XGI is back!

[PrayForDeath]

Originally posted by: Insomniak

Originally posted by: Captain_Howdy

Yes.... and you felt the need to emphasize this because....?

Sorry, I'm still bitter about dropping 200 bucks on that joke of a video card. Poor 3DFX.

Heh, fair enough.

Anyway, back to the OP, I don't think XGI is so much "back" as "still managing to be not-dead for the forseeable fiscal quarter". I don't see them sticking around very long.

Yeah, they're not really back, but I wrote that to attract viewers

 

[vss1980]

Originally posted by: SneakyStuff
XGI needs to be concerned about the low-end market, and integrated market, THAT's where the lucrative cash flow/return is. ATI and nVidia have the middle-high end markets covered, not to mention they have more resources, and experience.

Oh come on, most people who care know that XGI are in bed with SIS......
I wouldn't be surprised if we see an arrangement similar to that of VIA/S3.

 

[nitromullet]

XGI isn't in bed with SiS, They are SiS. SiS owns over 1/3 of their shares.

http://www.digitimes.com/mobos/a20040819B2073.html

From a newer review though, it doesn't really look like they're quite ready to compete in the mainstream sector...

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=1611&page=1

 

[Avalon]

I almost want to buy the Chaintech V3 just so I can see the card for myself

 

[AyashiKaibutsu]

If all XGI ever does is sap money out of the low end it's bad for us high end people since they will pull money from ATI/Nvidia R&D. Hopefully they will get into the high end and put some extra pressure on Nvidia/ATI.

 

[klah]

Here is an interview from last week with XGI's president Jonathan Shyi

http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20040923AB062.html

Q: How about the XGI roadmap for PCIe graphics chips?

A: Although we plan to start marketing native PCIe-compliant graphics chips by year-end, we still have to count on AGP8X models to boost revenues in the fourth quarter. XGI plans to deliver samples of its XG45 and XG47 PCIe chips to clients in the fourth quarter, as scheduled, and to start ramping up production in the first quarter of next year.


Q: XGI posted losses of NT$470 million before taxes in the first year of this year. Did the losses come as expected?

A: As I mentioned earlier, it is difficult to manage a product brand, and I think it is better to say that we are proud to have established an operating team with international competitiveness with only NT$470 million in funds. It would require about NT$4-5 billion in capital to establish a similar team in the US.

A GPU design company usually reaches a breakeven point after it has spent about NT$3-5 billion. XGI invested about NT$400-500 million in the first half of this year, which was in line with our planning.

 

[BenSkywalker]

RageIIc, RagePro, Rage128......

Don't think it is impossible for XGI to ever compete at the high end just because they can't make a decent product now.

 

[Avalon]

Ah, opportunity knocks.
A relative of mine just asked me if I could find them a cheap video card that has TV/Out so they could hook their computer up to their TV.
My choices were either a radeon 7000, geforce mx4000, or this XGI Volari 3 card.
They're all about $40 new, maybe the first two are up to $5 less, but I'm going to buy the XGI card so I can play with it and see what it's like. If it doesn't work, I'll just swap it for one of the other two cards.

 

[Peter]

Given that the Radeon 7000 and MX4000 both are DirectX 7 products straight from the Flintstones era, I would have gone with the V3 too. Please report back on how the drivers are behaving!

 

[Avalon]

Originally posted by: Peter
Given that the Radeon 7000 and MX4000 both are DirectX 7 products straight from the Flintstones era, I would have gone with the V3 too. Please report back on how the drivers are behaving!

I definitely will. I just hope some people out there will care about the results I'll try to provide. I'll probably run a suite of graphics tests. On the synthetic side, I'll run 3dmark01 and 03. The system I'm plugging the card into (A p3 700mhz) won't run 05 I bet
Then, I'll try to run some older games I have laying around on the system (Halflife, Stronghold, War3, JediKnight 2).
Unfortunately, I don't have an MX4000 on hand to directly compare the V3 to, but I do have an mx200. I know, I know, the mx200 is old stuff and lacking in comparison, but it IS a solid uber budget card (little driver issues, respectable brand name), so it should make for a decent comparison just to see how the V3 operates. Also, I'm going to investigate the driver cheating I've read about, so I'll most likely rename .exe files for games to do a before and after. Supposedly, the newest version of the XGI drivers stopped doing this .exe recognition optimizations, but there are still a load in the drivers/control panel that kill image quality, so that's something I must investigate as well. I'll also make sure the image quality is up to par with the mx200 (which isn't great, but it has no issues, and I'll be looking for issues, above all else). Maybe I can take some screenies and host them. We'll see. I ordered it earlier this afternoon, so I suspect I'll have it tuesday, maybe wednesday. Also, I'll see how the TV/out operates, since this is the main reason for purchasing the card to begin with.