NVISION 08 - Jen-Hsun Talks Larrabee, Mobility, VIA and More
by Anand Shimpi & Larry Barber on August 26, 2008 3:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Trade Shows
NVIDIA's Mobile Strategy: "Completely Focus on Smartphones"
Out of nowhere Jen-Hsun threw out quite possibly one of the most important statements I'd ever heard him make, that NVIDIA's mobile strategy is to "completely focus on smartphones".
Jen-Hsun went on to say NVIDIA believes the "phone will become the next personal computer".
This highlights an important potential strategy for NVIDIA. If Intel/AMD push NVIDIA out of the conventional PC market with their GPUs/platforms/CPUs, NVIDIA needs to look elsewhere: the mobile phone market is an interesting outlet. Remember this slide from IDF?
By 2012 Intel estimates that it will be shipping ~200M desktop CPUs, ~360M notebook CPUs and around 200M Atom CPUs. The mobile CPU market is just as large as the mobile GPU market, the difference being that margins are much lower. But it's quite feasible that NVIDIA could see a good hunk of its revenue coming from that market, should it be forced out of the GPU market. But it's worth noting that the Intel/AMD/NVIDIA GPU war looks like it will take at least 3 - 5 years to see through.
NVIDIA's approach could also really hamper Intel's push into getting x86 into mobile devices with Atom. NVIDIA would partner its GPU technology with existing CPU manufacturers/architectures (think: ARM), making Intel's competitors much better suited to compete with Intel.
Jen-Hsun on VIA
One reporter asked Jen-Hsun what his thoughts were on VIA, NVIDIA's CEO responded by saying that VIA has a really good chip (the Nano) and when paired with a GeForce GTX it can actually deliver a pretty high end gaming experience. Jen-Hsun committed to supporting VIA in two ways:
"We're going to go and optimize all of our software for Nano"
"We're going to do compatibility testing for all of the Nano platforms"
I'm unsure how much driver optimization NVIDIA can do for Nano, but it is a big deal since prior to this "announcement", NVIDIA had only optimized its drivers/software for AMD and Intel. Given the VIA Nano install base is nonexistent right now, I'd be willing to bet that the cost of "optimizing" for Nano is pretty small.
Compatibility testing is arguably more important as it means that NVIDIA GPUs should work with whatever Nano platforms end up on the market. Since Intel seems to be interested in leaving Atom crippled on the desktop from a platform standpoint, NVIDIA's support could allow VIA some additional success with Nano desktop machines.
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SoulSlave - Wednesday, August 27, 2008 - link
Well, they simply don't have to deliver linear performance increase. Anything above what SLI has to offer, at a reasonable price point would suffice, I mean, who would prefer to be straped to a single GPU manufacturer when you could have any combination of GPUs you want, delivering better performance?biostud - Wednesday, August 27, 2008 - link
The only problem for nvidia regarding Lucid Hydra is the loss of a need for a nvidia chipset.For both AMD/ATi and nVidia Lucid Hydra still needs two videocards, and since this is the core business for both companies it doesn't matter that much if it's going to replace Crossfire and SLI.
rjc - Tuesday, August 26, 2008 - link
As have an affected notebook, have been following the bad chips news stories, there is a reasonably informative article here:http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/39045/135/">http://www.tgdaily.com/content/view/39045/135/
If above holds i cant imagine the relationship between nvidia and notebook oems will be very good over the next 12 months. Whichs a pity for them as the notebook market seems to be growing quite well despite everything. I guess this is the idea behind the smartphones move - different business though volumes higher and margins tighter than on high end graphic cards.
whatthehey - Wednesday, August 27, 2008 - link
Strangely enough, all of the stories related to this inevitably seem to lead back to the Inquirer "reporting". You'll pardon me if I just can't take anything from Charlie Demerjian seriously. This is the same guy that hates NVIDIA and Intel, so I hardly expect his take on the situation to be reliable. There are certainly some problems with some of NVIDIA's chips, but nothing has indicated this extends much beyond a few select chips (8400M, 8600M and 8700M I think).What specific laptop do you have that has had problems, and what GPU does it use? I know I have a laptop with an 8800M GTX and I've had no problems whatsoever. (It's one of the Clevo units.)
rjc - Wednesday, August 27, 2008 - link
The article i linked claims from their sources the problem chips are the G84, G86 and G92. They couldn't confirm if the G94 also had problems.Again from the article nvidia has sold a total of 70 million of these chips. If say only 1%-2% need to be replaced then nvidia will be ok, say 10% or more would be kind of disastrous. As its early days people are trying to extrapolate from the current failures to get the eventual overall rate.
Re shooting the messenger is a natural thing to want to do. I think psychologists call it "correspondence bias" where you assume the messenger has an agenda ie is evil and thus their message can be ignored.
Personally my laptop is a asus with a 8600gt a v1s. It idles at over 60C, heavy workload can push it into the 70s ie the danger zone from the article, finally games send it into the mid 90s. According to notebook-review forums asus is getting regular returns on their g1s gaming laptop which has a 8600gt and trying to replace them on the quiet. I guess they want to try and avoid the bad publicity dell and hp recently got.
Frallan - Friday, August 29, 2008 - link
Any1 heard about the C90s??Same chip - but other cooling however Im starting to get some very disturbing signs from mine.
Also yes it it the Inq-well but that doesn't mean its wrong. Analog Just because you are paranoid it doesnt mean they are not coming for ya.
;0)
/F
iwodo - Tuesday, August 26, 2008 - link
ARM with Nvidia Graphics, aka the Tegra. And Desktop, x86 with VIA Nano.I am sure with some Restructuring Nvidia could surely sell x86 in some form. As long as it take control of VIA by other means without losing x86 license.
Interconnect - there are already Hypertransport. Nvidia has the Chipset experience. And Dual Core Nano isn't exactly low performance either.
If AMD could do it, why not Nvidia?
Griswold - Wednesday, August 27, 2008 - link
"As long as it take control of VIA by other means without losing x86 license."Voodoo. But since that doesnt exist, its not going to happen. Which answers your last question.
shin0bi272 - Tuesday, August 26, 2008 - link
Nvidia seems to be too concerned with other things at the moment to do anything about Lucid's Hydra. I also dont think that the hydra engine cares what the instruction is it just passes it to the right video card and takes requests from the cards and passes them to the north bridge. Its like the Xor chip on a hardware raid5 card. It just sends what ever data is sent to it to the right card or reads from the different cards and sends those requests to the system. Its a traffic cop. Well thats how I see it anyway... whether or not it actually works remains to be seen.computerfarmer - Tuesday, August 26, 2008 - link
It is nice to hear new things and different takes on the subject.One thing I would like to see, is the promised review on the AMD 790gx/SB750.