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Gear News Archive: May 2001 May 31st AMD Cutting L1 Lines Again For the last several months AMD had not been cutting the L1 lines on the surface of 1.2GHz and 1.3GHz Athlon processors. I had assumed this was because some motherboards did not have 12x and 13x multiplier settings, but there of course was never an explanation. Now, the latest batch of 1.3 GHz (AXIA) Athlons we received finally had the L1 lines cut again, forcing us to resort to the old No. 2 pencil trick to change the multiplier setting. Dag Nabit! Postscript: It has just come to my attention that AMD claims that cutting the L-1 lines can reduce yields and increase manufacturing time and costs. It was for these reasons that they discontinued cutting the L-1 lines on their higher speed Athlon processors. Considering the current shortages of higher speed Athlon's, I'm surprised that they resumed cutting the surface contacts. May 30th VIA KT133A Northbridge Bug? All the buzz today in Athlon land is that the newest stepping of VIA's KT133A chipset Northbridge has a bug. The symptoms appear to be problems with soft reboots, but getting details of the alleged bug are difficult at this point. Here is a quote from a messageboard including comments from John Gatt at VIA: "After speaking to MSI, I
have found out that they are replacing any faulty motherboards. This is
true. This is also a standard warranty procedure. The official figures of
the boards with this particular chip experiencing this problem is less
than 2% which is well within standard quality levels. MSI are known to
have very high standards and that is why they are offering the replacement
IF you have a faulty board. So there is no way that this can be classified
as a bug when it effects only 2% of ONLY their FIRST batch of motherboards
using the KT133A chipset. The numbers are very small indeed. You have
mentioned other manufacturers returning boards - please email me the
details so I can follow it up." We have not seen this bug yet, and I am not convinced it is a real bug. But we have noticed a different problem with the Abit KT7A motherboard when paired specifically with the Visiontek GeForce2 Pro card (no other models seem affected). Systems with this combination of hardware will not boot on the first press of the power button. But pressing the reset button right after pressing the power button gets them to boot normally without other problems. Once the system is warmed up, they will restart with a single power button press. When they remain off for several hours, you need to start them, and then hit the reset button again. This problem appears to be very specific to one type and brand of video card, so it can't be attributed to a "bug" in the Northbridge. Link: Tech Report May 29th Palominos to Go According to an article at EBN, AMD's mobile Athlon 4 processor will be the big hit at the Computex show next week in Taipei. To go along with their new mobile Athlon 4, AMD will be debuting their new mobile Athlon 4 chipset. Apparently, this new chipset is based on the chipset in Microsoft's new X-box game console. The Northbridge of the new chipset includes NVidia's latest graphics chip, and has a 128 bit graphics bus. Apparently, the idea is for Athlon 4 notebook computers to compete head-to-head with the Sony PlayStation 2 and Microsoft's X-box. I'm not entirely sure this is a good idea. Tell me if I'm wrong, but Athlon 4 notebooks are certain to cost about 10 times more than a PlayStation 2. I'm not sure that is a head to head competition that AMD can win. It is obvious that AMD needs a much better mobile processor offering. But I'm not sure that gearing this new high-speed offering toward gamers is the right way to go. We shall see. If I were in charge of AMD, I would be trying to get the mobile Athlon 4 and the desktop Athlon 4 to market at the same time, and I would be more interested in making the desktop version good for gaming, as opposed to the mobile version. Apparently they are pushing forward with the mobile version first, and with a slant towards 3-D graphics and gaming. It will be interesting to see if this gamble pays off for AMD. In the end, their success may depend most on how inexpensive the new Athlon 4 notebooks are. Link: EBN May 26th Intel's 64-bit Thing Intel is actually scheduled to release the now infamous Itanium 64-bit processor this coming Tuesday. It's not just a dumb name for a processor, it's also a dumb idea in general. Intel's new chip is not backward compatible with existing software. That means software companies are scrambling to get new code out the door in time for the debut. Imagine a platform for which no software exists. Exactly