a rumor.  3D Power's web site made their emphasis on NVidia products quite clear.  It would be nice to see a Rampage card show up, but it may never come to pass.  

Who knows?  If the huge, positive reaction that the rumor received is any indication of how many Rampage cards they could sell, maybe it's not such a crazy idea. But who owns the patents for Rampage cards now?  Are those some of the 3dfx patents that NVidia acquired, or not? I assume they are.

                                Dr. John  

June 7th

The Return of Voodoo!?

There is a rumor running rampant through computerdom. The rumor is that as much as 90% of the old 3dfx staff have reformed a new company, and that they have secretly been getting the Rampage card ready for production! It's very hard to get any detailed info on this, but here is the scuttlebutt.

The new company appears to be called 3DPower.  They have acquired a previous NVidia-only graphics board maker called Absolute Multimedia. Their first product is said to be the Rampage (Voodoo6) card we had heard so much about.  But of course, NVidia owns the Voodoo brand name now, and many of the 3dfx patents, so there may be a legal battle brewing here. The new card is rumored to be called the 3DPower Absolute (getting both companies names into the moniker).

If true, this is excellent news. The news is especially welcome considering that NVidia has been getting lots of bad press recently for their bullying tactics directed at graphics board makers that dare to use non-NVidia chips. Now those board-makers may have more choices, reducing NVidia's near-monopoly in the graphics chip market.

Keep in mind that this is a rumor, and that the 3D Power acquisition announcement discusses NVidia-based products, not "3dfx-type" products.

                                Dr. John  

Links:

3D Power 

TweakTown

The Inquirer 

New WHQL NVidia Reference Drivers!

NVidia has FINALLY released official (Windows Hardware Quality Labs certified) drivers that fully support Direct X 8 and GeForce 3 cards.  The new driver version, Detonator-3 version 12.41, is available for download here. But considering that hundreds of thousands of other NVidia card owners are attempting to download them right now, chances are you'll get a page error when you try to download. Things should quiet down on their servers by tonight or tomorrow.

June 6th

VIA Bursts Intel's Bubble, Intel Deflates VIA's Balloons

The "DDR chipset for Pentium 4" flap is having wider repercussions throughout the chip industry.  At the Computex show this week, VIA introduced it's DDR-capable chipset for P4 systems, much to the consternation and legal threats by Intel. Intel says "you can't do that", but VIA owns patents acquired from S3 that it says allow for manufacture of a P4 DDR chipset. 

When the Computex show opened this week, VIA reps were there first with huge silver helium balloons emblazoned with VIA/DDR logos. These went up at major motherboard makers booths. When the Intel folk arrived, they went ballistic. But rather than going through the usual channels to settle such disputes, VIA and Intel decided to have at each other in a scene reminiscent of Parliament sessions in the Philippines. One report suggests that the local police were summoned by Intel representatives.

In the end, Intel either forced motherboard makers to deflate the promotional balloons, or removed the balloons themselves.  Finally, the VIA balloons were replaced with ubiquitous Intel promotional material.

Intel has been very frustrated with slow P4 sales, and VIA's constant "nipping-at-heels" behavior. But what would make them so angry and aggressive about the VIA balloons? It's my guess that they too have seen the benchmarks coming out on the web which show that VIA's DDR DRAM motherboards for the Pentium 4 beat Intel's motherboards based on the more expensive and controversial Rambus DRAM. Intel is already having trouble selling Pentium 4s and their motherboards, so this news is a severe blow for them. VIA boards will be cheaper and faster, making Intel's situation even worse than it currently is.

Intel lied to it's customers when it said that Rambus DRAM was needed to improve Pentium III performance. That was proven wrong. Now it seems that they were lying again about the P4 requiring Rambus memory for maximal performance, since early benchmarks show DDR/P4 motherboards beating Rambus/P4 systems. Add to this the facts that AMD is now offering a dual-Athlon chipset (AMD 760MP), and that dual-Athlon boxes stomp dual-Xeon boxes, and you've got a recipe for severe heartburn at Intel Central. What's a giant chipmaker to do? (How about stop lying and bullying, and get back to work!?).

