| October 16, 1998 |
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By Reuters
October 15, 1998
ZD Net News
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Intel Corp.'s primary microprocessor for
the future may violate a patent held by S3 Inc. of Santa
Clara, Calif., people familiar with the matter told the
Wall Street Journal. Intel's new chip, code named
Merced, may infringe on a S3 patent, chip-patent expert
Richard Belgard told the paper.
S3 bought the patent along with others last year from
Exponential Technology Inc., which no longer exists, the
report said. S3 paid $10 million for nearly 50 patents
from Exponential, the report said.
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By Sandeep Junnarkar
October 16, 1998
C/Net
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Chipmaker giant Intel will make a $500
million equity investment in Micron Technology, the
companies announced today. Intel said its investment
in Micron is part of its strategy to support the
development and supply of next generation memory
products. Intel also said that it hopes to help drive
personal computer industry growth by accelerating the
adoption of Direct RDRAM , a high-speed memory interface
technology developed by Rambus.
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By Marcia Savage
October 14, 1998
Computer Reseller News
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Intel Corp. Wednesday presented details
of its upcoming 64-bit Merced processor and outlined its
road map for future high-end processors at the
Microprocessor Forum, held here. Due for production in
mid-2000, Merced is the first in Intel's series of 64-bit
processors targeting the high-end server and workstation
market. Stephen Smith, corporate vice president of
Intel's microprocessor products group, said the processor
is "inherently scaleable."
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By Alexander Wolfe
October 15, 1998
EE Times
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Intel Corp. revealed long-term plans on
Wednesday (Oct. 14) for two successors to its upcoming
64-bit Merced microprocessor. Merced, which is due in
mid-2000, will be followed in late 2001 by a previously
announced processor code-named McKinley. In a
presentation at the Microprocessor Forum, Stephen Smith,
vice president of Intel's microprocessor products group,
said that two additional IA-64 architecture devices will
follow.
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by Graham Lea
October 15, 1998
The Register
|
If you've ever wondered what Intel and
HP might be doing together in the microprocessor design
area, then be sure to drop by the Institute for the
Development of Emerging Architectures (IDEA) in
Cupertino. Last year it was awarded a patent,
US-5652859 for a "Method and apparatus for handling
snoops in multiprocessor caches having internal buffer
queues", and it also has four others - with no doubt
more in the, er, cache. So what's interesting about this?
Well, don't apply there for a job because IDEA turns out
to be a front organisation for Intel and HP, who assign
some of their patents to the Institute.
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By Lisa DiCarlo
October 16, 1998
PC Week Online
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Hoping to capitalize on the delay of
Intel Corp.'s next-generation Merced processor, some of
the leading RISC chip makers this week spelled out plans
for their high-performance 64-bit processors. Motorola
Semiconductor Products Sector described the next
generation of the PowerPC, called the G4, Compaq Computer
Corp. offered details about the next two versions of
Alpha, and Hewlett Packard Co. laid out a four-year road
map for PA-RISC.
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By Stephen Shankland
October 15, 1998
C/Net
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Rambus, developer of an up-and-coming
computer memory technology, announced fourth-quarter net
income of $1.75 million, or 7 cents per diluted share,
compared with net income of $1.06 million, or 4 cents per
share, for the same quarter a year ago. Those earnings
were in line with analysts' expectations of 7 cents
share, according to First Call.
The company's third-quarter net income was $1.7
million.
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| Today's Related Stories |
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By Margaret Kane
October 15, 1998
ZD Net News
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Intel Corp. is taking out a 6 percent
stake worth $500 million in memory-maker Micron
Technology Inc. Intel said today that the Micron
investment will help fuel development of a special type
of memory.
Intel has been pushing for new systems to use a new
expandable memory known as Direct Rambus Dynamic RAM
(DRDRAM). The memory was developed by Rambus Inc. with
input from Intel, and is seen as the successor to 100MHz
synchronous DRAM.
