Intel pulls ATI bus licence

locutus12 · 25 Jul 2006 at 00:54

"in a shock to no one, a few days ago, ATI had its chipset bus licence pulled, or at least not renewed by Intel. I guess that means that AMD won't be making many chipsets for Intel in a year or so" - http://theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=33225

now... this could all get very dirty very easily as AMD hold the licence for the EM64T extensions which intel has licenced from AMD in order to be able to implement a 64 bit architecture on Intel CPU`s...

locutus12 · 25 Jul 2006 at 01:29

Yewen said:
Think it means ATI wont be making any chipsets for Intel processors, thats it.

Don't know why AMD are drawn into this.

there drawn into it because they are the reason intel has cancelled the deal. by Q4 2006, AMD and ATI will be fully integrated. all the merger is waiting on now is shareholder aproval which they are certain to get given they are getting a 24% return on the current share price.

its in reference to certain controller chips and IGPU`s that ATI were making for Intel, basically they are trying to be spiteful and make damn sure they dont help AMD`s profit margins even if it causes intel problems initially.

locutus12 · 25 Jul 2006 at 01:38

lucifersam said:
dont intel use IA64 not EM64T, intel havnt leased anything of AMD since they got 64 bit first? but yes this is gonna get dirty and if i was the evil empire (intel) i would do my best to damage ATI and join forces with Nvidia

"AMD's standard was adopted by Microsoft, Linux and even Sun Microsystems. This left Intel in a position where they were forced to make an agreement with AMD to use the AMD64 extensions for their own 64-bit (EM64T) processors. The K8 is also notable for its Direct Connect Architecture." - Wiki

IA-64 is for itanium processors, the whole IA-64 itanium project was a failure as it couldnt hold against Opterons which used less power and did more work per Mhz, the Opterons went on to compete directly with Xeon chips after this...

Unless Intel managed to pull off a hostile take over of Nvidia, which i doubt it will do, Nvidia have already stated they have no plans for or desire to merge with anyone for the forseable future.

lucifersam said:
do you rekon Nvidia will still make AMD chipsets? more to the point do you rekon AMD will let them now they have ATI?

i wasnt aware they did in the first place.

locutus12 · 25 Jul 2006 at 01:44

Psycho Sonny said:
what is a chipset? or bus and why are the video card companies making them shouldnt mobo manufacturers or cpu manufacturers make them?

motherboard manufacturers generally dont make their own chips, they design a board to do certain things using various chips from various companys. peel off your northbridge cooler on your motherboard and under it youl find your chipset

locutus12 · 25 Jul 2006 at 01:48

well said.

locutus12 · 25 Jul 2006 at 01:51

lucifersam said:
i still cant see that there would be a licensing problem

there isnt yet

im just saying if things got dirty, both sides paths cross enough in the technology they produce to do each other some damage.

locutus12 · 25 Jul 2006 at 02:06

lucifersam said:
i think business is not that petty, intel and AMD are in a market worth billions there is more than having the last laugh at stake here

actually it is petty. the arrangement was proffiting both sides and there was no sound financial reason to cancel it. Intel is in a market which it dominates via illegal subsidisation of companys such as dell who until this year were bullied into not shipping AMD or else they would have to pay full price for Intel CPU`s as opposed to the large discounts they recieved from Intel for their loyalty. AMD by comparison have spent the last 20 years clinging on by its fingernails.

AMD`s profits last year were $209 million
intel profits last year were $8 billion - 40 times more than AMD.

locutus12 · 25 Jul 2006 at 13:10

Corasik said:
Intel doesnt make its EM64T under license, and AMD have no chance to claim on any breached of patent. Intel reverse engineered EM64T.

However AMD reverse engineered Intels 80386 (am386), and intel's laywers were unable to prevent it. If AMD sent its legal boys out against intel and actually found a loophole and won, intel would no doubt turn around and say that AMD64 is still based on the reverse engineered 386, and that the same loophole would work on their behalf.

Im pretty sure that AMD, and Intel are pretty safe from each other in that point of view.

sorry my friend, but thats totally incorrect. go read up on it over at wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amd

intel built their own 64bit set for the itanium chips which were a flop.