Topic 1
/// Sweeping Changes Due For CPUs ///
The next few months will usher in some sweeping changes in PC
motherboard and processor technology, as the industry gears up
for the 100-MHz system bus.
Trade sources are saying that Intel Corp. will be the first
chip maker to support the faster bus as we move from the 66-MHz
standard to the 100-MHz architecture. Intel's close rivals,
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and National Semiconductor/Cyrix,
however, will soon follow suit. And due to some specific
technical attributes of the 100-MHz platform, some analysts
indicate that AMD and Cyrix may have more to gain in performance
than Intel.
In all, the progression to 100-MHz will nearly double the band-
width between the PC components, the processor (CPU), memory,
and cache memory. One key factor here is the performance
difference between Intel's Pentium II (Slot 1) architecture and
the Socket 7 platform used with older Intel chips and the
present offerings from AMD and Cyrix.
Slot 1 already has an advantage in its packaging of the L2
cache with the processor to attain a more harmonious digital
link between the processor and memory. Socket 7, on the other
hand, must make that link remotely to its cache mounted on the
motherboard. It is considered by most engineers that the 100-
MHz bus will help Socket 7 devices to even out much of the
performance gap between the two technologies.
Intel, however, is not standing still. In April, the CPU maker
will announce its new 350- and 400-MHz Pentium II Slot 1 units
and the 100-MHz bus 440BX chipset to support them. Later in
the year, AMD will release its K6-3D line of 100-MHz bus (PC100)
processors with internal clock speeds of up to 300-MHz.
Cyrix has announced plans to produce its C6+ WinChips supporting
PC100 in 240- and 266-MHz versions later this year, but company
officials declined to comment on delivery schedule.
Customers looking at Pentium II systems should expect to see a
price contrast of between $300 to $500 more for PC100-based
computers as compared to P II systems running on a 66-MHz bus.
Topic 2
/// More News From Intel... 450-MHz? ///
Just as the dust begins to settle over the Slot 1 vs. Socket 7
skirmish, Intel Corp. has revealed that a Slot "2" version of
the Pentium II is in the making.
Industry sources happily announced that Slot 2 will double the
CPU's performance without doubling the price.
By early June, Intel will present its Slot 2 processors that
promise value-added resellers something big to offer their
corporate clients. The new processors will target the mid-to
high-end server systems in the $6,000 to $100,000 category, as
reported by Computer Reseller News last month.
These new Slot 2 processors will hit the distribution channel
by mid-1998, and will usher in the release of a more advanced
"Merced" CPU in 1999. Intel's plans for Slot 2 also include
provisions for mounting two Pentium II Katmai-class processors
within one module for increased computing power.
While few details have been released by Intel, industry sources
indicate that the Slot 2 units will be produced in 400- and
450-MHz versions.
Topic 3
/// Digital To Offer 600-MHz By Year's End ///
Soon to be a wholly owned subsidiary of Compaq Computer Corp.,
Digital Equipment Corp. allowed reporters a peek at its plans
to go head-to-head with Intel in the race for processor speed.
With its next-generation processor, the Alpha 21264, digital
will break the 600-MHz speed record before the end of this year,
and will take a shot at the 1-Gigahertz mark by the year 2000.
Digital's plans call for the 600-MHz CPU to ship this summer,
which puts the chip maker about one full year of Intel Corp.,
who's 600-MHz Merced processor will not be ready until sometime
next year.
The relationship between Intel and Digital is rather muddled in
that the two companies had penned an agreement last fall,
whereby Intel will also manufacture Alpha processors to be sold
only to Digital. This arrangement, according to observers,
gives Digital access to advanced manufacturing processes that it
does not yet possess.
Price information for the Alpha 21264 was not yet available.
Topic 4
/// Microsoft Still Feeling Pressure ///
Microsoft Corp. fell under attack last month on two new fronts
as the Software Publishers Association and Senator Orrin Hatch
leveled charges against the software giant.
The Software Publishers Association (SPA) delivered a set of
principles contesting Microsoft Corp.'s position. Of the issues
in question, the SPA sited that Microsoft is leveraging its
operating system to sell other products and services. Other
SPA charges question the company's licensing practices to OEM
(original equipment manufacturers) and resellers.
Judiciary Committee Chairman, Orrin Hatch stated his intentions
last month to hold additional hearings on Microsoft's business
practices. Senator Hatch stated he will conduct his committee
investigation based on federal antitrust guidelines.
The state of New York also wants to take a swing at Microsoft
as State Attorney General, Dennis Vaaco announced last month
that New York has joined eleven other states who have
subpoenaed the software company's plans to integrate the Inter-
net Explorer browser into Windows 98.
Microsoft did, however, find it still has someone on its side
when it received support from one group of lawyers and noted
economists sponsored by a think tank group called The In-
dependant Institute, which is based in Oakland, California.