how many corporations are going to trash their Unix boxes and run out to get an Itanium box without software to run on it? And then there will be the version 1 bugs to deal with, not to mention the perennial driver problems that will crop up for all that hardware in the new boxes. Then AMD comes out with it's 64-bit Hammer series of processors early next year, which will be fully compatible with existing 32-bit software. It's a cruel world. Link: EBN May 25th Italian Court: "Arrivederci Rambus!" An Italian court ruled this week that Micron did not violate Rambus synchronous memory patents, and dismissed the case of Rambus vs. Micron. While this is another severe blow to Rambus and their inscrutable plan to take over all computer memory on the planet, there was a ray of hope for the pugnacious IP company. A panel of experts convened by the court concluded that Micron had violated Rambus patents! But the judge threw the decision out like so much soiled tissue paper, and concluded that the Rambus bus was multiplexed, while the SDRAM bus was not. So for the first time, a panel of experts in a court has sided with Rambus, and this is just the type of nugget that will keep Ramboids buzzing for weeks. It is unclear in the extreme why the judge would convene a body of learned experts, only to ignore their findings. But it is also clear that Rambus has maintained since 1990 that the Rambus multiplexed bus was different, and superior to the SDRAM bus. So if you ask me, this whole struggle is over a moot point. Rambus obviously owns the patents to Rambus DRAM, and no one is challenging that. However, many memory makers are challenging the idea that Rambus could patent a standard memory architecture that was in development by a standards committee that Rambus was a member of. I expect Rambus to lose all upcoming patent infringement cases on the same grounds as they lost the previous two cases. The multiplexed bus issue will come back to haunt Rambus until they quit litigating against companies that make non-multiplexed memory modules. My guess is, as soon as the court costs exceed the dwindling royalties that Rambus gets for SDRAM and DDR DRAM, they will quit. Link: EBN May 24th EZ CD Creator Creates Huge Windows 2K Problems The Register is continuing to report on problems with the popular Adaptec CD burner software called EZ CD Creator version 5. Apparently, a module in the program called Take Two is trashing Win2K installations, and the patch has not fixed the problems many users are experiencing. The problems do not occur with Windows 98. These continuing burner problems in Windows 2000 should help boost the popularity of competing programs such as Nero from Ahead Software. Clearly, it is much more difficult to write good software and drivers for Windows 2K than for Windows 98, and many consumers who upgraded are paying the price with driver, hardware and software problems. Indeed, the vast majority of problems reported to us concern systems running Windows 2000. Lets hope that Microsoft makes it easier to write software and device drivers for Windows XP. May 23rd NVidia Benefits From the Death of 3dfx NVidia's profits are up at a time when most other computer parts maker's earnings are down. No doubt this is in part due to the death of 3dfx, and the subsequent acquisition of it's corporate corpse by NVidia. But NVidia is adopting a fairly risky strategy in the face of the inexpensive and zippy Kyro II chip from Power VR, and ATI's upcoming video card selection. This is because NVidia just reworked it's low-end video card line (now the 200/400 series MX cards) and is in the process of replacing it's popular GeForce 2 cards with more expensive GeForce 3 cards. The risk lies in the facts that the new 200/400 series MX cards are more expensive and slower than their older cousins (the original MX cards), and that the GeForce 3 is more expensive, but not really any faster than GeForce 2 Ultra cards which it is replacing. So NVidia is counting on consumers choosing the new MX cards over faster and cheaper Kyro II-based cards, and hoping that many customers will be willing to pay more for the GeForce 3, even though it is not faster than it's predecessor. Only time will tell how risky this strategy is. May 22nd Firewire B vs. USB 2.0 A computer peripheral standards war has been brewing over the last several years. The fight to connect peripherals to your computer has reached a new stage. The two remaining contestants are IEEE 1394b (FireWire B) and USB 2.0. Companies including Microsoft and Intel have been struggling with the decision to adopt or not adopt USB 2.0 for many months. This waffling behavior seems to have increased the chances that