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By John Lettice
October 15, 1998
The Register
|
Intel has bought a $500 million stake in
Micron Technology, the company which, after its takeover
of TI's memory operations earlier this year, is the
flagship of the US DRAM business. The Intel investment
represents approximately 6 per cent of Micron's stock. According
to Intel, the investment is part of the company's
strategy "to support the development and supply of
next generation memory products and to help drive PC
industry growth by accelerating the development of Direct
RDRAM," Rabus' high speed memory technology. The
investment will also however help Micron out - the DRAM
company claims that it will have no digestion problems in
assimilating TI's meory operations, but with its old
enemies from Korea facing serious financial difficulties,
Micron has a golden opportunity to go onto the attack,
provided it has the money to do so.
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October 16, 1998
Semiconductor Business News
|
Intel announced Friday that it will make
a $500 million equity investment in Micron Technology.
Intel will acquire stock rightsexchangeable for common
stock representing approximately 6 percent ofMicron's
outstanding common stock. The investment in Micron is
part of Intel's strategy to support the development and
supply of next-generation memory products and to help
drive PC-industry growth by accelerating the adoption of
Direct RDRAM, a high-speed memory interface technology
developed by Rambus. By providing additional financial
resources, the investment by Intel, in Santa Clara,
Calif., should enhance Micron's competitive position in
the DRAM industry. |
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| October 15, 1998 |
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By Drew Cullen
October 14, 1998
VNU Business News
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Chipmaker AMD is to supply the CPU for
HP's entry to the Windows-Based Terminal market. According
to an HP spokeswoman the CPU is an AMD 486, and the
company plans to establish a premier position around the
world in thin-client computing - which should mean
significant volumes for AMD.
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By Michael Kanellos
October 12, 1998
C/Net
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A good news/bad news scenario will
likely play itself out this week in earnings
announcements from semiconductor companies. On the
positive side, Intel is expected to report revenues in
excess of the projections it released last month,
according to some analysts. Accordingly, the company is
expected tomorrow to report earnings of 80 cents per
share or more.
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By Lisa DiCarlo
October 15, 1998
PC Week Online
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A Federal Trade Commission commissioner
on Wednesday defended the government's increasing focus
on antitrust violations in the technology industry. The
commissioner, Mozelle Thompson, gave a short speech here
at the Microprocessor Forum before participating in a
discussion panel with antitrust attorneys and law
professors on the government's role in the industry.
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| Microprocessor
Forum Coverage |
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By Dominique Deckmyn
October 15, 1998
VNU Business News
|
Intel downplayed its Merced 64bit
processor at the Microprocessor Forum in this week and
instead emphasised its successor, McKinley, and a new
high-performance 32-bit CPU, codenamed Foster. The
Foster chip is based on a new 32-bit processor core and
will match the performance of Merced, Intel claims.
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By Brooke Crothers
October 14, 1998
C/Net
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Intel provided concrete details of its
64-bit Merced processor for the first time at the
Microprocessor Forum today and announced a low-cost
64-bit chip architecture. Providing particulars that
are esoteric but essential for moving Intel to a 64-bit
future, Merced targets high-end computer markets that
Intel can only dream of now. The chip is due out in
mid-2000.
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By Tony Smith
October 15, 1998
The Register
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Intel revealed details of its future
IA-32 processor technology, codenamed Foster, at this
year's Microprocessor Forum. The company also discussed
its positioning of the IA-64-based Merced and its
successors, McKinley, Madison and Deerfield. Foster is
set to ship late 2000/early 2001 and, according to Intel
Microprocessor Products Group VP Steve Smith, will be
based on a new core design which will replace the
P6-based core currently used in Xeon and to be extended
with the Katmai multimedia instructions in Tanner and
then Cascades.
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By Matthew Loney
October 15, 1998
ZDNet UK
|
In stark contrast to Tuesday's
"small is beautiful" theme, Wednesday was
"big is better" day here at the Microprocessor
Forum. The major processor manufacturers discussed
future directions on the high-end of the processor
market, highlighted by Intel Corp.'s further outlining of
its plans for the next four years.
