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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dan3 who wrote (93961)	2/17/2000 10:45:00 PM
From: Tenchusatsu	Respond to of 1571798

Dan, <So far, at least, Rambus hasn't been working out as planned (except, I must admit, for those holding stock this last week - what the heck happened?)> I don't know, but I sure enjoyed it! Kind of makes me realize that, despite all of the rational arguments for (or against) Rambus, the stock is ANYTHING BUT RATIONAL. <But we'll see - even at a 100% price premium, $20 compared to $10 wouldn't be a problem for Timna, as long as they can really get prices that low.> My hope is that RDRAM can come down to a 40% premium over PC100 SDRAM, all other things being equal. (In effect, that would be close to a 25% premium over DDR.) That would mean that Intel can finally ditch that memory translator, go native RDRAM on Timna, and push the performance of sub-$600 PCs to very high levels. Tenchusatsu

To: Dan3 who wrote (93961)	2/17/2000 10:51:00 PM
From: steve harris	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1571798

Dan, would this affect *ntel's future of it's new projects? Check this out from "voi_nguyen" dailynews.yahoo.com Thursday February 17 10:01 PM EST Intel confirms problem with chip sets By Ken Popovich, PC Week Intel Corp. has disclosed a problem involving its 820 and 840 chip sets that has spurred the company to scrap plans for three motherboards it had on its server road map. But while an Intel representative stressed that the problem would likely affect only a few users, some analysts said the trouble may indicate a flaw in a crucial component used to configure the boards with SDRAM. The trouble arose when Intel's 820 and 840 chip sets, which were designed to take advantage of speedier Rambus memory, RDRAM, were configured to work with SDRAM. According to Intel, memory errors may result from the combined use of the memory-repeater hub (known as MRH-S), which is used to translate native RDRAM support to SDRAM, and ECC (error correction coding). Intel said it believes few customers will be affected since most 820 and 840 chip set customers using ECC, commonly in workstation and servers, are likely to have gone with Rambus memory for greater performance. However, customers seeking a lower-cost server or workstation solution may have elected to go with less-expensive SDRAM over RDRAM in order to get the highest amount of memory for their money. "We are informing vendors that certain server platforms using the memory repeater hub as well as the error correction coding have been experiencing memory issues or errors," said Dan Francisco, an Intel spokesman. How big a problem? If the problem is actually tied to just the memory-translation hub, it could spell big trouble for Intel, said Mike Feibus, principal analyst at Mercury Research in Scottsdale, Ariz. "We're predicting that more than half of the 840 chip sets that will ship this quarter will be configured with SDRAM," Feibus said. "So if there's trouble with the memory translator, that could pose major problems for Intel." A spokesman for Dell Computer Corp. said the company has avoided packaging SDRAM with 820 and 840 chip sets after it became aware of the problem a couple of weeks ago. A representative at Compaq Computer Corp., which sells workstations with SDRAM, said the company has been made aware of the problem and is working with Intel to resolve it. Officials at Hewlett-Packard Co., which also sells systems packaging SDRAM with the 820 and 840 chip sets, were not immediately available for comment. Industry analyst Kevin Knox said that, while he was unaware of the problem, he's not surprised. "Anytime you put a translator in there [i.e., the memory translator hub], you're asking for trouble," he said. "The 820 and 840 chip sets were not designed for SDRAM," Knox said. "So trying to make them work with SDRAM posed an obvious risk of introducing errors." Pruning the trees The problems involving the memory translator and error correction coding came to light after Intel informed vendors that it was scrapping plans for three chip sets targeted for use in servers. The chip sets, known by the code names Pine, Hemlock and Willow, were developed based on the 820 and 840 chip set designs. Intel had planned to design the boards to accommodate dual processors configured with SDRAM. "We are working to resolve the issue and expect to fix it in the next 'stepping' of the parts," Francisco said. The 820 chip set's introduction was initially delayed last fall due to a platform integration issue involving Rambus. The problem was addressed by altering the motherboard from its original three-slot RIMM configuration to a two-slot RIMM configuration. See this story in context on ZDNN's Page One Section.