FireWire B may make its way into consumer PCs over the next year. Indeed, Windows XP may debut in October with FireWire support, but without USB 2.0 support. If we look at the specifications for both standards, FireWire B is the clear winner. USB 2.0 offers up to 480 Mb/s with cables up to 15 feet long. FireWire B offers a maximum data transfer rate of 3.2 Gb/s with cables up to 300 feet long. FireWire B is 100 percent backward compatible with FireWire A devices. Because more popular home electronics devices, including digital camcorders, are using FireWire connections, it is quite possible that FireWire will become the more accepted connection method over USB 2.0. It is even possible that USB 2.0 will replace the older connections for simple devices such as mice and keyboards, while FireWire B is used for beefier peripherals including digital camcorders, and external storage devices. Link: Silicon Strategies May 19th Rambus to Sink or Swim The recent guilty verdict against Rambus on fraud charges has it's legal team in turmoil. The case of Rambus against Micron, which was to begin right about now, has been postponed 5 months until October. Micron is glad because there is no rush now that Rambus is in the doghouse. Rambus is glad because they need time to work on plan B. One other reason both sides may want a little breather here is that Judge Payne has not ruled yet on the enforceability of Rambus SDRAM and DDR patent claims, or lack thereof. So both sides are in legal limbo as they await the Payne Master's final and most important decision in the case of Rambus vs. Infineon. If Judge Payne invalidates the Rambus patent claims, the remaining court cases may fall like dominos. And quite a few cases there are! In addition to the case of Rambus vs. Micron in the US, there is the case of Hynix (previously Hyundai) vs. Rambus, also in the US, a Micron vs. Rambus case in Italy, not to mention another Hynix vs. Rambus case in Britain, and Rambus cases against Micron, Hynix and Infineon in Germany. Oh what a tangled web we weave... So now it looks like we may hear word from some of the European cases before the next case comes to trial in US courts. But everyone is really waiting to see if Judge Payne delivers another Payneful blow against Rambus and their house of patent cards. May 16th DDR Unpopular? Many articles have come out on the web which indicate that DDR memory has not become popular as quickly as expected. And one report says that DDR support for the Pentium 4 has been delayed until early next year. So I thought that this would be a good topic for discussion today. DDR motherboards for the Athlon are currently limited in number, with boards based on the AMD 761/VIA 686B chipset combination being the most popular. DDR memory currently offers about a 15% memory performance boost over PC-133 SDRAM systems, but some features are lost. Notably, multiplier overclocking features in the BIOS, and on-board IDE RAID support are absent. In my mind, the new DDR motherboards are at a stage in development similar to Rambus memory and the i815 chipset. The big difference is that the AMD 761 Northbridge doesn't have the big problems that the i815 chipset had. But performance increases are not what people had hoped for, and the motherboards are not fully featured yet. These teething problems are to be expected, and are the primary reasons that DDR-based PC system sales haven't taken off yet. But lets look at an arena where DDR is king. Video cards. Have you ever wondered why, if Rambus memory is soooo good, not one video card maker on Earth is using it in their video cards? It most likely has to do with several things, including cost, pin architecture, and memory controllers. My guess is that Rambus will never be used in PC video cards, which leaves us with DDR memory. Everyone who has a DDR based video card knows how much faster they are than similar SDRAM based video cards. The same could be true of PC systems, once they get proper DDR chipset support. So don't count DDR computers out of the running yet. They will take off as soon as a good DDR chipset/motherboard combo hits the market. AMD is pushing DDR for all it's worth, and I am certain that they will succeed eventually. May 15th Athlon 4 Previews Pop Up AnandTech and Tom's Hardware have previews of the Athlon 4 (Palomino core) posted, which discuss the improvements over the Thunderbird Athlon core. For those who were hoping for a radical new chip design, like that of the Pentium 4, forget it. This is a logical extension of the Thunderbird, and the main benefits will be higher clock speeds and lower operating voltages and temperatures. The first release is a notebook version, but apparently, these