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By Andy Santoni
October 14, 1998
InfoWorld Electric
|
Just a week after disclosing its road
map for workstation and server CPUs, Intel updated its
plans by revealing the names of two future 64-bit
processors at
the Microprocessor Forum here Wednesday.
Following Merced, the first 64-bit, Intel architecture
(IA-64) CPU, Intel will update the line late in 2001 with
McKinley, reiterated Stephen L. Smith, corporate vice
president and
general manager of Intel's Santa Clara processor
division. McKinley should debut with clock speeds faster
than 1 GHz, he said. |
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By Mark Hachman
October 15, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
|
A week after Intel Corp. outlined its
64-bit roadmap through 2000, the chip giant published a
second edition. As part of a presentation at this
week's Microprocessor Forum, Stephen L. Smith, corporate
vice-president of Intel's Microprocessor Group, added the
names “Madison” and “Deerfield” to
its 64-bit roadmap.
At the same time, he provided some additional details
of the architecture of Intel's first 64-bit chip, Merced.
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By Andy Santoni
October 14, 1998
InfoWorld Electric
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Between presenting papers on its 32-bit
and 64-bit PC processor plans at the Microprocessor Forum
here this week, Intel switched gears and introduced
low-power embedded CPUs for handheld and other
applications. Low-power, 166-MHz and 266-MHz Pentium
MMX processors target point-of-sale, industrial
automation, and communications equipment. Priced at about
$60 and $100, respectively, the two CPUs are available in
a low-profile package to fit tight spaces.
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By Craig Matsumoto
October 14, 1998
EE Times
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Intel Corp. made its pitch for the
embedded market at the Microprocessor Forum conference on
Tuesday when it announced a new StrongARM processor, as
well as new embedded parts from the Pentium and i960
families. Intel provided details of the SA-1101
StrongARM device, which was previously announced as the
processor used in Hewlett-Packard Co.'s latest portable
computer. The SA-1101 is noteable as the Intel's first
new StrongARM device, and more are certain to follow,
said Mark Casey, StrongARM marketing director for Intel.
Specifically, Intel is working on an SA-2 core, a
follow-up to the SA-1 inherited from Digital
Semiconductor, Casey said, though he wouldn't say when
the new core would be completed.
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October 14, 1998
Tech Web
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New types of computing devices that
connect to PCs or interact with them could be enabled by
a series of 32-bit embedded products announced here by
Intel Corp. These devices include handheld consumer
appliances, communications equipment, point-of-sale (POS)
terminals, PC-like industrial automation systems and
data-storage management systems.
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By Matt Loney
October 15, 1998
IT Week
|
AMD said Tuesday that its next
generation processor, the K7, will be enabled for
multiprocessor systems, creating a possible threat to
Intel in the low-end server market. However, when
presenting this vision, director of engineering for AMD's
K7 programme Dirk Meyer, added a corollary:
"Multiprocessing is clearly not our thrust," he
said, "but with the K7 we want to be in a position
to address markets we haven't been in before."
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By David Lammers
October 14, 1998
EE Times
|
Advanced Micro Devices Inc. placed its
K7 microprocessor at stage center of the Microprocessor
Forum. Expected to hit the market in mid-1999, K7 will
target Intel Corp.'s lucrative 85 percent share of the
personal computer microprocessor market. The K7 is an
X86 design that takes AMD further afield of Intel in
terms of its instruction set, bus architecture and chip
set support. The K7, which is expected to debut with a
clock speed above 500 MHz, is to be AMD's counter to
Intel's Katmai processor with the Katmai New
Instructions, set to hit the market in the first quarter.
|
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By Mark Hachman
October 14, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
|
Advanced Micro Devices Inc.'s
presentation at the Microprocessor Forum in San Jose
yesterday was slightly less bombastic than the keynote
delivered last year by chairman and chief executive Jerry
Sanders. But AMD surprised the audience when it
announced that EV-6, a bus architecture that it licensed
from Digital Equipment Corp. for use in its forthcoming
K7 microprocessors and is interchangeable with the Alpha
chip, will run at 200 MHz, which is much faster than the
133 MHz bus speed Intel Corp. has proposed.
|
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By Arif Mohamed
October 15, 1998
ZD Net News
|
AMD has revealed plans for a 3D K6 chip
with a L2 cache that runs at the same speed as the
processor. The firm also plans to unveil the
next-generation K7 processor at the 1998 Microprocessor
Forum in San Francisco. The K7 is expected to go into
production spring 1999, said AMD.
