NVIDIA could be in for a rocky summer thanks to IBM. It's been reported that IBM will no longer make the AGP bridge chip that NVIDIA uses on its entry-level graphics cards.
While PCI-Express graphics cards have pretty much taken over in the graphics market, AGP-based solutions are still quite prevalent -- especially given the fact that Intel has been dumping 865 chipsets with AGP on the market. NVIDIA will likely find a new partner in due time to take over for IBM, but that's the least of the company's worries. EETimes reports:
There are other issues for Nvidia as well. "We are trimming estimates on Nvidia due to inventory accumulation, the emergence of aggressive pricing, and the prospects of slow business conditions in July," Caso said...Nvidia's inventories were up 36 percent — or 19 days — in its fiscal first quarter, as compared to the previous quarter. And Nvidia is offering deep discounts by "bundling" a high-end 7800 graphics chip "with one or more 6000 series products," according to the analyst.
When PCIe was introduced, it was assumed by many that AGP would be sticking around for quite some time. Interestingly though, most of the motherboards and even low-end graphics cards shipping today have all moved over to PCIe.
Many users who have purchased high-end AGP graphics cards but have wanted to upgrade to faster CPU/motherboard combinations have been out of luck. While some manufacturers have started to produce AGP counterparts of their PCIe products, most are limited to low-end products. HIS for example, has a hybrid AGP/PCIe graphics card based on ATI's X1600 Pro. Sapphire also previously released AGP cards based on the same GPUs.While this may be adequate for some, the AGP market is clearly shrinking and faster GPUs from both ATI and NVIDIA are being produced as PCIe only parts for the foreseeable future.
While PCI-Express graphics cards have pretty much taken over in the graphics market, AGP-based solutions are still quite prevalent -- especially given the fact that Intel has been dumping 865 chipsets with AGP on the market. NVIDIA will likely find a new partner in due time to take over for IBM, but that's the least of the company's worries. EETimes reports:
There are other issues for Nvidia as well. "We are trimming estimates on Nvidia due to inventory accumulation, the emergence of aggressive pricing, and the prospects of slow business conditions in July," Caso said...Nvidia's inventories were up 36 percent — or 19 days — in its fiscal first quarter, as compared to the previous quarter. And Nvidia is offering deep discounts by "bundling" a high-end 7800 graphics chip "with one or more 6000 series products," according to the analyst.
When PCIe was introduced, it was assumed by many that AGP would be sticking around for quite some time. Interestingly though, most of the motherboards and even low-end graphics cards shipping today have all moved over to PCIe.
Many users who have purchased high-end AGP graphics cards but have wanted to upgrade to faster CPU/motherboard combinations have been out of luck. While some manufacturers have started to produce AGP counterparts of their PCIe products, most are limited to low-end products. HIS for example, has a hybrid AGP/PCIe graphics card based on ATI's X1600 Pro. Sapphire also previously released AGP cards based on the same GPUs.While this may be adequate for some, the AGP market is clearly shrinking and faster GPUs from both ATI and NVIDIA are being produced as PCIe only parts for the foreseeable future.