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

To: Jeff Lins who wrote (7496)	9/22/1998 12:03:00 AM
From: Greg S.	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 16960

This lawsuit doesn't seem to hold water. The computer technology industry is notorious for the presence of ridiculous patents and lawsuits. Look at some of the reference patents for the one in question. My favorite is: "Arithmetic and logic processing unit for computer graphics system" This 1993 patent granted to HP essentially covers any system with a graphics processor. Sound a bit sketchy? If this patent were in any way enforceable, HP would be 17 years ahead of the competition. Some engineers from Microsoft received a patent on the idea of "memcpy()". For those non-developers on here, they patented the idea of copying data from one location in memory to another. It is my impression that these are "vanity patents", and for the most part impossible to enforce. You should note that multitexturing is in no way an original idea by 3Dfx. They cite as references independent research papers (probably presented at SIGGRAPH) from 15 years ago. This information is effectively in the public domain - the challenge lies in the implementation. But SGI has been doing it since the 80s - their graphics cards such as the RealityEngines featured the ability to plug in additional "raster managers" for scalability of the rasterization process. (although I don't believe they were multitexturing - merely using parallel processors to render more than one pixel at a time) In short, 3Dfx never should have gotten this patent in the first place, and I'll be very surprised if they can enforce it. The TNT is a respectable competitor to the Voodoo2/Banshee series, even if nVidia is not a respectable competitor to 3Dfx, and I think an injunction of any kind will only harm consumers and the industry. -G

To: Jeff Lins who wrote (7496)	9/22/1998 10:48:00 AM
From: Marc	Respond to of 16960

Is this a riddle? Is the answer: To get to the other side? Nope, i not ready yet, but by reading some news i often heard on 3dfx (that i already said i like) like this morning. HOUSTON (Sept. 22) BUSINESS WIRE -Sept. 22, 1998-- Presario Line for Holiday Season Offers Quick Internet Access and Rich Multimedia at Prices Up to 24 Percent Lower than Dell; Up to 14 Percent Lower Than Gateway(1) "abstract" Compaq Built for You -- Custom Ordering for Value, Performance and Quality Providing the value and flexibility of buying direct with the convenience of retail store support, Compaq's "Built for You" retail program lets consumers configure and purchase a Presario 5600 Series desktop PC or Presario 1600 or 1800 Series notebook PC with the options that best suit their needs. With new pricing introduced last month, consumers can configure their own Compaq desktop or notebook PC at base prices ranging from $1,299 to $3,499(6) (after rebate(7), shipping not included). In addition to new competitive prices, there are several new options available for Compaq's desktop PCs such as JBL Pro Premium Powered speakers with sub woofers and Diamond Monster II 3D (3Dfx Voodoo II) with 12MB of memory.