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By Mark Hachman
October 14, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
|
Centaur Technology Inc., the
microprocessor subsidiary of Integrated Device Technology
Inc., confirmed EBN's earlier report that the company had
reworked its roadmap due to limitations in clock speed. Centaur
will “redirect” development of the WinChip2+NB,
the successor to Centaur's WinChip 2 microprocessor, to
include graphics.
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By David Lammers
October 14, 1998
EE Times
|
The Cyrix division of National
Semiconductor Corp. described its Jalapeno core as a
600-MHz "memory centric" design that will be
used in Cyrix's M3 family of processors, which will begin
sampling late in 1999. The design will include a Rambus
ASIC cell as an on-chip memory controller that will
support 3.2-Gbytes of bandwidth between the processor and
a Rambus in-line memory module (RIMM).
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By Michael Kanellos
October 14, 1998
C/Net
|
For a computer vendor that wants a
low-end chip, Cyrix is working on the answer. The
processor subsidiary of National Semiconductor is in the
process of expanding its silicon lineup for the
sub-$1,000 computer and Internet appliance markets. By
next year, the computer vendor will be marketing four
distinct classes of processors that will be suited for
everything from low-cost multimedia PCs to DVD players,
set-top boxes, and the always fashionable wearable PC.
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| October 14, 1998 |
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By Lisa DiCarlo
October 13, 1998
PC Week Online
|
Five X86 microprocessor companies
provided technical details about their 1999 products
Tuesday as the 11th annual Microprocessor Forum got under
way. Design engineers were on hand here from Intel
Corp., Advanced Micro Devices Inc., National
Semiconductor Inc.'s Cyrix Corp. subsidiary, Centaur
Technology Inc. and newcomer Rise Technology Corp.
Intel, of Santa Clara, Calif., gave a few more
technical details about its Katmai New Instructions, a
set of 70 three-dimensional instructions that will be
embedded in the Tanner and Katmai processors in the first
quarter of 1999. Both of those chips, for
servers/workstations and performance desktops,
respectively, will be released at 500MHz.
|
See more Microprocessor Forum Reports
from Intel, AMD, Centaur, Cyrix, and Rise Technologies |
|
October 14, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
|
Citing continued pressure from a weak
semiconductor market, Integrated Device Technology Inc.
saw more red ink for the second fiscal quarter ended
Sept. 27. IDT's sales fell 2.9% sequentially from
$134.5 million to $130.6 million in the most recent
quarter. Year-over-year sales dropped 9.2% from $143.8
million.
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By Dawn Kawamoto
October 14, 1998
C/Net
|
Shares of Intel dipped nearly one
percent despite the news that the chipmaker had leapt
past Wall Street estimates for its third-quarter earnings
yesterday, driven by a healthy pace for worldwide PC
sales. The stock was down 0.97 percent or 0.81 points
to 82.75 in early trading, and has reached a high of
95.63 and a low of 65.65 during the past 52 weeks.
In looking at the coming fourth quarter, several
analysts remain bullish on the company.
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By Stephen Shankland
October 13, 1998
C/Net
|
Intel announced improvements to several
chips designed to be embedded in electronic equipment
ranging from cash registers to computer network routers
to handheld computers. The modifications include a
lower-profile Pentium processor that generates less heat
and uses less power, said Joe Jensen, director of
marketing for Intel's Embedded Microcomputer Division.
These new low-power Pentiums run at 166 MHz and 266 MHz,
but unlike their desktop cousins, they rise a mere 1.5
millimeters above the circuit board.