are regular old socket A chips, so they should fit into your KT133A motherboard's socket. The good news is that unlike the Pentium 4, software does not need to be re-written to take advantage of the new chip. Also unlike the Pentium 4, the Athlon 4 will fit on most or all existing KT133A motherboards! So AMD listened to consumers, and gave them what they really wanted. A faster, cooler version of the same respected chip that does not require a new motherboard, or newly optimized code, to perform better. Benchmarks indicate about a 10% to 15% performance boost over the Thunderbird, and clock speeds are expected to go as high as 1.8GHz. May 14th Taiwan Fire Raises Supply Questions Again A large fire destroyed portions of the office buildings in the Taiwan Eastern Science Park used by Acer subsidiaries AOpen, HiTrust, Servex, Pivotal and Apacer. Other company's facilities were apparently not harmed by the blaze. It is not know if the fire will cause any computer parts supply problems over the next months, but the question arises every time there is a natural or man-made disaster at the Science Park. A disproportionate percentage of the world's computer parts come from Taiwan, and we have to wonder if putting so many technology eggs in one basket isn't asking for trouble. Taiwan sits astride one of the largest, most active continental subduction zones on Earth, meaning that they will experience devastating earthquakes on a fairly regular schedule. The threat of a possible new cold war with China also places Taiwan in a bad physical, as well as political spot. It would make sense for Taiwanese computer companies to continue moving assets off of Taiwan, in order to spread their infrastructure out over a wider, less threatened geographic area. Link: Acer GeForce3 Hits Store Shelves GeForce 3 cards have finally started reaching store shelves in quantity. The debut price is just under $400, rather than the threatened $500. We have seen cards from Visiontek and Asus already. Keep in mind that the GF3 is not noticeably faster than a GeForce 2 Ultra card, which costs about $100 less. Also, the special graphics features in the GF3 are not available in games yet, so having one will not add to your gaming joy until new games with these special features come out. Rambutts Sit on Pins and Needles Judge Payne will be deciding this week if the $350,000 cap on Virginia court damage awards applies to the Rambus punitive damage fine of $3.5 million. Further, Judge Payne will rule on whether or not the Rambus patent claims on SDRAM and DDR DRAM have been invalidated by the fraud verdict. If the fine is not reduced, and the patents are deemed unenforceable, Rambus will loose most of it's revenue stream, and will deplete their war chest significantly. May 12th The Intel Empire Strikes Back Part II The buzz throughout hardware land is that the Intel Pentium III at 0.13 microns will be out in four to six weeks. If you had been reading the news here over the last several weeks you may remember the rumors that the transition to 0.13 microns at Intel was going to be delayed. This was due to a hold up in the delivery of new laser lithography tools. So without all that new chip tool hardware, how can Intel transition to the smaller fabrication regime? My guess is that they opted for plan B. And just what might plan B be? The method is known as phase-shift masking. Rather than bore you with the technical details, I'll just say this is a quick and dirty way to fabricate smaller trace lines using the older lithography tools already in place at Intel fabrication plants. The problem is that phase-shift masking adds to the cost of producing microprocessors. So I'm guessing that Intel has decided that waiting for the new argon fluoride laser scanners before introducing 0.13 micron processors was a bad idea. With AMD processors performing better and costing less, Intel is desperate to reduce the size and cost of their processors, while allowing for increased clock speeds. This is probably the only way they can accomplish this in the next two months in any kind of volume production. I'm not saying that Intel has not converted any of their plants to the new equipment, just that they don't have enough fabrication capacity yet with the new equipment to roll out several new flavors of the Pentium III and Pentium 4 processor. The question in my mind is, "will phase-shift mask 0.13 micron Tualatin Pentium IIIs run as cool, and clock as high as ones made with the new argon fluoride laser equipment?" My guess is no. Phase shift mask technology is a less desirable method of attaining 0.13 micron fabricated processors. The fallout from Intel's accelerated plans has already caused