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Technology Stocks : 3DFX -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Waldeen who wrote (7023)	9/9/1998 9:04:00 PM
From: Patrick Grinsell	Respond to of 16960

Tony T. and others at 3dfx have stated that Banshee in its current form cannot do SLI. There were no if's in their statements. The single TMU unit on Banshee makes this impossible. I think it may be possible that the Voodoo1.5 (previously trashed) might have been able to SLI with Banshee but we'll never know. I do know that 3dfx is aware of the benefits of such a strategy and have been drilled by the press several times in this area. Unfortunately, Voodoo2 is a limited solution. (No 3d in a window. No res. over 1024x768. Passthrough cable needed.) What might be an even better solution is a scalable chip for SLI integrated into the two TMU version of Banshee. The chip could possibly recognize up to 3 other Banshee chips on the same board (or possibly another board) and each chip would do every 2nd, 3rd, or 4th scanline depending on the configuration. (I got this idea from the sellers interview where he said 2d could be turned off.) These boards can have empty slots that individuals could order additional Banshee II chips directly from 3dfx for an additional $50. This is almost double the money ($28) they would get by selling a second board but allows the user to double power for a mere $50 compared to current $150 for a whole board. If you are going SLI cool, but why waste the extra slot and give all the money to the IHV?

To: Waldeen who wrote (7023)	9/9/1998 9:15:00 PM
From: Simon Cardinale	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 16960

SLI Banshee I'm not sure why that last post was directed at me, but maybe we need a little discussion of what SLI is. It's not 2 cards putting their heads together and thinking faster. It's one card doing even lines, while the other does the odd. The two cards need to be working at the same speed with the precise same set of features. Could Banshee have been made to work in SLI with a Voodoo2? No. Although Banshee's 3D is built around the Voodoo2 core it is not precisely the same. Just look at the different memory architecture, the absence of a second TMU, and of course they're running at different clockspeeds. The odd lines wouldn't mesh with the even lines. Oops. There have been some drivers released lately that should allow two Voodoo2 cards to be linked together even though they're from different manufacturers. I bet they don't work for all manufacturers, just those that stuck with the reference design. I think it's impressive that even this is possible, but let's not get carried away. It may be possible to have 2 Banshees do SLI if they've got the right connector. The current generation doesn't. Why not? This is an OEM part, with the lowest price they could get. They didn't figure to sell very many in retail channels. If they gave this first Banshee SLI capability they might take away too much of Voodoo2's appeal. When they release their retail Banshee (maybe 6 months from now?) we'll probably see SLI and second TMU. On the other hand, why not a single card SLI Banshee? Quantum3D has been quietly doing this all along with the Voodoo2. If they can do it with the Banshee I'll buy one. :) Their single card SLI Voodoo2 had a hefty premium attached to it with no speed advantage over two Voodoo2 boards. With Banshee it'd be different. They could explode onto the retail scene. Simon

To: Waldeen who wrote (7023)	9/10/1998 12:57:00 AM
From: Jeff Lins	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 16960

Hello all. Regarding Banshee SLI, though it has been stated that it cannot be done, I believe it can. At its heart, the Banshee is a V2. Within the workings of the V2 is the ability to do SLI. I think that the only folks who would do it, however, is Quantum. Remember, they did a SLI V1 card. V1 cards didn't have SLI connectors, the feature wasn't advertised, and nobody else did it. As for Banshee not working with V1 I don't think I understand the point. V1 cards don't do SLI. Even if Banshee had the connector, it wouldn't work. As for Banshee itself doing SLI or the thought that if it did SLI with V1 it would be great for sales, get over it! TDFX isn't interested in selling this to the retail market. Yeah, yeah, of course they want the sales, and they want to increase their market share, but they want to sell VOODOO2 at retail! They want to sell Banshee to OEM's! Lets try to remember that a key to success is focus. Lets not make a bunch of different top of the line chips; make your chips for each market. Hit that market hard. Go after new markets. If TDFX came out with a nice $15 chip aimed at low, low end, would we all be crying foul because it didn't do SLI? Do we really want to sell 2 lower priced lower margin chips instead of the V2? Banshee runs at a faster clock than V2. Put it in SLI mode and you have just killed most of your V2 sales. You have to look at the big picture here. Strategy. Product positioning. Product sales mix. Profitability. Not doing SLI with banshee was not a mistake, but rather good judgement. The real mistake was not doing 32bpp color in 3D and not doing 2x agp. Not because these features are really important now, but because of marketing. These are the features-for right or wrong- that you will see more and more in TNT reviews. "Yeah, TNT isn't a V2 killer, but it does have some advantages..."