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By Stephen Shankland and Michael Kanellos
October 13, 1998
C/Net
|
Hewlett-Packard is adopting a
two-pronged strategy for the future of its processors,
developing workstations and servers that can use either
HP's PA-RISC chips or Intel's IA-64 "Merced"
chips. While HP plans to extend its PA-RISC
architecture on into the year 2003 with an 8900 chip
running at a speed of 1.2 GHz (1200 MHz), the PA-RISC
chip apparently will be phased out eventually
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By By Ron Wilson
October 13, 1998
EE Times
|
Members of the Hewlett-Packard Labs team
that originally conceived the IA-64 Epic (explicitly
parallel instruction computing) architecture have turned
their attention to custom-configured Epic engines for
embedded computing. "We believe it is possible to
start out with the high-level code for an embedded
application, and compile not only machine code, but also
an optimized custom wide-word machine to execute the
code," said B.R. Rau, senior research scientist at
the HP Labs Computer Research Center.
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| Today's
Microprocessor Forum Coverage |
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By Robert Lemos
October 14, 1998
ZD Net News
|
Running against common wisdom, three
microprocessor vendors unveiled technology on Tuesday
that aims to steal market share from Intel at the bottom
of the PC market. Their aims are modest.
"We don't have the world's fastest
microprocessor," said Centaur Technology President
Glenn Henry, "but we have the lowest cost -- and we
are still in business."
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By Will Wade
October 13, 1998
Semiconductor Business News
|
Advanced Micro Devices Inc. finally
revealed the details of its upcoming K7 microprocessor,
and as the company continues to roll out more advanced
processors, AMD is beginning to look more and more like
arch-rival Intel Corp. "We had been relegated
primarily to the sub-$1,000 PC market, but in 1998 we
have started to creep out of that niche," said
Michael Steele, product marketing manager for the K6
family. "We now have a complete line of solutions
for the entire range of PCs."
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By Tony Smith
October 13, 1998
The Register
|
AMD's forthcoming K7 processor is set to
tackle Intel's high end CPUs head on, with a ground-up
new core design, high-speed system bus technology, a
multi-processing oriented architecture and a Slot 1
configuration. K7 supports clock speeds of 500MHz and
up. Initially, it will support bus speeds of up to
200MHz, using the Alpha EV6 bus technology, developed by
Digital, but that will rise to 400MHz in the next
release, said Dirk Meyer, AMD's director of engineering
for K7.
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By Will Wade
October 13, 1998
Semiconductor Business News
|
It's been a long year for Glenn Henry,
president of Integrated Device Technology Inc.'s Centaur
Technology division and the driving force behind its line
of WinChip microprocessors. Henry introduced the product
last year at the Microprocessor Forum, and he spoke at
the event again this morning to recap the company's
moderate performance. "I'm glad to be speaking
here today because it means we're still in
business," he said. Although more than 500,000 units
have shipped to date, IDT has been forced to revise its
WinChip roadmap in recent months, and it is unclear how
successful the company will be as it pursues its strategy
that emphasized value over performance.
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By Mark Hachman
October 14, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
|
National Semiconductor's Cyrix will not
apparently adopt the "slot" interface used by
competitor Intel's Pentium II microprocessor, according
to an industry analyst. Michael Slater, president of
MicroDesign Resources, in Sebastopol, Calif., said
Cyrix's third-generation microprocessor, code-named
Cayenne, will adopt the Socket 7 interface when it ships
in 1999. Cyrix and National officials were not available
for comment.
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By Mark Hachman
October 14, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
|
National Semiconductor Corp.'s chief
executive Brian Halla at the Microprocessor Forum in San
Jose yesterday outlined Cyrix Corp.'s roadmap, which
shows the introduction next year of a MediaPC
microprocessor running at 233 to 300 MHz for the
ultra-low-cost PC market. Cyrix's MediaPC is a low-cost
system-on-a-chip, which integrates a microprocessor,
video decompression engine, 2D graphics, and associated
peripheral logic, aimed at an evolving sector of the PC
market that Halla expects will be priced
“free.” [See story National's Halla predicts
PCs will be free within a year]
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By Mark Hachman
October 14, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
|
Cyrix Corp., a subsidiary of National
Semiconductor Corp., will join the ranks of PC
microprocessor makers to license Rambus Inc.'s memory
interface, National executives said. “No, we
haven't announced that, but we've got an agreement to
license Rambus," said Stan Swearingen, vice
president of desktop products for Cyrix, Richardson,
Texas. "It was practically a given that we
would.”