complaints in Taiwan. Motherboard makers feel like Intel is yanking them around by their chains, switching chipsets and sockets willy-nilly. They are getting a little tired of it, and would like to concentrate on new Athlon motherboards, like those based on the AMD 760 multiprocessor chipset for Athlons. But as we all know, when Intel speaks, mobo makers jump. Links: May 11th The Intel Empire Strikes Back! Intel must be getting a little nervous right about now. "What? Intel worry?" If their new roadmap and price cut schedule is accurate, they are practically livid with fear. After Rambus, Intel's partner in crime, was found guilty of fraud in a Virginia court this week, I have a feeling that the Intel bunnypeople are in need of some cheering up. Rumor has it that Intel will be releasing Tualatin Pentium IIIs and 2GHz Pentium 4s in June! This is earlier than expected. But my question is, are they really going to release them, or just say so? I have been hearing for some time that the first release of the Tualatin (0.13 micron) PIII would be the mobile version for notebooks and laptops. I was under the impression that Intel did not have enough fab capacity converted to 0.13 fabrication yet to produce both mobile and desktop Tualatins simultaneously. But who knows? If they can keep to this time schedule, it may force AMD to push their Palomino release forward slightly. Again though, we are interested in product releases, not paper releases. So watch both companies carefully, and see if either tries to pull a fast one again. Ramboids.... Unite! In case you had thought that most Rambus stock holders had gotten a good dousing with cold water this week, think again. They are convinced that Infineon used money and high-priced lawyers, along with a dishonest judge, to fool the jury into a guilty verdict. They are absolutely convinced that Rambus Inc. invented SDRAM and DDR DRAM, not just Rambus DRAM. Rambus has put out some very effective propaganda, and it is still working on a small minority of loyal followers. Anyone who believes that Rambus remained in JEDEC until 1996 for any other reason than amending their pending patent applications is just kidding themselves. Rambus maintained all along that their low pin-count multiplexed bus design was unique, now they say they own the rights to the high pin count non-multiplexed design. Excuse me for saying so, but what a bunch of jerks. For those who enjoy listening to others self delude themselves, check this out. May 10th Et Tu, Intel? I may be going out on a limb here, but the deathly silence emanating from Intel's corporate headquarters has me wondering if they are in consultation with their lawyers about Rambus. If I were Craig Barrett, I would have my lawyers scour that Rambus contract for clauses that would free Intel from their obligations. If there isn't a clause about voiding the contract on the 2nd party's conviction for fraud, I'd suggest they work on one for any future contracts they sign. After Rambus' conviction on fraud charges, I would think that Intel would at least want to look into escaping the contract that limits them to using Rambus memory exclusively for the Pentium 4 until 2002. We really don't know yet how well the Pentium 4 processor will work with double data rate memory on Brookdale chipset motherboards. But my guess is that real-world performance for such systems will be very close to Rambus DRAM based systems. The price on DDR systems will be lower as well. If Rambus ends up losing all SDRAM and DDR DRAM royalties, and Intel begins to distance themselves from Rambus DRAM, the future of the technology may be in question. The Sony PlayStation 2 uses Rambus DRAM, which should be fairly lucrative for Rambus Inc., but Rambus has been counting on Rambus DRAM becoming the new PC memory standard. If their shenanigans end up alienating too many of their own allies, such as Intel, and the bad press continues to erode the public image of Rambus, they may just slowly fade into niche markets, and obscurity. Based on the results in the trial, I expect that Rambus will end up losing all rights to SDRAM and DDR DRAM, but retain all rights to the actual Rambus DRAM multiplex bus design. Rambus had always maintained that their low pin-count multiplex design was different and better, so their attempt to claim rights to the older (high pin count) DRAM design was always suspect. PS: The Rambus muttonheads that have been pushing Rambus stock all along (it still has a buy recommendation!!) have always said that the share price will never drop below $12. A quick check shows the price at $11.98.... opps, I mean $11.91... ack, $11.89.... (I'll stop now). It seems the muttonheads were wrong again.
