4Q to see heated competition for PCIe chipsets for the AMD K8 platform
 

The fourth quarter should see heated competition in PCIe chipsets for the AMD K8 platform since VIA Technologies, ATI Technologies, Nvidia and Silicon Integrated Systems (SiS) all plan to release products.

VIA will start volume shipments of its PCIe-enabled K8T890 chipset for the AMD Athlon 64, AMD Opteron and AMD Sempron processors in October.

ATI stated earlier that it will begin volume shipments of its K8 chipset, the RX480, later this month. However, sources at Taiwan motherboard makers said the RX480 would be available early in the fourth quarter.

Nvidia is also planning to launch a K8 chipset in the fourth quarter, the sources said. A part number for this chip has not been finalized.

SiS plans on shipping its SiS 756 PCI-enabled K8 chip in November, the sources noted.

Although Taiwan-based ULi Electronics is also providing PC solutions for the K8 platform, its K8 chipset, the M1689, does not support PCIe. ULi began volume shipments of the M1689 in August.

Competition among the vendors should be fierce since the K8 platform is expected to account for about 5% of the global desktop market in the fourth quarter, the sources noted.

http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20040929A7043.html

In time for Christmas shopping.:)

I already put some money into AMD last month; fingers crossed.:)

>$180 A64 Processor + >$120 Motherboard + > $200 PCI-e Vcard = $500