6/19/09

NVIDIA News Brief - 6/19/09 @ 9:48 am - By: MikeC - Source: Email

Jen-Hsun Makes the Rounds New York Times interviewed NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang about the state of the company and the new products that were introduced at Computex. "Every time there is a difficult quarter, someone wants to blow it up. But in order to do something great in the future, you have to take risks today. The CEO has to be the virus. To build a great company, you have to kill it a bit every day." Forbes also talked with Jen-Hsun about the changing processor industry. "There is no question now that the GPU is a disruptive technology." ION Momentum Surges, Despite Intel "Rebates" At Computex, twenty-one new ION-based systems were introduced. DigiTimes sees even more new expansion ahead for ION. "NVIDIA ION has successfully won the adoption from first tier OEMs/ODMs like HP, Dell, Acer, Lenovo, Asus, MSI, AsRock, Foxconn, Pegatron and ECS. Now NVIDIA is also tapping into the white-box PC market in China, which is expected to be a promising market." This is in spite of Intel's efforts to keep ION out of consumers' hands. According to a report on PCPOP, Intel may be trying to keep ION off the market using more of the infamous Intel rebates. "Why is it that such an outstanding product not been pervasively used? Insiders give the answer: It’s because of Intel's undermining. Insiders say that Intel has a lot of methods to blockade its opponents. If sellers are found to be separating CPU to be used in the combination of 330 + ION, Intel will withhold the rebate of US $16 from distributors." In the press conference to discuss Intel's record antitrust fine, Laptop Magazine was able to confirm rumors that Intel is charging more for Atom CPUs than they are for Atom CPUs plus the Intel chipset. "In fact, many netbook vendors have told us off the record that this higher cost has been the primary reason for them being skittish about embracing NVIDIA's ION platform." ION is being called disruptive technology. By combining an ION GPU with an Atom processor, NVIDIA is able to deliver premium PC performance and features in low-cost, small form factor PCs. Consumers want it. And OEMs are excited about the possibilities it creates for affordable, low-powered PCs. AMD Pulled a Fast One A dirty trick, not a fast GPU that is. Seems that the Radeon HD 4770 cards reviewers may have written about will never see the light of day. AMD has very few chips, and the ones they do have looks like they will not get placed on retail boards with the same top-of-the-line components that reviewer's received. "We have suggested that this was done to meet the price point in our reviews and this has now been confirmed. One source told us that AMD admitted that it was nigh on impossible to meet the price point with the full design after several back-and-forth discussions." Larrabee Uncovered, Not Good Tom’s Hardware got the scoop on Larrabee recently and a close read of their story reveals a few interesting tidbits. May not ship until summer 2011 (translation: late) 1st, 2nd generation not compatible with 3rd (translation: orphaned products, no support, dead end drivers) 3rd generation has emulation compatibility mode (translation: performance and reliability will suffer) This is starting to sound a lot like Intel's other attempts at graphics. Tegra was Big in Taipei Computex produced a lot of Tegra news. The UK's BBC put it into perspective. "Tegra combines eight different processors, each one dedicated to a specific task such as HD video decoding or audio playback, packing them onto a circuit board about the size of a pack of chewing gum." Laptop Magazine went hands on with Tegra. "In our short hands-on experience, the Tegra platform seemed to fulfill most of its promises. While there is no word on pricing yet, the Mobinova elan looks like it will give smartbooks a good name." Engadget talked it up with NVIDIA's Gordon Grigor. If you didn't believe the Tegra hype -- 25 days audio, 10 hours of 1080p video on single charge -- already then pull up a stool, son, NVIDIA wants to tell you a story. TechVideoBlog sat down with Gordon Grigor, NVIDIA's Director of Mobile Software to see Tegra's little Atom smasher in action. It even spawned its own Web site in the US - http://www.tegrabased.com/ So call them what you want, but GIGAOM thinks NVIDIA is on to something with Tegra. There are other category-defining names that have been floated by various companies over the past few months, such as smartbooks, UMPC, netbooks and cloud computers. Whatever the name, they are essentially cheap PCs. Jen-Hsun Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, summed up my feeling when he said, 'Netbooks are not a new category, instead they are just cheap PCs.' The $399 PC is here to stay and it will get better and better." At Computex, NVIDIA had seven new high-definition mobile Internet devices all based on Tegra. These devices deliver desktop-class Internet browsing with Flash video and animation acceleration and high-definition video playback, all with cell phone-class power management — making days of HD mobile Internet experiences a reality. MainGear: Small, Green and Upgradable MainGear announced the world's first GeForce-upgradeable ION PC. It delivers remarkable performance in a tiny footprint. CNET wants to see more PCs like it. Short of a Firebird update from HP, or a similar desktop from another vendor, the Maingear Pulse may become your only up-to-date option for a small, power-efficient, midrange gaming PC. We think HP was on to something when it introduced the concept last year, and while we're glad Maingear picked up and seemingly improved the torch, we'd love to see other vendors help keep this innovative category alive. Buy.com Infomerical NVIDIA has its own infomercial on BuyTV. It went live last week on Buy.com’s homepage to help mainstream consumers quickly comprehend why they want to purchase and use GeForce as their graphics solution of choice.