Why didn't SGI go more into making consumer products?

[Anarchist420]

I was wondering, because even their work in the Nintendo 64 was not purely for the end user.

I know that their original staff went elsewhere (for example, SGi staff formed ArtX, they envisioned the Flipper and then ATi got credit for the Gamecube's graphics processor) and that they were more of a research and development firm. Nintendo made some dumb decisions with the Flipper graphics processor IMO... having embedded 1T-SRAM (which Nintendo wanted) wasn't good for the gamer. They should've used more off the shelf parts like Sega did. The Dreamcast was actually much better IMO, considering that it first launched almost a full 3 years before the Gamecube did. Nintendo had an excellent chipset for the Nintendo 64 also but they held it back themselves because Nintendo does what they want, not even what will make itself the longest term profit. I loved Sega the most not just because of the games, but because they were always a balance of ethics, prices, and product quality (especially when Tom Kalinske was CEO of Sega of America)... it is unfortunate that it may have contributed to their lack of financial success.

I started this thread because I just dream there were alternatives to nv/AMD (as well as MS/Apple), like there used to be... the market may have built nv's inherent shrewdness but the state kept it alive for the long term and prevented 3dfx's engineers from restarting their own company... that may have been why the Geforce FX turned out why it did. I'm sure 3dfx's engineers and management learned from their mistakes after 3dfx went bust, while most of nvidia never will.

The market will be free enough to break nvidia corporation one day though (and probably myself which I need to be aware of)... AMD's graphics division (or at least most of the engineers) could've regrouped when they had a weaker (as in nicer) CEO, but they won't have the ability to do so much longer if they still have it.

I don't know when exactly nvidia will dissolve, but it will happen likely when tax payer-subsidization runs out.

Anything above that should be added, deleted, or corrected?

 

[Keysplayr]

Wut?

 

[railven]

Wut?

Your free swag is in danger!!!

Another possible doom and gloom thread?

We're DOOOOOOOOOMMMMMEDDD!!! :twisted:

 

[Anarchist420]

I wanted to discuss the ideas and concepts I mentioned in the OP.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Nvidia dissolve? It's making money...unlike AMD who posts losses all the time.

 

[BenSkywalker]

Why didn't SGI go more into making consumer products?

They weren't into making anything fast, nor were they into making things cheap back in the early days of rasterization. SGi made highly accurate parts that by comparison were much slower then their consumer grade counterparts. They could do things far beyond what the original Voodoo, ATi or nV parts were capable of, but they had terrible fill rate(which for their uses, wasn't that great). Back in that time era general compute power was very limited and SGi's Cray supercomputers were massive margin makers. Creating a consumer based part would have required an entirely different approach that SGi wasn't interested in. Unfortunately for them, the accuracy of the consumer parts increased in a dramatic fashion very quickly making their high end 3D irrelevant.

I started this thread because I just dream there were alternatives to nv/AMD (as well as MS/Apple)

PowerVR and ARM both have alternatives to nV/AMD/Intel, they just aren't in the PC space. The smartphone/tablet market is already significantly larger on a unit basis then PCs(desktop, laptop and netbook combined).

the market may have built nv's inherent shrewdness but the state kept it alive for the long term and prevented 3dfx's engineers from restarting their own company.

They only large scale government hand out to any of the surviving GPU makers was AMD getting a hefty check from the German government which was a loan(which they used to build the Dresden fab).

The market will be free enough to break nvidia corporation one day though (and probably myself which I need to be aware of)

Without government intervention nVidia would be gone now, as would AMD, Intel would be the only player left around. The free market, given its' run, would have placed Intel as the sole provider of computing solutions in the PC space.

 

[Anarchist420]

Without government intervention nVidia would be gone now, as would AMD, Intel would be the only player left around. The free market, given its' run, would have placed Intel as the sole provider of computing solutions in the PC space.

Intel would be gone without their patents that they lobbied for (and got in the mid 80s) or else they wouldn't be intel. What you said about SGi makes sense