In February STMicroelectronics announced that they would selling off their graphics devision to the highest bidder (which turned out to be VIA). This announcement seemed to indicate that NVidia and ATi were the only major players left in the graphics card business. Players like 3DLabs, Trident, SiS, and Matrox didn't seem to have an answer to NVidia or ATi...just yet.
The graphics scene has changed dramatically since the STMicroelectronics announcement. Creative Labs announced in March that they would be acquiring 3DLabs and would at the same time be reentering the graphics card market with a 76 million transistor graphics card to compete with NVidia and ATi. Just a few days ago 3DLabs released some info on this 76 million transistor product, codenamed P10. Indeed, the specs compare very well to the flagship graphics cards from both NVidia and ATi.
About two months later Trident announced that they would also be reentering the graphics biz, with a DX8.1 compliant mobile graphics card named XP4. The specs on this mobile product compare very well to the flagship mobile offerings from both NVidia and ATi.
Just over one week after the Trident announcement, SiS announced their brand new series of DX8 capable graphics cards named Xabre. These offerings look to compete very well with the low and middle-end market offerings of both NVidia and ATi.
Just when it seemed the graphics scene couldn't get any more competitive, Matrox today added a flash intro to their web site marking May 14th as an important date for the company. There have been rumors of a very special graphics card from Matrox for months now. More recently though, May 14th is believed to be the date Matrox introduces their new graphics card codenamed "Parhelia." Reactor Critical claims to know the specs for Parhelia. Looking at these specs (if they are true), it's clear that Parhelia could be a very competitive product when compared to current flagship products from NVida and ATi, namely the current GeForce4 Ti4600 and Radeon 8500.
All in all, it looks as if the graphics card market will be anything but boring for the foreseeable future.
The graphics scene has changed dramatically since the STMicroelectronics announcement. Creative Labs announced in March that they would be acquiring 3DLabs and would at the same time be reentering the graphics card market with a 76 million transistor graphics card to compete with NVidia and ATi. Just a few days ago 3DLabs released some info on this 76 million transistor product, codenamed P10. Indeed, the specs compare very well to the flagship graphics cards from both NVidia and ATi.
About two months later Trident announced that they would also be reentering the graphics biz, with a DX8.1 compliant mobile graphics card named XP4. The specs on this mobile product compare very well to the flagship mobile offerings from both NVidia and ATi.
Just over one week after the Trident announcement, SiS announced their brand new series of DX8 capable graphics cards named Xabre. These offerings look to compete very well with the low and middle-end market offerings of both NVidia and ATi.
Just when it seemed the graphics scene couldn't get any more competitive, Matrox today added a flash intro to their web site marking May 14th as an important date for the company. There have been rumors of a very special graphics card from Matrox for months now. More recently though, May 14th is believed to be the date Matrox introduces their new graphics card codenamed "Parhelia." Reactor Critical claims to know the specs for Parhelia. Looking at these specs (if they are true), it's clear that Parhelia could be a very competitive product when compared to current flagship products from NVida and ATi, namely the current GeForce4 Ti4600 and Radeon 8500.
All in all, it looks as if the graphics card market will be anything but boring for the foreseeable future.
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