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Technology Stocks : Rambus (RMBS) - Eagle or Penguin -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Scumbria who wrote (25446)	7/21/1999 10:44:00 PM
From: Jdaasoc	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 93625

Scumbria: You wanted me to say $30,000??? We are talking $1,600 to $2,000 for 512 meg RAM; $4,000 for dual PIII XEON mp; $4,500-$5,000 for 30 GB SCSI RAID array. It may be $10-12K fully outfitted. I hate to say it RDRAM will compete with PC133 for next 12 months followed by another 12 months competing with DDR. I don't know if I have the stomach for two more years of this unless strictly as a trading stock. semibiznews.com A service of Semiconductor Business News, CMP Media Inc. Story posted 3 p.m. EST/noon, PST, 7/19/99 By Jack Robertson "SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- Intel Corp. here today confirmed what has been the company's worst-kept secret: the microprocessor giant is considering supporting PC133 SDRAMs after steadfastly spurning the higher speed memory chip. Peter MacWilliams, Intel fellow and director of platform architecture, said the chip maker was evaluating PC133 "as an interim memory" until its specified Direct Rambus DRAMs are ramped up in volume. He said Direct RDRAM and the accompanying Camino 820 chip set will be introduced as planned in the third quarter. However, "we are hearing concerns from OEM customers that they are concerned about the rate of [Direct RDRAM] ramp," he said. "We are getting OEM requests to support PC133 SDRAMs on an interim basis. "To launch the new Camino 820 chip set, we need a very aggressive Direct Rambus ramp," MacWilliams continued. "It appears that may not happen as quickly as we would like. I expect we will see substantial price premiums." MacWilliams also said that initial Direct RDRAM prices "may be higher than we would like." The higher pricetag is compounded "by the very low prices now for SDRAMs." He conceded what others in the industry have maintained: that memory makers and OEMs can easily put low-priced PC133 SDRAMs in the same-type DIMM modules that are used for PC100 chips. The Intel official said a final decision on whether to support PC133 SDRAMs will likely be announced at the Intel Developers Forum in Palm Springs, Calif., in Aug. 31-Sept. 2. If Intel does embrace PC133, the firm would evolve a yet-to-be-specified chip set in its line to support the new higher-speed SDRAM. But even if Intel joins the PC133 camp, sources said that either the upcoming 810e low-end chip set or the Camino 820 -- or both -- could be modified to support PC133. MacWilliams said the company wouldn't deliver its PC133-supporting chip set until the first quarter of 2000. That gives VIA Technology and other Taiwan-based independent chip set firms coming out now with PC133 units a head start of up to six-months over Intel. MacWilliams said he wasn't concerned, because he questioned how quickly those Taiwanese rivals would be able to ship their PC133 chip sets. The Intel PC133 revelation raises a major cloud over Intel's ardent campaign to make Direct Rambus the next-generation standard for PC memory. Until now, Intel had adamantly eschewed PC133 to avoid having even an interim competitor to Direct RDRAM. If Intel itself begins promoting PC133, the new memory chip could gain an even stronger foothold in the server, sub-$1,000 PC, and midrange desktop markets. The Intel official declined to comment on VIA's announcement today that it was immediately shipping its PC133 chip set with a 133-MHz front side bus (see today's story). Intel is suing VIA to block that chip set, alleging that it isn't licensed by the microprocessor firm. VIA has countered that the chip set is produced for it by National Semiconductor Corp. under a manufacturing cross-license from Intel originally given National's former Cyrix division, the former stand-alone x86 processor business that VIA acquired from National. MacWilliams conceded that a shift to PC133 could "push out an aggressive Direct RDRAM ramp by a quarter" -- with the expected shift of mainline desktop PCs to the new chip now coming in mid-2000. However, he felt by that time, memory makers would have invested sufficiently in backend assembly and test equipment to ramp up for Direct RDRAM to move aggressively into the market. Intel's MacWilliams said he believed that once Direct RDRAM ramps next year, it will win out over a rival double-data-rate (DDR) PC266 SDRAM memory. He said the DDR chip requires new interfaces from the existing PC133 SDRAMs, has a new 128-bit protocol, and will need a new infrastructure. He claimed all the DDR changes make Direct RDRAM very competitive." MacWilliams is one of Intel's brightest guys they have but not to business savy. If he says RDRAM is competing in any way shape or form with DDR next year, we will have same arguements 6 months from now RE DDR and then DDRII and so on and so on.