                                Dr. John  

Link: Inquirer 

GeForce 3 Review

If you haven't been lulled into utter insensibility by huge GeForce 3 reviews, and are ready for some more punishment, I've posted my GeForce3 Mini-review.  It's painlessly short, and to the point. You can check it out here.

PS, There is a great Athlon 1.4GHz review over at Tech Report today.

June 5th

All Sorts of Goodies

There is just too much news today to pick one or two juicy bits.  So let's start with AMD dual-Athlon systems.  Reviews have popped up everywhere, and Intel has gone into hiding. Systems based on the new AMD 760MP chipset are not only very fast, they are very reliable too.  Intel's domination of the small server market just came to an end!

Also, at the Computex Computer show, VIA is showing off a DDR-capable chipset for Pentium 4 systems. But that's not the interesting part of the story.  The show started out with many motherboard makers displaying huge VIA/DDR helium balloons at their booths. That was before the Intel goon squad arrived.  Threats flowed like beer at a college party.  Within minutes, the balloons were either cut lose to float to the ceiling, or were deflated and removed. Just as rapidly, Pentium 4 promotional material popped up at all the vendors booths.  Doesn't that just make you want to run out and buy a Pentium 4 system right now?? I can hardly restrain myself.

And speaking of dastardly sales and marketing tactics, NVidia is back in the news for just such behavior.  Digitimes reports that graphics card makers have been threatened by NVidia to not use competitors graphics chips.... or else.  This is not just a disturbing (and I would hope illegal) business practice, it hurts consumers.  Currently NVidia is unable to produce enough GeForce 2 and GeForce 3 graphics chips to meet demand by video board makers.  There is a worldwide shortage of GeForce-based video cards, at the very time when NVidia is trying to prevent board makers from using alternative chips like the Kyro II.  Let's hope that the tactics backfire, and drive more companies to use alternative graphics chips.

And the question on everyone's mind ever since Rambus lost it's court case against Infineon: "Why are the other memory makers still paying Rambus royalties for SDRAM?" It looks like the new CEO of Rambus has written to concerned stockholders (what? Rambus stockholders worried?) to reassure them that the ill-gotten gains will continue to flow.  When Rambus starts writing memos like that, it means they are worried. Keep your eyes peeled for stories on memory makers withholding royalty payments to Rambus (at current SDRAM prices, they can't afford royalties!).

                                Dr. John  

June 3rd

Rook to Queen's Knight Six

The Rambus vs. Infineon trial is getting more like a chess game every day.  The well-paid lawyers on both sides scheming and plotting all along. The latest move by Infineon lawyers in a recent post-trial motion session was to not ask the Judge to rule that the Rambus patents were unenforceable (equitable estoppel). 

Infineon has already won the case, and a punitive damages settlement, but it was assumed by most that they would also ask for estoppel relief from future litigation by Rambus. Instead, it appears they are waiting to see what happens in the upcoming Micron vs. Rambus case, and what happens with any Rambus appeals of the jury verdict on fraud charges.

Some have suggested that the reason for not requesting estopple was that Infineon did not want to pay Micron's legal bills by having the patents rendered unenforceable. This may be true, but it may also be that Infineon believes that Micron has a strong and distinct case to pursue, and they want as much legal muscle brought to bear on Rambus as possible.  Fighting a legal war on several fronts will keep Rambus off guard and distracted.

In the end, I can't imagine any court in the world awarding Rambus the right to SDRAM and DDR DRAM royalties, simply because Rambus participated in the JEDEC committee during the development of these memory standards.

                                Dr. John  

Link: EBN

Gateway in Trouble?

You may have seen the ads.  Gateway will beat anyone's advertised price on a new computer.  Considering that the profit margin in this business is already extremely low, it sounds as if Gateway is joining the ranks of computer hardware companies which have decided that profit is less important than market share. They can't go on doing this forever, and indeed, this may be Gateway's last gasp before joining Micron and others in that grand computer vendor graveyard in the sky.

And believe me, selling computers below cost is a risky endeavor if you cover that hardware with a good long warranty.

But nonetheless, if you've got a hankerin' for a real cheapo computer, at a real cheapo price, git it now while the gittin's good. ;)

                                Dr. John