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Intel Discrete Graphics Chips Confirmed
Posted by
kdawson
on Tue Jan 23, 2007 08:03 AM
from the ready-or-not dept.
from the ready-or-not dept.
Arun Demeure writes "There have been rumors of Intel's re-entry into discrete graphics for months. Now Beyond3D reports that Intel has copped to the project on their own site. They describe it as a 'many-core' architecture aimed at 'high-end client platforms,' but also extending to other market segments in the future, with 'plans for accelerated CPU integration.' This might also encourage others to follow Intel's strategy of open-sourcing their Linux drivers. So, better watch out NVIDIA and AMD/ATI — there's new competition on the horizon."
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AMD Promises Open Source Graphics Drivers 264 comments
MoxFulder writes "Henri Richard, AMD's VP of sales, has promised to deliver open-source drivers for ATI graphics cards (recently acquired by AMD) at the recent Red Hat Summit. A series of good news for proponents of open-source device drivers. In the last year, Intel, the leading provider of integrated graphics cards, has opened their drivers as well. But ATI and NVidia, the only two players in the market for high-performance discrete graphics cards, have so far released only closed-source drivers for their cards. This has created numerous compatibility, stability, and ethical problems for users of Linux and other open source OSes, and prompted projects like Nouveau to try and reverse-engineer NVidia drivers. Hopefully AMD's decision will put pressure on NVidia to release open-source drivers as well!"
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More competition (Score:5, Insightful)
Mostly they are efficient (Score:5, Insightful)
But they invariably _have_ to have some benchmark-breaking super-card to grab the headlines with. The way it works is that while only a minority of people will actually buy the top-end graphics card, there are millions of people who just need a reminder that "nVidia is fast" or "ATIs are fast". They'll go to some benchmark site to see some "nVidia's 8800 GTX is faster than ATI's X1900XTX!" article (not entirely unexpected, it's one generation ahead), end up with some vague "nVidia is faster than ATI" idea, then go buy a 5200. Which is the lowest end of two generations behind the ATI, or 3 behind that 8800 GTX.
Both ATI and nVidia even went through times of not even trying to produce or sell much of their headline-grabbing card. And at least ATI always introduces their latest technology in their mid-range cards first, and they tend to be reasonably energy efficient cards too. But it's like a chicken contest: the one who pulls out loses. The moment one of them gave up on having an ultra-high end card at all, the benchmark sites and willy-waver forums would proclaim "company X loses the high performance graphics battle!"
I don't think Intel will manage to restore sanity in that arena, sadly. Most likely Intel will end up playing the same game, with one overclocked noisy card to grab the headlines for their saner cards.
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Technologicly, it does. But then there's the part about market economics, you charge what the market w
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The voltage required for a device depends on the device complexity, and the frequency - for every device, you can find a sweet-spot in terms of voltage per unit frequency, after which you tend to get decreasing returns. By selling a device clocked at its "sweet sp
Re:Mostly they are efficient (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe I'm in the minority of people here, but I've always gone to sites that have actual reviews of the card I will potentially be buying. Companies have different models and each one of those models of product has its own advantages and disadvantages. I think a lot of the people that do a lot of shopping comparison online (i.e. most of the market that's actually going to be buying/installing their own graphics card) know this and do the same. ATI and Nvidia cards are only going to sell to a certain section of the market other than OEMs, and I doubt very severely that this is the approach that the type of people upgrading video cards would use in determining which card to purchase. I know I usually check out anandtech.com and look for benchmarks on the price range that I'm in.
This is like saying "Alpine stereos are better" and buying the lowest model level alpine without comparing it to anything else in the price range, nobody who is going to be installing it themselves can be that stupid, unless they were fanboys looking for a reason to hype up their favorite company anyway. Either way it doesn't look like a real market strategy to me.
Parent
Re:Mostly they are efficient (Score:4, Funny)
"Oooh look! 256MB RAM! That shiiiny FX5200 has to be better than my friend's 128MB 9700 Pro"
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Competition is almost always good, so I look forward to this. I'd like to see Intel push ATI and Nvidia to create more power efficient chips, as it's quite rediculous right now.
No kidding! Looking at video cards to get away from dreaded shared memory I couldn't believe what they want for anything decent that wouldn't burn a hole in anything it touched (heat/cost). And given Intel's history of Open Source drivers for the wireless, I am not holding on waiting for them. AMD/ATI, I hope AMD makes ATI manag
Intel Video hardware is just nice... (Score:4, Informative)
Intel drivers for Linux Just Work(TM). I installed Ubuntu 6.10 on my Acer notebook, with a i915g video adapter, and everything worked without any extra effort. And I'm even able to use Beryl/Compiz as my default window manager, without any stability issues.
Both nVidia and ATI should learn from Intel.
What desktop motherboard? (Score:2)
Are Intel's own-brand motherboards worth it? In the past I've bought Asus but that was for AMD-based systems.