Topic 5
/// 56K Standard Decision Ratified By ITU ///
A vote last month by the International Telecommunications Union
in Geneva, Switzerland has officially ratified the v.PCM modem
standard for 56-Kbits/second and higher.
The ITU decision clears the way for equipment manufacturers to
now produce 56-Kb modems that can talk to each other. And as
reported by Electronic Buyers' News, Rockwell Semiconductor
Systems and 3Com said they are already shipping updated ITU
code products to their manufacturing partners, which means
that we should see the v.PCM compliant modems for sale within
another month.
Other modem makers have gotten down to work on cross-platform
compliance testing that will pave the way to unite both the
Rockwell K56Flex technology with the x2 platform used by U.S.
U.S. Robotics/3Com and others.
Topic 6
/// S3 Gains Graphics Patents From Cirrus ///
S3 Inc., Santa Clara, California, announced last month that it
will purchase the rights to 10 patents and 25 patent applicat-
ions from Cirrus Logic Inc.
The $40 million deal also involves a cross-licensing agreement
where both companies may share any remaining technology patents
not named in the sales contract.
S3 plans to use the acquired technology to advance its position
in the 3-D accelerator market and boost investor confidence in
the company in light of its poor financial performance this
quarter. Business analysts noted that layoffs and management
restructuring efforts by the company have been implemented to
recover some of its losses.
Topic 7
/// Via Beats Intel To Market With 100-MHz Build ///
In the realm of Socket 7 chip technology vs. the Pentium II Slot
1 platform, one Fremont, Calif. company has beaten Intel to
market with its 100-MHz bus solution.
Via Technologies Inc. is selling its MVP3 100-MHz chip set,
which will give new life to the older Socket 7 processor
architecture.
Intel Corp.'s 440BX next-generation 100-MHz chip set supporting
the Pentium II Slot 1 technology will not go to market until
mid-1998, according to industry sources.
The Via MVP3 chip set is said to increase a Socket 7 processor's
bandwidth to the input/output (I/O) and memory on the mother-
board. Socket 7 includes processors such as the P5 MMX chips
from Intel, AMD's K6-class, Cyrix/IBM's 686MX, and Integrated
Device Technology's WinChip C6.
The Via chip set will support up to 1-Gigabyte of Fast Page,
EDO, or SDRAM memory architecture, and up to 2-Megabytes of L2
cache.
The MVP3 is in full production, and is priced at $29 each in
lots of 1,000.
Topic 8
/// New ZIP Drive For Notebooks ///
VST Technologies Inc., Acton, Mass., has a solution for note-
book PC users who want the extra storage of a ZIP drive, but
don't want the hassle of lugging around the extra weight and
cables associated with external drives.
Now, notebook users can have the convenience of an "internal"
ZIP drive in a similar manner that desktop users enjoy.
The VST Zip 100 Expansion Bay Drive is compatible with the
Iomega Zip drive, and is produced in Apple PowerBook and IBM
ThinkPad compatible versions. The unit is powered by the
notebook's internal power supply, which eliminates the in-
convenience of having to use an AC power adapter-- as when
traveling by commercial passenger aircraft, or working in
remote locations in the field.
Hot-Swapping of the drive is allowed so that you can plug it
into a floppy or CD-ROM port without having to restart the
computer.
The Zip 100 shows a suggested list price of $349.
Topic 9
/// SIA Wants Korean Companies To Foot Their Own Bills ///
If they cannot sustain themselves on the basis of market
principals, they should be allowed to fail.
That was the message the Semiconductor Industry Association
(SIA) wants to convey to the Clinton administration and congress
regarding the proposed bailout of the South Korean semiconductor
manufacturers by the IMF (International Monetary Fund).
A document released last month by the SIA calls for the
establishment of an interagency task force to guarantee that an
IMF bailout would not result in unjustifiable commercial support
for Korea's semiconductor industry.
The SIA further noted that the Korean companies may not be
"credit worthy," and according to U.S. corporate sources, there
appears to be a consensus of opinion among our semiconductor
manufacturers that an IMF bailout is a very bad idea.
In its official document, the SIA urged the U.S. Government to
insist that South Korea adopt interntionally accepted
accounting standards. South Korea's electronics businesses, as
pointed out by their own ING Barings Securities organization,
had endured heavy currency exchange losses last year-- but
those losses somehow did not show up in their books!
The Barings estimates indicate that Samsung's share of the
losses amounted to $1.7 billion, while Hyundai Electronics and
LG Semicon fell victim to $625 million and $840 million in
losses respectively.
Topic 10
/// Intel Offers Transition Chip To Merced ///
It is code-named Tanner, and Intel Corp. hopes it will help
make the transition smoother for OEMs later migrating to the
64-bit Merced processor.
Intel has already begun its information campaign to show OEMs
that the 32-bit Tanner processor will also operate from the
same Slot "M" connector that Merced will use. The Slot M
connector will be consolidated into the upcoming 460GX chip
set, which among other new features, offers the capability to
run up to four processors and address 16-Gigabytes of memory.
