Simon wrote:
On 2/13/07, James Richard Tyrer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
There is a downside to this. :-( When questioned, KP was very vague as
to whether or not Intel would offer the GMA X3000 on a video board. If
they decided to do this, this project would be dead unless we offered an
X server on a board system or if we had a board with additional
acceleration. It is possible to use this chip, or a lessor one that is
still Vista approved, to provide the basic VGA, basic video operations,
memory controller, and video output. This might be more efficient than
reinventing them and we have the ability to run Vista.
The only failsafe solution for free software friendly hardware is to
get a group of people that honestly want to support free software
(that's us) and gain the expertise needed to become self-sustaining.
Intel could decide to release a new chip and not release full
documentation for it, and we'd be out of luck if we were dependent on
them for hardware improvements.
Yes, they could always change their path if they thought that it was in
their best interest. However, this would not make a great deal of
difference till they discontinued the 82G965 chip. Their history with
northbridge graphics is that of forward compatibility; I doubt that this
will change.
That being said, you can count on the fact that Intel is working on
discrete hardware themselves (do a search for intel discrete
graphics).
Most of this chatter seems to be about a new architecture high end card
possibly based on their new multi-core project:
http://www.intel.com/research/platform/terascale/teraflops.htm?cid=cim:021207_tera_ggl_st
This again raises the question of software vs hardware.
On new years eve last year, someone in #ubuntu-offtopic
even mentioned having seen discrete 965 cards ...
This is the question. And, if Intel chooses to make what -- for gamers
at least -- would be a low end card (a card that would be quite useful
for many business users), how will they go about it. They could use a
single chip solution by making three chips (PCI/AGP, PCIe, HTX) based on
the G965; they could make a reduced version of the G965 chip (probably
just the current chips that have defects and some pins not bonded out)
and use an interface chip to the Pentium bus; or they could make a chip
with a new bus. This would produce a more flexible and upgradeable
architecture.
--
JRT
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