VIA going for the win... new player in the market?

[taltamir]

With via subsidiary set to release a fully x86 compatible (and 64bit version as well) CPU with a dual core version following soon after one can hope they will become a serious competitor...

Well their other subsidiary S3 is now releasing a brand new GPU core:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/v...0_1_Graphics_Chip.html

With DX10.1, OpenGL 2.1, and full decode capbilities...

Like their CPU it is not up to the performance of the big players yet... but there are big plans, and like their CPU it is gonna have ultra lower power consumption and heat... making it an ideal HTPC...

Soon you could get an HTPC with a VIA CPU and a VIA GPU being quit and cool (low energy means less cooling) and cheap...

Color me impressed. Sure I am not gonna buy it for my next gaming system. But this makes me think of the K6 days with AMD... it will be really cool if AMD makes a comeback with their fusion in 09... and nvidia diversifies... intel comes out with their own video card... and via's next next gen (the ones after this iteration of CPU and GPU) brings about enough performance to make them a serious player...
A 4 company market sounds downright delicious!

 

[Ika]

Just because it makes a great HTPC doesn't mean it will be popular... I swear VIA had some nice offerings a few years ago, then disappeared off the radar again. Being a serious player takes not only quality, but volume as well. I don't know if VIA has anywhere near the capacity that AMD did back in the A64 days, but it took AMD 2-3 years just to take marketshare back from Intel (and even then, Intel still dominated them in the OEM market). If VIA wants to get into the market, it has to fight against BOTH Intel and AMD. With Intel rolling the way it is now, I don't think VIA can make much of an impact...

 

[taltamir]

and it has to fight against nvidia too... what i meant was that they are building the technology, and it will be interesting to see where it goes... maybe their next gen after this one would be significantly faster. One can only hope.

 

[hans007]

they dx9 and below chips did not really even see daylight for the most part. you could not really buy them at newegg anyway. its good though to see this, as this is likely to be what will be part of their mini itx igps someday

 

[bunnyfubbles]

Meh, people won't care. VIA tried to entice us by showing that their processor could keep running Quake 3 smooth as butter should the heatsink actually fall off...and that the Intel CPU it was competing against would die a horrible death...but nobody cared because your heatsink will never just fall off

The same is true of this CPU. Extreme niche, and the fact that you'll be able to get a comparable Intel or AMD CPU (even if you have to underclock/undervolt it to get comparable power consumption) for just as cheap and should also be easier to buy.

News of low end graphics is not news. S3 with there Chrome line has supplied crappy low end solutions since forever, so this "news" doesn't bring any more promise of any bigger or better future.

As much as I'd love some insurance that Intel and nVidia will have some competition should AMD implode, I seriously doubt VIA will do anything significant to splash the pot.

 

[ViRGE]

Woohoo, go S3!

 

[n7]

Yup, there were similar threads on Via cards from a couple years ago; just next to no one bought one (except Avalon here IIRC), & now the same thing is happening again...

I wish they could really compete, but that doesn't seem likely anytime soon.

 

[waffleironhead]

Looks like to nv8400 and ati2400 finally got some solid competition.

 

[Peter]

Well, even if it's going to make only a brief appearance on the VGA card market, this is the technology to go into next generation VIA chipsets - as integrated graphics.

The same happened with the last three or four generations of S3 graphics engines - born as standalone chips, hardly making a dent on the retail cards market but somewhat more popular with volume OEMs, and then reappear in VIA northbridges as integrated graphics.

If they're making some more inroads on the card market this time, then fine. There's definitely a niche for full-featured, truly low power silent cards.