Late Breaking News (maximum Payne) Rambusted for Fraud! Rambus Inc. was rambusted for fraud in a Virginia court today. Cheers and rejoicing rebounded through memory land in the wake of the jury's verdict, in which they found Rambus guilty on two counts of fraud. Please pinch me, I must be dreaming. Is it possible there is still justice in the world, albeit in modicum? The jury awarded the defendant (no... that's not a mistake, I actually do mean the folks the case was filed against) $3.5 million in punitive damages. But Rambus may only have to pay Infineon $350,000 due to a Virginia cap on damage awards. Rambus was found guilty of Count 10, actual fraud and Count 11, constructive fraud. They will of course appeal the case. We can only hope that as their royalty payments dry up, and their legal fees mount, that they will recognize the folly of their pesky ways, and get back to the task of designing memory. Rambus knows they did not design SDRAM, or DDR DRAM, and that their presence at JEDEC for years was a tacit acceptance of the fact that SDRAM and eventually DDR DRAM would become open standards. But Rambus lives in a world where IP (intellectual property) is everything, and hard work and fabrication are to be left to peons. In their minds, patent applications are the stuff of corporate espionage and counter espionage, not honest legal protection for actual inventions. The implications for Intel are enormous. They were hoping that Rambus memory would be a high-tech boost for Pentium 4 sales, and that the new memory would be embraced by performance enthusiasts. Instead, the Pentium 4 has received a substantial amount of bad press in the form of low benchmark numbers, and now Intel's technological partner has been found guilty of fraud. Rambus will fight on, and for now Intel will stay the course. But things couldn't look much worse for the little IP company that couldn't. May 9th Who's Winning the Processor Wars? In 1999, we sold Intel processors exclusively. We tried to warm up the the AMD K6-2, but poor motherboard quality and overheating chips made us a little leery. Then, just over a year ago at the beginning of 2000, the AMD Athlon processor was starting to gain popularity. We sold our first "Athlon-based" computer in January of 2000. But even by mid-2000, we were still selling mainly Coppermine PIII systems and kits. How has the situation changed since mid-2000? Well, we have gone from primarily an Intel dealer to being an almost exclusive AMD dealer. A quick check of our books breaks down this way for the year 2001 to date: Athlons accounted for 62% of computer and kit sales, Durons accounted for 29%, and Pentium IIIs accounted for 9% of sales. We didn't sell (or even try to sell) a single Celeron or Pentium 4 processor. That breaks down to 91% for AMD, and 9% for Intel. As the Coppermine PIII declines in popularity, our Intel sales will probably drop off to zero. It was reported today at The Inquirer that Intel will be cutting prices again this month. Will it help? Possibly, but the Pentium 4 costs several times as much money to produce as the Athlon, making the price war a loosing situation for Intel. And now that the Athlon is at 1.3GHz, the 1GHz PIII seems like a Celeron in comparison. At our distributors, the 800MHz PIII is still more expensive than the 1.3GHz Athlon. That's a recipe for disaster. Intel not only needs to cut PIII prices, they need to discontinue the Celeron line, and concentrate on the Tualatin PIII and P4. But recent reports indicate that Rambus has collected more royalty payments for SDRAM and DDR DRAM than they have for Rambus DRAM. That means their sales figures also show non-P4 processor systems outselling P4 systems by a wide margin. This is retched news for both Intel and Rambus. So who's winning the processor wars? AMD is the clear winner, and Intel's strategy is not working. Until they clean house of the Celeron, and get the PIII and P4 down to 0.13 microns, Intel will continue to loose market share to AMD. Late Edition Rambus May Lose Royalties, Case Goes to Jury It looks as though Judge Payne (also known as, the Rambus Payne Master) is letting the jury decide if Rambus violated the rules of the JEDEC memory standards committee. One RICO statute charge and two fraud charges remain for the jury to consider. Closing arguments were heard today, and a decision could come at any time. If the jury rules against Rambus, they still have plenty of ammunition left in the form of additional law suits, and more patent claims, not to mention appeals. Indeed, if you have followed any of the trial coverage over at FredHager.com, you would understand the intense loyalty and near religious devotion that Rambus groupies have for the pesky IP company. But even the Rambus groupies are starting to show cracks in their armor of denial. It will be fascinating to see what the jury comes up with. Rambus is considered by those outside the