Will we ever see the new Nforce2 MCP????

[GreatDaleness]

Way back in July the Inq posted that there would be 3 new Nforce 2 MCPs. One adds SATA, one SATA RAID, and the MCP S1000 would offer SATA RAID and gigabit Lan. These chips were supposed to be mass produced in August for a September release. Anandtech made a comment about them at some point as well, though I forget the article. Do these chips actually exist? If so, will we ever see them?

 

[poppyq]

Not sure what chipset it uses but the Asus A7N8X-E DLX has nforce2 with gigabit lan

 

[GreatDaleness]

Uses the MCP-T southbridge. THe SATA raid and gigabit are not integrated into the southbridge, so they share the PCI bus. The whole point of integrating is that it bypasses that bottleneck, just like on the intel chipset.

 

[Megatomic]

I don't think the MCP-S and it's variants are going to see the light of day. The AN7 was supposed to be based on the MCP-S and provide integrated SATA RAID. Rather, it was based on the MCP-T just like the NF7-S and they included the uGuru chip to differentiate it from the NF7-S.

I have heard that Gigabyte is still planning on using the MCP-S, time will tell though. I am not optimistic.

 

[SUOrangeman]

Given the trend toward 64-bit, I'd be very surprised if we see these new features in the nForce2. I'd suspect we'll most likely see this in nForce3.

-SUO

 

[EeyoreX]

Given the trend toward 64-bit, I'd be very surprised if we see these new features in the nForce2. I'd suspect we'll most likely see this in nForce3.

-SUO

I don't know mow much the supposed trend toward 64-bit computing is really going to matter at this stage of the game. How many 64-bit desktops will be sold out of Dell and Gateway? How many consumers are demanding (or are even aware of) 64-bit? We won't see any chipsets based on what the Inquirer says. We'll see them when nVidia announces them. That may very well mean never. I just think 64-bit is not really a primary factor here. More money is to be gained from the 32-bit market. I just bought a $200 CPU and $135 nForce2 motherboard a few months ago. I can assure you I won't be upgrading every major component in my system for the "glory and honor" of being among the first in the near-useless (at this time) realm of 64-bit desktop computing.

\Dan

 

[GreatDaleness]

Originally posted by: EeyoreX

Given the trend toward 64-bit, I'd be very surprised if we see these new features in the nForce2. I'd suspect we'll most likely see this in nForce3.

-SUO

I don't know mow much the supposed trend toward 64-bit computing is really going to matter at this stage of the game. How many 64-bit desktops will be sold out of Dell and Gateway? How many consumers are demanding (or are even aware of) 64-bit? We won't see any chipsets based on what the Inquirer says. We'll see them when nVidia announces them. That may very well mean never. I just think 64-bit is not really a primary factor here. More money is to be gained from the 32-bit market. I just bought a $200 CPU and $135 nForce2 motherboard a few months ago. I can assure you I won't be upgrading every major component in my system for the "glory and honor" of being among the first in the near-useless (at this time) realm of 64-bit desktop computing.

\Dan

I believe his point was that with AMD putting out a $200 A64 this early nvidia probally won't see many new Nforce 2 sales, and thus won't put forth the time and money needed.

 

[MDE]

Nvidia sees Socket A as a dead-end market, and isn't putting much effort behind it. I wish they could write some decent drivers and get that spiffy audio control panel out the door sometime soon.

 

[SUOrangeman]

My fault. I did mean to imply an AMD-only bias. Socket A is probably dead as a developing/emerging platform. We all may be better off with this if AMD can keep pumping out 64-bit products with continually falling prices.

-SUO

 

[mechBgon]

I'd be delighted to build next fiscal years' systems with an MCP-S1000-based board (been using nForce 220D up 'til now) and I bet HP could find a market for gigabit-equipped business desktop systems to follow in the footsteps of their nForce- and nForce2-based D300-series. SocketA ain't dead yet, and gigabit is on its way in.

