Posted 08/29/08 at 01:12:03 PM by Paul Lilly

Forget about daytime television, the real drama takes place in the tech industry. Intel and Nvidia's relationship can be described as rocky at best, and now the GPU maker has said it will make "a significant investment in optimizing software" for VIA's Nano processor. VIA's low power chip has already been spotted outperforming Intel's Atom CPU, making this latest announcement all the more interesting for anyone paying attention to the ultraportable market.

The announcement also puts to rest an earlier rumor alleging Nvidia of using its relationship with VIA as a bargaining chip with Intel. Recent speculation suggested Nvidia's motive all along was to convince Intel to let its Atom processor support  Nvidia's MCP73 IGP chipset, and in return, the GPU maker would terminate its alliance with VIA.

With the ultraportable market seemingly exploding as of late, should Intel be worried about a more solidfied relationship between Nvidia and VIA?

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mobile, notebook, laptop, nvidia, Drivers, VIA, ultraportable, nano

Posted 08/13/08 at 08:36:04 AM by Chris Moody

CustomPC reports that VIA is calling it quits in the motherboard chipset business, and will focus on making x86 processors.

They quote VIA’s vice president of corporate marketing in Taiwan, Richard Brown, as saying,  “One of the main reasons we originally moved into the x86 processor business was because we believed that ultimately the third party chipset market would disappear, and we would need to have the capability to provide a complete platform.” He adds, ‘That has indeed come to pass,’ and said, ‘Intel provides the vast majority of chipsets for its processors and, following its purchase of ATI, AMD is also moving very quickly in the same direction.’

This comes after Nvidia said that they were not offering a native chipset for Bloomfield (now Core i7) processors, and SLI would be available in the form of the nForce 200 chip, similar to the Skulltrail implementation with the nForce 100.

VIA was always popular with the enthusiast on a budget crowd, which shot up with their Apollo P4X266 chipset. The P4X266 brought DDR memory support to the Pentium 4 and went ahead without a license from Intel to do so.

This seems to highlight a trend that the industry no longer needs third party chipset manufacturers, with AMD now offering it’s own chipsets for it’s own CPUs, just as Intel has done for a long time. It would seem logical that CPU manufacturers would be in the best position to offer chipsets that would squeeze the most out of their respective CPUs, but without a multitude of third party manufacturers, I can’t help but wonder who will keep them honest in doing so, and not allow the field to stagnate.

Are you going to miss VIA chipsets?

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intel, motherboard, hardware, chipset, VIA, build a pc

Posted 07/30/08 at 02:06:13 PM by Paul Lilly

Much has been made over Intel's Atom processor, the 45nm wonder-chip finding its way into more netbooks than production can seemingly keep up with. But lest the world forget, VIA also has a low power chip of its own, one the company claims delivers "truly optimized performance for the most demanding computing, entertainment, and connectivity applications."

VIA's 65nm Nano processor saw an official launch a full two months ago, but it's Intel's Atom that keeps getting the attention. Is it justified? A pair of review sites looked to answer that question by pitting an Intel Atom 230 (1.6GHz) against a VIA Nano L2100 (1.8GHz), and both sites came to the same conclusion: VIA's Nano is the faster processor.

Clocked 12.5 percent faster the Atom chip, it should come as no surprise to see the Nano L2100 churn out better performance numbers, but it's the margin of victory that might turn a few heads. In some cases, the Nano chip outpaced the Atom by a margin of 15 to 20 percent, showing it deserves more attention than just as an also-ran.

Of course, it's all for naught if VIA can't win the one contest that matters most: Vendor support.

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intel, mobile, notebook, laptop, processor, hardware, VIA, ultraportable, atom, rigs, netbook, nano

Posted 07/08/08 at 06:25:56 PM by Paul Lilly

If you're a subscriber to Maximum PC magazine, turn to page 8 in this month's issue (and for everyone else, hit the subscription link) and read Gordon Mah Ung's take on Intel and Nvidia's Secret War. Gordon discusses the issues preventing users from being able to run SLI on an Intel chipset, and what roadblocks might be in place for future Nehalem support on upcoming Nvidia chipsets. In other words, you might end up having to choose a side. Sound familiar?

Now there's talk of Nvidia want to support Intel's Atom processor, and whether or not you care about the low-cost PC and MID market, it might be in your best interest if the two sides can come to an agreement. But can they? Earlier in the year Nvidia and VIA entered into an alliance, and speculation suggests it was forged to compete against Intel's Atom. Now it appears Nvidia's intention all along may have been to gain a bargaining chip to convince Intel to let its Atom processor support Nvidia's MCP73 IGP chipset. If Intel agrees, DigiTimes reports Nvidia will then terminate its alliance with VIA and its Nano processor. And while VIA might not be too pleased with the idea (rebound relationships never work out anyway), an agreement over licensing terms in the low-cost PC market might open the door to better communication in the mid- to high-end desktop sectors.

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intel, nvidia, processor, hardware, VIA, atom, build a pc, rigs

Posted 06/30/08 at 02:10:48 PM by Tom Halfhill

Will they never learn? Another start-up hoping to compete with mighty Intel has crashed, sending some 200 engineers to the unemployment line and squandering about $74 million from disgruntled investors. Montalvo Systems, originally named MemoryLogix, is now just another smoking crater in Silicon Valley.

Hit the jump for the full scoop on another chip maker who coulda been a contendah.

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tom halfhill, fast forward, VIA, transmeta, columns, Montalvo Systems

Posted 06/27/08 at 04:13:22 PM by Pulkit Chandna

Intel and VIA are concentrating their resources on developing the least power-sapping processors to wrest the lucrative ultra-portables market. But they might soon have to contend with a late entrant. A leaked slide on Gottabemobile.com suggests that AMD is going to enter the low-voltage processor race with its Shrike platform.

Assuming the authenticity of the slide and veracity of Gottabemobile, the Shrike platform will be the first manifestation of AMD’s exciting Fusion platform, and so, will have a GPU and CPU on the same dye. The slide proudly proclaims Shrike to be the first Accelerated Processing Unit. If this does head to ultra-portables then it will certainly spruce up their limited graphical capabilities.

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amd, intel, hardware, VIA, atom, build a pc, Intel Atom, leak, rumor, ultra-portables, low voltage, shrike, fusion

Posted 04/07/08 at 11:00:30 PM by Will Smith

At Maximum PC, our main concern is speed—we like to call it pure PC power. But, as much as we love the massive power available in a desktop replacement notebooks today, our shoulders just won’t let us tote those über-powerful, über-heavy rigs any further than from the sofa to the fridge and back. Even worse, high-powered, ultra-portable rigs are just too damn expensive. And it’s tough to pay more than $2000 for a machine with integrated graphics, even if it weighs only 3 pounds.

Click Read More for more.

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news, hp, VIA, eee, ultralight, ultraportable, will, upc

Posted 01/03/08 at 10:49:26 AM by Mark 'Marcus Soperus' Soper

2008's only a few days old, but it's already obvious that the motherboard and chipset makers' 'Who's Who' needs an update. Find out who's new, who's in, and who's out.

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Asustek, VIA