fight as the "little bitsy underdog".... who also happens to be an American IP company facing a gigantic German manufacturer in court. If the typical US pro-IP, anti-big corporation psychology sets in, Rambus will probably be cleared of all charges. If reason and logic rear their unlikely heads in this US court, Rambus will be in for a much tougher fight in their upcoming cases. It was also revealed today that Rambus' biggest licensee, Samsung, is looking into implementing a clause in their royalty contract that eliminates royalties if Rambus loses their court cases. RMBS shares closed at $13.70 today. Link: May 8th Rambus Wins!... Sort of Judge Robert E (for "Enjoys") Payne yesterday threw out all charges against Rambus for Anti-Trust violations in the memory market. In many ways this suggests that Judge Payne is not going to take any of this stuff at face value. But many observers had wondered if the anti-trust charges would stick, simply based on Rambus' attempt to garner royalties for all memory modules sold. That's not your usual anti-trust situation, even though it does seem more than ostentatious. The Judge however, did not throw out the RICO (racketeering) charges against Rambus for it's actions in the JEDEC memory standards committee. And yet, based on his stubborn resistance to both parties views, my guess is that these charges may be thrown out, and the case will never make it to the jury. (Talk about a wasted 2 weeks for those poor, unutilized jurors. Makes you want to jump up and volunteer for jury duty, doesn't it?) The end result will be that nothing has happened. There will not be a solid precedence laid down by this trial, and that means we will be back to square one when the next trial begins later this month. It's a shame, because it would have been better for the computer industry if this entire affair were settled and behind them. But there are quite a few remaining court cases on the dockets, so this whole thing could go on for months, or years. It's not definite that Judge Payne will throw out the racketeering charges, so keep your fingers crossed! The best possible outcome I can foresee is that a limited racketeering case does make it to the jury, and the jury finds against Rambus. The result would be that the Rambus patents are deemed unenforceable, which would effectively end their royalty collections. But no one can predict what an American jury will do (remember the OJ case?). RMBS shares were down to under $13.50 yesterday, which is near the lowest point that the stock price has gone over the last turbulent year. Compare that with the share price of $130 last June (down 90%). Links: AMD's "Barton" Processor As you may have heard, AMD is delaying all it's "hammer" family of 64-bit processors, and it's 0.13 micron shrink of the Athlon, code-named "Barton". The delay of the "Bart" is so that AMD can incorporate SOI (silicon on insulator) technology into the new 0.13 micron chips. As in the case of Intel, AMD is awaiting new laser scanning equipment that will allow them to ramp volume production of 0.13 micron fabricated processors. There has been a delay in delivering these new argon-fluoride scanners because of a shortage of the new calcium fluoride lenses that they require. Expect volume production of 0.13 micron processors from both Intel and AMD to be delayed until early 2002. Link: EBN May 5th Oh the Payne... the Payne ....to paraphrase the lovable Dr. Smith from the TV series "Lost in Space". Rambus Inc., their lawyers, and all those muttonheads that have been pushing Rambus stock must be chanting that phrase like a mantra, after Judge Robert E. Payne threw out the last 3 remaining charges against memory maker Infineon yesterday. But the case is not over. As I have been saying for weeks now, the case has been turned round to where the plaintiff has become the defendant, and versa visa. The only charges the Payne Master is still considering sending to the jury (who may be starting to feel like chopped liver about now) are fraud charges against Rambus while a member of the JEDEC memory standards committee. What is most incomprehensible is that Rambus still seems to think it has just run into a spate of bad luck, rather than the fact that they have no case to continue with. And indeed, the Rambus muttonheads are still crying "on to victory!" as you can see here. But what this outcome really indicates is the unraveling of the Rambus attempt to collect royalties for all computer memory sold on Earth. It was a risky move, and was certain to make enemies throughout the memory industry. But if it had worked, the muttonheads could have sat back with their margaritas, and relaxed for the rest of their miserable lives. Alas, it was not to be. My guess is that counter suits are already being drawn up by lawyers for the memory makers that were bamboozled into paying Rambus royalties on non-Rambus parts. I expect that these companies will want to try to recoup their royalty payments to Rambus, which will only make the Payne worse for the little IP company that couldn't. Links: The