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By Tony Smith
October 13, 1998
The Register
|
Pretenders to Intel's low-end crown
Cyrix, IDT/Centaur and Rise all announced next generation
Basic PC-oriented x86-compatible processors at the
Microprocessor Forum in San Jose, California today. Cyrix's
product is M3, the first chip based on its new Jalapeno
x86 core. According to project manager Greg Grohoski, the
design focus was on increasing the bandwidth of the host
PC's memory bus, rather than attempt to allow ever more
program instructions to be processed simultaneously, the
approach taken by Intel and by AMD for K7.
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By Dominique Deckmyn
October 14, 1998
VNU-Net
|
Rise Technology officially joined the
ranks of Intel, Advanced Micro Devices, Cyrix and IDT on
Tuesday when it launched its first x86-compatible chip at
the Microprocessor Forum in San Jose. The company was
founded in 1993 and is headquartered in Santa Clara,
Intel's home town. Like IDT - another recent entry into
the CPU market - Rise is targetting its products mainly
at the price sensitive low-end of the PC sector - the
area where Intel is considered most vulnerable.
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By Mark Hachman
October 14, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
|
As the opening act for introductions of
the latest, fastest, and most expensive microprocessors
at the Microprocessor Forum in San Jose this week,
National Semiconductor Corp.'s chief executive Brian
Halla calmly predicted that the PC will be free in a
year's time. Halla presented the concept of a
“Free PC” as part of his ongoing belief that
the major components of a PC can and will be combined
onto a single chip. Halla's keynote address set the stage
for new chip introductions from National's Cyrix Corp.
subsidiary, Advanced Micro Devices Inc., Centaur
Technology Inc., a subsidiary of Integrated Device
Technology Inc., as well as newcomer Rise Technology.
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| October 13, 1998 |
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By Michael Kanellos
October 13, 1998
C/Net
|
Advanced Micro Devices provided details
surrounding its next generation microprocessor, the K7,
today at the Microprocessor Forum in San Jose,
California, while Intel and National Semiconductor also
unveiled chip designs. Among other features, the K7
will run at 500 MHz and higher and use a new technology
for the "system bus," a critical data conduit
which allows the processor to talk to other components in
the computer.
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By John Lettice
October 13, 1998
The Register
|
In San Jose today Intel and AMD will set
out their rival stalls for next year’s Katmai versus
K7 needle match, with AMD taking the offensive for the
first time in many a year. So far this year AMD has
managed to carve out a better share for itself at the low
end of the market, but it’s now tooling-up for an
assault further up the PC food chain, and with the K7 is
planning a spring offensive which it feels could at last
pull it ahead of Intel. The new K7 will be out in the
first half of 1998, and will run initially at speeds in
excess of 500 MHz. AMD will be pushing 3D graphics
capabilities heavily, and will be supporting Direct
Rambus memory technology with the chip. Intel’s
counter will be the Tanner chip using the new Katmai
instruction set.
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By Craig Matsumoto
October 13, 1998
EE Times
|
Rise Technology Co., the latest
microprocessor hopeful to take on Intel Corp., unveiled
details of its X86 architecture, nearly five years in the
making, today (Oct. 13) at the Microprocessor Forum. David
T. Lin, chairman and chief executive officer of Rise
(Santa Clara, Calif.), introduced his company's MP6
superscalar processor and outlined plans to tackle the
relatively young “base PC” market for
sub-$1,000 PCs and notebooks.
|
See
Today's Related Stories |
|
By Mark Hachman
October 13, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
|
Rise Technology Co. will not stray from
its stealthy approach into the PC microprocessor
marketplace, even at an industry forum known for
revelatory glimpses into a company's future. One of
the most awaited presentations at today's Microprocessor
Forum here will be the introduction of the mP6, Rise's
new low-power microprocessor for both the desktop and
notebook PC market. But Rise has picked its customers,
and will not be disclosing any product specifics except
to those OEMs, according to company executives.
