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Technology Stocks : S3 (A LONGER TERM PERSPECTIVE)
SIII 0.00010000.0%May 12 5:00 PM EST
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To: JerryP who wrote (12310)11/20/1998 6:32:00 PM
From: Synapsid  Read Replies (1) of 14577
 
I think the best way to describe the graphics chip business now is as super-competitive. ATI, NVIDIA, 3Dfx (as well as S3) all have new chips directly targeted at PC OEMs, and are putting significant marketing power behind them (as well as Matrox), while Intel is also in PC OEM space with its "Whitney" chipset. S3 might still have a time advantage though for the OEM-directed product.

Meanwhile, in the "low-cost" segment, there are signs of 8 MB memory becoming more of a standard feature. S3 currently does not have a chip (Savage3D apparently isn't low-cost) for the low-end segment that supports more than 4MB memory. Silicon Integrated Systems (SiS) of Taiwan does have a low-end chip that supports 8MB (even Diamond is shipping it). Some local retailers have been including somewhat higher priced i740-based boards in systems not for performance, but for 8MB video memory, and given lower priced alternatives they will go for those instead.

I have seen a Taiwanese manufacturer's webpage mentioning "Virge/GXL" in the fourth quarter, but given excess inventories of older products it seems unlikely that S3 will go on and release that product (presumably equivalent to the "Trio3D AGPx2" product mentioned earlier, with 8MB SDRAM support). The upshot is, even in the low-end segment memory size limitations are hurting S3, as they did in the high-end with Savage3D.
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