Inquirer May 4th EZ CD Creator 5 Wipes Win2K Machines According to a story at The Register, the newest version of EZ CD Creator, version 5.0, can wipe out a perfectly good Windows 2000 installation. Why is it that every new computer horror story coming out concerns Windows 2000? I'm beginning to wonder if Windows XP is going to offer the same kind of fear-inducing scenario to the average user. The problem with EZ CD Creator 5.0 is apparently caused by a utility, which is installed by default. The utility, called Take Two, does not have to be installed for the program to function. Therefore, selecting 'custom install' and deselecting Take Two should alleviate all potential problems. Link: Roxio May 3rd US Loses Last Chip Tool Maker Silicon Valley Group, the last microprocessor fabrication tool maker in the US, has just gotten approval from the Bush administration to merge with AMS Lithography in the Netherlands. The deal was allowed to go through after ASM Lithography agreed to attempt to sell the subdivision that provides advanced lens polishing services, the Tinsley Laboratories. Many military analysts worry that the acquisition of the Silicon Valley Group by AMS Lithography will give away advanced military chip fabrication technology, since the chip tool maker worked closely with the US military on various chip fabrication tool projects. Intel is waiting on a $100 million order of new 193 nanometer lithography systems from Silicon Valley Group, which are needed to make the transition to 0.13 micron fabrication on Pentium III and Pentium 4 processors. Link: Silicon Strategies May 2nd Rambus in Perspective Judge Payne isn't throwing out any more of Rambus' charges against Infineon for patent infringement, but Rambus may end up wishing he had. Three charges remain, but the Judge has already ruled that there was no intentional wrongdoing by Infineon regardless if the jury rules against them. So Infineon is already in the clear, and the only company still on trial is Rambus, despite the fact that they are the litigant that filed the lawsuit! Why might Rambus wish that the 3 remaining charges were dismissed by the Judge? Because otherwise the case will center around the wrongdoing by Rambus while a member of the JEDEC memory standards committee. And in my opinion, if the jury hears the evidence against Rambus, they will find them guilty of willful violation of the JEDEC rules, and possibly guilty of anti-trust or racketeering charges. This would form a solid evidentiary foundation for the trial of Micron vs. Rambus, scheduled for the end of May, where Micron intends to focus almost solely on the misbehavior by Rambus while attending JEDEC meetings. Thus, the trials no longer center around whether Rambus should get royalties from the non-compliant SDRAM makers, but whether Rambus is in violation of laws themselves. What's going to happen to Rambus, and what about Intel if the court cases go against Rambus? It's impossible to say yet. But we have several other trials in the US and Europe still pending, and of course appeals by Rambus to higher courts, not to mention the fact that other players may step in. For one, I would think Intel has quite a lot at stake here. I'm sure they are not enjoying this situation at all, and are wondering if there is anything they can do. For example, they could help Rambus with another cash payment or stock trade. But what if the court cases and appeals go against Rambus, which seems quite possible at this juncture? First off I would assume that SDRAM makers would sue to recoup the royalties that Rambus inappropriately acquired from them. But because many SDRAM makers were dumb enough to sign contracts with Rambus before these issues were settled in court, they may be out of luck. Who know what kind of fine print is in those contracts? As for Intel, Rambus has gotten them in hot water on more than one occasion, and I'm thinking they are getting a little gun shy on the entire topic. They don't want to be intimately associated with a company that ends up being prosecuted on racketeering charges. But the entire Pentium 4 campaign is currently chained to Rambus at the wrist and ankles. Woe is Intel. Until the Brookdale chipset is ready with DDR memory support, the Pentium 4 requires Rambus DRAM. Therefore Intel must make sure that Rambus survives at least in the near term. More long term speculation is difficult. If Rambus gets in real serious court trouble, they may be forced into bankruptcy. If so, I'd expect that Intel would be interested in talking to the Ramboids about buying out their patents for a nice lump of cash. At this point, anything is possible. Link: EBN And for those few remaining Ramboid loyalists, here is your bread and butter! Copyright 2001, KickAss Gear |