While Rise executives avoided the metrics of price and
clock speed, they did say that Rise will produce two
chips: the mP6, slated for a general release this
quarter, and the mP6 II, a similar chip with 256
kilobytes of level 2 cache memory integrated directly
onto the processor die. The mP6 II will be released in
the first quarter of 1999.
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By Will Wade
October 13, 1998
Semiconductor Business News
|
National Semiconductor Corp.'s upcoming
Jalapeno processor core will be a showcase for company
president and CEO Brian Halla's vision of a
fully-integrated system-on-chip design. Halla restated
his long-held goal of a single-chip PC this morning
during the keynote address at Microprocessor Forum 98
here, and company executives later disclosed that the
next-generation microprocessor will feature a larger
Level 2 cache, as well as integrated graphics and memory
controllers.
The Jalapeno is scheduled to be included within the M3
processor, which may sample by the end of 1999. The
microprocessor will initially be manufactured using
0.18-micron process technology, and initial clock speeds
will be 600 to 800 megahertz. Greg Grohoski, M3 project
manager, said the new design emphasizes improving speed
and performance by reducing memory latency time.
"This architecture is scaleable to more than 1
gigahertz," he said.
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By Mark Hachman
October 13, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
|
National Semiconductor's Cyrix Corp.
will not apparently adopt the "slot" interface
used by competitor Intel Corp.'s Pentium II
microprocessor, according to an industry analyst. Michael
Slater, president of MicroDesign Resources, Sebastopol,
Calif. said that Cyrix's third-generation microprocessor,
code-named Cayenne, will adopt the Socket 7 interface
when it ships in 1999. Cyrix and National officials were
not available for comment.
Currently, Cyrix's "M II" microprocessors
use the "Socket 7" interface, a microprocessor
bus structure and connector used by Intel's
now-discontinued Pentium processor.
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By Lisa DiCarlo
October 13, 1998
PC Week Online
|
Hewlett-Packard Co. on Monday offered a
glimpse of what it says will be the world's first IA-64
chip set and bus. At a gathering at its historic HP
Labs here, the disclosure was made just outside the
original offices of Bill Hewlett and David Packard, which
have been left untouched since the pair occupied them in
the 1950s.
Beginning sometime next year, HP will begin shipping
PA-RISC and Intel Corp.-based systems with a motherboard
that will also be used in Merced-based systems when the
chip is available in mid-2000.
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By Amber Howle
October 12, 1998
Computer Reseller News
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Advanced Micro Devices on Thursday
unveiled plans to develop chip sets supporting Direct
Rambus memory for its K7 microprocessor. The Sunnyvale,
Calif.-based integrated circuit supplier will do its own
development by licensing the Direct Rambus interface
technology developed by Rambus in conjunction with Intel.
In the past, third parties supplied chip sets for AMD's
(company profile) processors.
Direct Rambus technology is expected to enable
thelevel of performance to date: 1.6 Gigabytes per second
of peak bandwidth from a single device. DRAM industry's
highest
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By Lisa DiCarlo
October 12, 1998
PC Week Online
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Over the next few quarters, Intel Corp.
will have less to do with producing one of its biggest
competitors, the Alpha chip. That's because Compaq
Computer Corp., which now owns Alpha, is looking to IBM
Microelectronics and Samsung Electric Co. Ltd. to be the
primary suppliers of the processor.
"We're talking quite seriously about IBM and
others being our primary alternative suppliers,'' said
Jesse Lipcon, senior vice president of the
high-performance server division at Compaq and a former
Digital Equipment Corp. executive.
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By John Lettice
October 13, 1998
The Register
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AMD has scored a sweet deal as icing on
the cake of today's K7 unveiling - the company is to
supply the CPU for HP's entry to the Windows-Based
Terminal market. According to an HP spokeswoman the
CPU is an AMD 486, and as the company says it plans
"to establish a premier position around the world in
thin-client computing," the volumes for AMD should
be significant. A certain piquancy is also added because
HP recently announced it had taken out an ARM licence,
and would use the chip as a strategic platform for a
range of devices, including handhelds and peripherals.