And according to industry sources, the new chip set will inter-
face to an Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP) "4X" standard.
At present, Intel's graphics chips incorporate AGP 1X & 2X
connections, but the 4X mode should come of age next year. 4X
will bring with it the ability to perform four data trans-
actions within a single clock cycle over a 32-bit connection.
Still another one of Intel's battle plans calls for Tanner to
function from a Slot 2 module, which may indicate that the new
processor could be designed for both 32- and 64-bit computer
systems.
Topic 11
/// Intel May Offer RDRAM Pacifier To OEMs ///
As an insurance policy to ease the transition to the high-speed
Rambus DRAM (RDRAM) memory configuration, Intel Corp. may offer
OEMs a transition module that will accept both the present-day
SDRAM (Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory) operating
under the PC100 (100-MHz bus) architecture as well as compliance
with the forthcoming 800-MHz Direct Rambus DRAM (RDRAM).
With the arrival of RDRAM slated for later this year, some PC
makers are already protesting the appearance of yet another
specification to muddy the waters and confuse resellers and end
users alike as to exactly what memory architecture to use.
A revised version of Rambus has already been released in the
form of the S-RIMM (Synchronous Rambus In-line Memory Module),
which is being pushed just in case the Rambus chips become too
expensive or fall into short supply when the market demand
comes into play next year.
One PC manufacturer noted that these new memory options will
further complicate the issue, especially when you take into
account the two competing memory specifications against Rambus,
which are: SLDRAM and Double-Data Rate DRAM (DDR-DRAM).
Topic 12
/// 400 MIPS Performance From ZSP DSP ///
A recent arrival to the digital signal processor (DSP) market
arena, ZSP Corp., has announced its ZSP16401 DSP chip that can
deliver up to 400-mips (millions of instructions per second) of
computing power.
As the new company's first offering, the ZSP16401 is billed as
a four-scaler device that employs a five-stage processing
system that includes dual multiplying accumulator units and
dual arithmetic logic units.
With an operating frequency of 200-MHz, the ZSP chip will offer
400-mips in performance, according to company specifications.
At present, the chip has been limited to 100-MHz, but ZSP plans
to release its 200-MHz version by the second half of this year.
Topic 13
/// XYZ Becomes Celeron As Intel Shuffles Names ///
Rumors within the computer industry of a new series of micro-
processors coming from the Intel organization referred to only
as the "XYZ" chips, were put to rest this month when the formal
name "Celeron" was announced.
On March 4, Intel Corp. announced its newest addition to the
Intel Inside program would be the Celeron processor, which will
be marketed as a "Basic PC" solution. Intel defines the Basic PC
category as one that is "affordable" to many first-time home PC
buyers.
Intel's press release noted that the Celeron is based on the
same Slot 1 design as the current Pentium II processors, but
will offer a more cost-effective solution for manufacturers of
Basic PC systems.
The "official" release of the new CPU will be announced next
month, and the first systems to use the Celeron are expected to
go to market by mid-year, according to the press release.
After the Celeron chips go on sale, the "Pentium II" name
category will apply mainly to higher-end systems geared to
professionals and the more serious PC enthusiast.
Gigabyte GrapeVine
Bottom Line
---------------
Topic 14
/// SENATE JUDICIARY INVESTIGATION OF MS CONTINUES ///
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) led
the attack against Microsoft Corp. as he challenged MS Chairman,
Bill Gates on Tues., Mar. 3, 1998 regarding his company's
licensing practices with Internet content providers and the
packaging of the MS Internet Explorer browser software with
the Windows 95 operating system.
Hatch took a turn at the end of a 4 1/2-hour session to try to
trip up Mr. Gates, who maintained his composure throughout the
session, and seemed to present his case in understandable
terminology. Much of what Mr. Gates had to say seemed to make
sense, but until all the facts are in, I would hesitate to
declare who might be the winner of this ongoing dispute.
As a consumer and PC user, the word monopoly does come to mind
if you ever go in search of an alternative operating system--
one not produced by Microsoft. In true 32-bit operating systems
that are capable of running all the modern software, you would
be hard pressed to find such an alternative. I also think
"monopoly" when I remember reading about all the small soft-
ware companies that Microsoft has acquired over the past four
years. But, who am I to even begin to define "monopoly?"
It seemed apparent to some people watching the story unfold on
the live C-SPAN broadcast, that the true definition or modern
definition of a monopoly could swing this case either way.
In the mean time, I'll continue to surf the Internet with my
[Netscape] browser in search of more information on this on-
going soap opera.
Gary Miller
This month's GrapeVine was acquired from segments of
information and articles published in selected computer and
electronics industry trade publications in addition to
several online sources. The information contained within is
comprised mostly of factual information, editorial comments,
and a few rumors from the electronics industry in general.
Each month, we will try to focus on items of interest related
to the computer/electronics industries as they become news-
worthy, and hopefully, the GrapeVine will be both informative
and entertaining to our readers.