Opinions on ATI/AMD

[jonyb222]

I'm curious on what most people's opinion is on AMD/ATI's recent "steps" in getting CUDA, PysX and Havok.

My opinion is that, while AMD/ATI is trailing behind their competitor (mostly the AMD side) they're granted access to more ressources to make up for it. (Since the others either don't see them as too much of a threat, want to use them to hurt the other (Intel <->Nvidia) or just to keep them afloat to keep the market alive)

 

[jonyb222]

Beer's
Ultimate
Master
Peter

(aka BUMP)

 

[San Pedro]

Nvidia and Intel both want AMD to use their technology so they can attempt to gain more control of the market. If everything is made with PhysX then that would give Nvidia the ability to write all the rules and put themselves into better positions. If Havoc is dominant then Intel can do the same (a la the CPU market).

 

[ovaltineplease]

Nvidia is putting a lot of effort into this i think because they want to have good relations with AMD in the longrun. With intel's license cutting nvidia off from dual gpu support on their next gen cpu, they have to look at other options for the future.

ed: I know NV is not directly working with AMD yet on the physx subject, but they will be eventually I think.

 

[jonyb222]

^^ can AMD/ATI make chipset for nehalem?

Because if they can, then it would be hilarious to see Nvidia having to go through them to get SLI with nehalem

 

[CSA_Myth]

It's kind of interesting how all this works, and its more to do with AMD's purchase of ATI than anything else.

AMD and Nvidia have always had a close relationship, NVIDIA got into the chipset business with AMD processors and they have been partial to working with AMD in the past, a lot of respect is shown on how these companies interact. All you have to look at is before AMD purchased ATI they were going to buy NVIDIA, they sat down and discussed their thoughts and idea's and came to the conclusion that they may be better off as two different companies. However you never heard talk of a hostel take over or anything else, they shook hands and parted ways with respect.

The same can be said of ATI and INTEL. Intel based a lot of their early integrated video on ATI borrow tech, and over the years there has been shared tech between the two companies. ATI chipsets and integrated boards were mostly geared to the Intel brand (yes they did have some boards for AMD) but when AMD needed a physics engine ATI used their past pull with the HAVOK team and Intel to get a license.

AMD/ATI is kind of in the weird position of deciding the battle but killing themselves in the process. They will be the no-man's land that INTEL and NVIDIA will have to control in order to push their tech as standard (Havok/PhysicsX) (SLI/CROSSFIRE) ECT... However in the process they will help weaken the loser of the tech war and then have to stand alone against the winner, while still having to paying them for the tech they have help make the standard.

Sounds a lot like the x86 license.