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I've looked around for boards with these chips and found them in several brands including Asus and Intel. A search for "gma" on your favourite computer store's site should find something.
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Since gaming isn't really your focus if you're running Linux
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That might have to do with their drivers being Open Source, which has been recommended by the Linux community for a long time. According to all statements from kernel devlopers I've read, Open Source drivers are much easier to maintain.
Re:Intel Video hardware is just nice... (Score:5, Interesting)
This is because Intel's graphics chipsets are crippled and don't implement any of the features covered by other companies' patents which force ATI and NVidia to go closed-source.
You seem to forget that ATI had fully open-source drivers until they were forced to "go closed" due to licensing another company's IP for their chipsets. In that particular case, the first incident was S3 Texture Compression, a feature essentially required by all modern games, and apparently with patent licensing agreements that prohibit closed-source drivers. For a few months, S3TC was why Unreal Tournament 2003 (or was it 2k4?) only ran on NVidia cards under Linux - it wasn't until ATI released binary drivers that supported S3TC that UT2k3 would run on ATI cards under Linux.
The end result is that ultimately, the choice will not be Intel's as to whether to go open-source or not for full functionality, just as ATI had no choice but to "go closed" or simply leave certain critical features disabled/unsupported under Linux.
Parent
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Re:Intel Video hardware is just nice... (Score:5, Interesting)
And I should care about that why?
Intel cards are not bleeding edge. However, if all you want is a reasonably powerful, 3D supporting card for your open source desktop, then they are perfect. I don't require a huge framerate in $LATEST_GAME, because I don't play it. If I did, then an Intel card would obviously not be for me.
My intel-based graphics work perfectly, and don't give a moments trouble. I can run 3D applications if I want, and a flashy eye-candy-full desktop too. I previously had an nVidia card, and it was nothing but a fight - is my card supported with this release of the driver? Is it crashing my computer? Is it going to compile with the latest kernel?
Nowadays, I do nothing but apt-get upgrade to keep my graphics in order and I am a lot happier for it.
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However, like Andy Dodd point out there are several glaring omissions in the driver; the biggest one for me is that
My money is on NVidia (Score:4, Interesting)
If anything the graphics market has gotten even more specialized since then. I don't know why they think they can succeed this time.
Re:My money is on NVidia (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
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They could care less? It would only possible do be able to care less if you actually cared.
http://www.impleader.com/photos/blog/caringcontin
Re:My money is on NVidia (Score:5, Insightful)
I suppose I could care less, but I'm not sure how.
I agree with you, and concede the point.*
*Here "I agree with you, and concede the point" is actually short for the phrase "I could agree with you, and concede the point, but I consider using words which mean the opposite of what you are trying to say in normal conversation to be extremely silly.".
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Re:My money is on NVidia (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember when AMD made Intel clones down to the very chip architecture and it didn't matter which manifacturer you bought from?
Remember how AMD K5 sucked and people started leaning towards Intels? And then Pentium 4 happened, and AMD's new architecture was much superior? And then Core turned things on their head again?
Things change. I don't think we're using 3DFX cards anymore either too. They used to be ahead of everyone.
Parent
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Remember when AMD made Intel clones down to the very chip architecture and it didn't matter which manifacturer you bought from?
Remember how AMD K5 sucked and people started leaning towards Intels? And then Pentium 4 happened, and AMD's new architecture was much superior? And then Core turned things on their head again?
Pepperidge Farms remembers.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
From a chipset standpoint, Intel actually makes decent (not spectacular, but better than many) graphics hardware already, they just don't have hardware transformation and lighting (T&L), which gets offloaded to the CPU. That means you can't be throttling your CPU(s)/cores and need a decent pipe between the hardware and memory. Intel said a couple of years back that it's a myth [intel.com] that the bottleneck is usually in
Intel is the only one... (Score:2, Interesting)
Intel has technology, has brains, has money, has plants. They can do something "as good as" the two others. Competition is a good thing (prices falling, etc); only two main actors for videocards is a bad things.
S3 can't compete. Matrox can't compete. 3dfx can't compete (they're dead). Others can't compete. Intel is our only hope.
Re:Intel is the only one... (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
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The graphics part of S3 was sold to VIA at about the same time as it transformed to SONIC|blue. So the Chapter 11 thing is irrelevant.
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What they don't have, though, is ATI(AMD) and NVIDIA's patent portfolios.
If they really do this, I am sold (Score:2)
Especially if they have open source Linux drivers for the thing
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Re:If they really do this, I am sold (Score:4, Insightful)
I specifically said "Open Source"
Parent
I wonder if this will change onboard graphics... (Score:2, Interesting)
One can always hope.