 

[InlineFive]

Originally posted by: GreatDaleness
Uses the MCP-T southbridge. THe SATA raid and gigabit are not integrated into the southbridge, so they share the PCI bus. The whole point of integrating is that it bypasses that bottleneck, just like on the intel chipset.

As an addendum this feature is only on some 875 based motherboards that have the CSA bus.

 

[EeyoreX]

Given the trend toward 64-bit, I'd be very surprised if we see these new features in the nForce2. I'd suspect we'll most likely see this in nForce3.

-SUO

I don't know mow much the supposed trend toward 64-bit computing is really going to matter at this stage of the game. How many 64-bit desktops will be sold out of Dell and Gateway? How many consumers are demanding (or are even aware of) 64-bit? We won't see any chipsets based on what the Inquirer says. We'll see them when nVidia announces them. That may very well mean never. I just think 64-bit is not really a primary factor here. More money is to be gained from the 32-bit market. I just bought a $200 CPU and $135 nForce2 motherboard a few months ago. I can assure you I won't be upgrading every major component in my system for the "glory and honor" of being among the first in the near-useless (at this time) realm of 64-bit desktop computing.

\Dan

I believe his point was that with AMD putting out a $200 A64 this early nvidia probally won't see many new Nforce 2 sales, and thus won't put forth the time and money needed.

And my point is that people aren't going to be running towards 64-bit in the quantities needed to sustain profitability at this time for nVidia. Enthusiats are willing to spend extra to be bleeding edge. There are likely plenty of people that would continue to purchase nForce2 boards. Not to mention (as someone did) that business desktop world can benefit from the platform (Socket A) for quite a while yet. There aren't a whole lot of businesses that are going to run out and buy a crap load of 64-bit desktops. Not to mention the current trend towards small form factor/HTPC. How many people need a 64-bit CPU for this when a lower end Athlon XP (heck, even Pentium II) will do the trick? Now, I did readily admit nVidia may never release an updated version, but I don't think nForce2 is going to go away that quickly either, there are still too many places that the platform is useful and that64-bit (even for $200) is excessive and unneeded.

\Dan

 

[GreatDaleness]

I agree, it isn't going away. The question I asked was will they release the new MCP. To do that, they have to invest lots of marketing and support money. So compare the money they would need to invest vs the INCREASE Nforce2 sales would see related to that. How many business consumers looking for a cheap PC care if it has gigabit Lan or SATA Raid 0?

 

[ViRGE]

At this point, I'm not so sure they could release a new MCP even if they wanted to. Creative purchased Sensarua, from whom Nvidia licenced their HRTF's for the MCP's audio. Unless Nvidia has a perpetual licence, they may have to licence each product seperately, and now that Sensaura is owned by Creative, I doubt they're handing out any new licences.

 

[EeyoreX]

How many business consumers looking for a cheap PC care if it has gigabit Lan or SATA Raid 0?

SATA RAID, probably not many. Gigabit LAN, a lot more. Businesses would (I should think) be especially receptive to gigabit LAN.

\Dan

 

[WobbleWobble]

Originally posted by: EeyoreX
SATA RAID, probably not many. Gigabit LAN, a lot more. Businesses would (I should think) be especially receptive to gigabit LAN.

\Dan

Most businesses don't use AMD anyways.

 

[EeyoreX]

SATA RAID, probably not many. Gigabit LAN, a lot more. Businesses would (I should think) be especially receptive to gigabit LAN.

\Dan

Most businesses don't use AMD anyways.

That's a good point. But they still would likely be interested in Gigabit LAN

It would be nice if more big companies would use AMD based systems. Give AMD a nice shot in the arm, plus we all know many business apps run better on AMDs procs (not that a P4 isn't doing the job just fine). Oh well...

\Dan

 

[Megatomic]

ABIT will not be making another new Socket A motherboard. My guess is that the other big manufacturers will follow suit.