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By Stephen Shankland
October 12, 1998
C/Net
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Cell phones and other wireless
communication equipment could become more powerful but
less power-hungry, thanks to a new chip technology IBM
announced today. The arcane technology improves a
chip's conducting efficiency. IBM's silicon germanium
technology embeds germanium atoms in certain locations in
the silicon crystal that forms the base of microchips.
Infused with germanium, the silicon substrate becomes a
better conductor of electricity.
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| Today's Related Stories |
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By John Lettice
October 13, 1998
The Register
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Rise Technology has unveiled its mP6
line of processors, low-cost x86 compatibles aimed at the
sub-$700 desktop and sub-$1,000 notebook markets. In a
release timed at 5.17am by the California clock, the
company claimed to have already demonstrated "a
number of Windows-based multimedia applications"
running on the chip to the adoring attendees of the
Microprocessor Forum today. Workaholics? We got 'em,
evidently... The mP6 is low power consumption, and is
aimed at what Intel refers to as the 'Basic PC' market -
interactive education, entertainment, digital imaging and
other consumer-oriented applications, says Rise.
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| October 12, 1998 |
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By Michael Kanellos
October 12, 1998
C/Net
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A good news/bad news scenario will
likely play itself out this week in earnings
announcements from semiconductor companies. On the
positive side, Intel is expected to report revenues in
excess of the projections the company released last
month, according to some analysts. Accordingly, the
company is expected to report earnings of 80 cents a
share or more. Intel reports tomorrow.
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By Craig Matsumoto with additional reporting by David
Lammers
October 10, 1998
EE Times
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The Microprocessor Forum will kick off
Tuesday (Oct.13) with a look across a landscape that's
become terra incognita. The personal computer industry,
long seen as a steady line of incrementally more powerful
Intel X86 processors, marching — more or less
unaccompanied — toward the horizon, has devolved
into chaos. With its once monolithic market fractured,
Intel Corp. is no longer in control. Competitors of every
stripe, from historic archrival AMD to completely new
ventures, are sinking their roots into a niche or two,
hoping to outmaneuver the Santa Clara, Calif., giant. In
high-end servers, increasingly a multiprocessing market,
Intel will hand out a few more hints on IA-64: its Merced
and McKinley processors. But Advanced Micro Devices Inc.
will counter with a first look at the Alpha-bused,
giant-cached K7 CPU. And in perhaps the unkindest cut of
all, stalwart Intel customer Compaq Computer Corp. will
unveil its plans for a new, full-blown Alpha
implementation, the 21364.
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By Stephen Shankland
October 9, 1998
C/Net
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Advanced Micro Devices has licensed
Direct Rambus, a high-performance computer memory
technology developed by Rambus. Direct Rambus enables
a processor to communicate with memory chips at speeds up
to 1.6 gigabytes per second. By comparison, conventional
memory technology in today's high-end PCs allow a peak
bandwidth of 800 megabits per second, half the Rambus
speed, said Subodh Toprani, vice president of marketing
at Rambus.
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By Andrew MacLellan
October 12, 1998
Electronic Buyers' News
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With chip makers releasing their first
Direct Rambus DRAM engineering samples, early industry
cost estimates indicate that the emerging architecture is
... expensive. Not prohibitively expensive, but costly
enough to slightly retard the Direct RDRAM adoption track
proposed by the technology's chief backers-Intel Corp.
and Rambus Inc. Further blurring the market picture is
the chip industry's ability to manufacture enough Direct
RDRAM to meet the PC market's needs in 1999, according to
one market research firm.
Six vendors are currently shipping 64-Mbit Direct
RDRAM engineering samples, with prices from the likes of
Mitsubishi Electronics America Inc. and LG Semicon Co.
Ltd. set at $45 each. While sample prices are typically
several times those of volume tags, an initial cost
projection from leading DRAM vendors reveals that 64-Mbit
chips will carry a 15% to 30% premium in OEM quantities.
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