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It's also unlikely Intel boards would have a GPU slot that's not PCIe (or PCIe 2.0), since no one would buy a motherboard that locks them into only Intel. Even Crossfire/SLI boards allow you to have one of the ot
Re:I wonder if this will change onboard graphics.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Another interesting approach (albeit not for high end machines and somewhat OT here) is AMD's plan to integrate the GPU with the CPU. That way, you might have some more choice than with a soldered in chip, and GPU cooling could profit from the availability of decent CPU coolers.
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This doesn't take up one of your expansion slots, since you already have the graphic-out ports on the motherboard in such solutions. Meaning in a small-form-factor machine, you have one more option for tweaking the system to what you want/need.
Intel can interface with theircpus (Score:2, Interesting)
I'll believe it when I see it (Score:2)
I just upgraded my sister's mobo + CPU. It had embedded graphics, so I figured it would be comparable to her 2 year old nVidia AGP card. Nope. I had to buy a new PCIe nVidia card to handle Sims 2.
On a side note: Has anyone noticed that the extremely popular family-friendly 3D games are the worst performers? Sims 2 and RCT3 both take eons to load - much slower than Q4 or HL2.
Real-time raytracing from Intel ? (Score:3, Interesting)
Real-time raytracing needs a lot of power; so, a multicore videocard is a great idea ! With raytracing, each core can compute one part of each picture. Better than SLI.
Using their knowledges, Intel can build a very fast multicore real-time raytracing videocard. It will be "something different", and it will compete with ATI and Nvidia in a new innovative way...
Thanks but no thanks (Score:5, Funny)
Welcome back, Intel (Score:5, Insightful)
Intel have already made a return of sorts to 3D with their Media Accelerator 9XX series chips you'll find in many Intel laptops. It's funny, because you'd expect an embedded chipset to be lame; lowest common denominator, shared RAM and akk. But this lappie has it and the graphics scream. It's faster than my nVidia 5700 which is two years old. The driver is stable too; never crashed. If they can do this with an embedded chipset 3d, imagine what they can do when they really put their mind to it?
nVidia and ATI have the market to themselves these days. nVidia has got pretty lax regarding driver stability for these days, and it's damned near impossible to get support out of them. They've fobbed off support to OEMs, who slap electronics onto cards and are in no position to help with driver problems. That's the sort of thing that happens when a company dominates a market.
If Intel can come out with some high performance electronics and stable drivers, well, Welcome back, Intel! I for one welcome you as my new Overlord!
Question about Intel Media Accelerator 9XX (Score:3, Interesting)
I mean, I like nVidia, but if Intel is supported out-of-the-box with open source drivers, then that wor
Re:Question about Intel Media Accelerator 9XX (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Liar! (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1821814
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2427 &p=3 [anandtech.com]
http://everythingapple.blogspot.com/2006/03/intel- gma-950-terrible-opengl.html [blogspot.com]
Driver Open Sourcing (Score:5, Interesting)
Has anyone considered that the reason ATI/NVidia won't open source their drivers/firmware is because there are blatant copyright and patent violations in their code? I'm not saying there are violations, but if there are, then I would expect each to violently defend against anyone seeing their source code. To date, the best argument heard is that access to the code would provide their competitors an unfair advantage into their optimization techniques, which most of us recognize to be hog wash. At worst [zdnet.com], they wrap it up in "we have licensed proprietary algorithms" declarations and refuse to give the community a chance to work around those algorithms.
There is only one way forward. NVidia should fund the effort to rewrite their firmware/drivers, providing only the hardware register descriptions and nuances. I'm quite sure others have asked NVidia to do this already, but Intel moving forward with this plan should force the other's hand. I'm surprised that Microsoft hasn't chimed in here because for every open specification we get in the OSS world, they also get. That's where all those Microsoft drivers come from. And only on occasion is a vendor-supplied driver better that the Microsoft one. Open sourcing any drivers also helps Microsoft support more hardware out of the box, without a multitude of licensing agreements and royalty schemes.
And of course, NVidia (and now ATI) have been adding more treasure to their war chests with the PCIe motherboards. I just bought a new motherboard and it's extremely hard to find a new board with PCI-Express that doesn't have an nForce or ATI chipset.
It's going to be a tough game for Intel because it's not just graphics drivers. AMD could play into this game if they took a decisive maneuver with their GPU integration into the CPU. Remember that AMD now owns ATI.
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Yes, this has been suggested before. These violations, if they exist, may not be deliberate though.
Remember that software patents are often very broad. It is hard to write any software at all without violat
Re:Predictable... (Score:5, Funny)
Try reinstalling the drivers.
Parent
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Re:But will they do DVI? (Score:5, Insightful)
No, in fact they aren't even going to include DSUB outputs. They are going to use modulated RF outputs like you got on the ATARI ST and AMIGA. They will be capable of displaying NTSC resolutions at anything up to 60Hz refresh rate.
What the fuck do you think?
Parent
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