Nvidia to develop x86 CPU in 2 to 3 years.

I don't see why they'd bash each other products. Intel makes some integrated GPU's and laptop GPU's which suck for gaming but are ok for anything else. nVidia doesn't make CPU's... Yet lol

I'd give them a chance though, lots of people laughed at Microsoft when they announced they were making a games console. nVidia also never used to make motherboards too, now they have some of the best. AMD has some good motherboards as well. These are companies/corporations that are just expanding their business/product line.

Also, more competition is better for us, the consumer. Look at the huge drop in ATI/AMD's 4870 graphics cards, you can get one for less than $200. These cards perform at GTX260 levels and the 260 goes for $240+.

Hopefully it goes well for both of them. The only bad thing I see is having too much choice lol!

Just like Microsoft was a joke when they brought out the Xbox. Sony and Nintendo gang-raped them... Oh wait...

I say give them a chance.

I just can't see them being at all competitive against Intel. Even AMD has a hard time (though the Phenom II is definitely their best effort since the Core 2 series came out), so Nvidia is completely screwed. I'd love to be proven wrong in this, but I just don't see how it would happen.

Actually the original Xbox was ganged raped, it was a piece of garbage with poor game support. Also the PS2 was already in 100 million homes and the Gamecube was worthless. Bad example on your part.

Yea, but if it does happen, and their SoCs are doing well, by the time they reach DT, Im sure itll come down to the mobo makers wanting to make some money, if theyre in demand. Even Intel and AMD doesnt want to mess with their partners and deny them profit to the point of totally disallowing something like a shared socket from nVidia

I'm sure sockets are patented IP. Though... maybe not. If Nvidia already has access to the IP through a license that allows them to build chipsets, they might have enough information to make their CPU compatible.

Either with they still need a X86 license. I doubt Intel would willing give them one.

As far as I know, the original patents for x86 have expired, meaning pretty much anyone can use the x86 instruction set in a chip if they wished to. However, the specialized instruction sets have not expired. This means they'd be at the whims of Intel and AMD if they wanted to get the SSE, MMX, 3dNow!, and x86/64 instruction sets... and whatever other intellectual property they'd want to obtain for their chips.

Going after such licenses would be lucrative for both AMD and Intel, and there wouldn't be much reason to deny them as long as the price is right. If Nvidia does not go after this IP, they could only produce a CPU as powerful as Atom (and probably a little less so), making very low end laptops and desktops, or what other's have said... a new push into mobile devices, which would make the most sense.

Nvidia does not currently have the engineering prowess, nor the facilities (or the cash flow to improve on either asset), to make the jump to a competitive desktop CPU within the next 5 years if they don't buy the rights to AMD and Intel's IP. If they manage to stumble across 40 billion dollars, it might be possible. Even if they get the assistance from Intel and AMD, it would still break their bank.