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| Top Stories for June 22, 2001 (details below) | |
| EBN | Transmeta snubs IBM in favor of TSMC for new chips |
| Semiconductor Business News | Transmeta, Seiko to develop "energy-saving'' processors for notebooks and Internet appliances |
| C/Net | Investors hammer Transmeta |
| Truths...from the rumor mill | |
| The Inquirer | Dell-AMD 'deal' takes strange twist |
| The Inquirer | SiS, ALi push Intel to Sue Via |
| The Inquirer | Intel to fight AMD 'til death |
| The Inquirer | Compaq Alpha team for sale? |
| Microprocessor
Headline News Collected By Robert R. Collins |
Week of June 17, 2001 |
Older News |
| June 22, 2001 | |
Transmeta snubs IBM in favor of TSMC for new chipsBy Bruce Gain June 22, 2001 |
Transmeta Corp. has chosen Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing
Co. to make its next generation Crusoe TM5800 and TM5500
processors, sparking speculation that Transmeta will
eventually opt for TSMC to serve as its primary fab source
instead of IBM Corp. In February, EBN reported that IBM, which late last year reversed a decision to use Transmeta Corp.'s Crusoe microprocessor in a notebook computer, would no longer be the exclusive foundry supplier to Transmeta after TSMC was signed as a second source. |
Transmeta, Seiko to develop "energy-saving'' processors for notebooks and Internet appliancesJune 21, 2001 |
Transmeta Corp. and Seiko Epson Corp. here today announced
that they will co-develop a future line of "energy-saving"
microprocessors, chip sets, and other products for notebook
PCs and Internet appliances. Under the terms, the companies will co-develop low-power processors that combines Transmeta's Crusoe family of x86-based MPUs and Seko Epson's "energy-saving" chip technology. The companies are cooperating on several other fronts. First, Seiko Epson and Transmeta will establish a cooperative relationship toward the development of a technology partnership or alliance in the Internet appliances field. |
Investors hammer TransmetaBy Tiffany Kary June 21, 2001 |
Shares of Transmeta were pummeled Thursday after the company
issued a revenue warning and analysts downgraded the stock. Transmeta, which makes power-saving chips for notebook computers and Internet appliances, closed down $7.24, or 57 percent, at $5.36. Transmeta said second-quarter revenue would be down 40 percent to 45 percent compared with revenue of $18.6 million for the first quarter of 2001. That would put revenue around $10.2 million to $11.2 million. First Call's estimate had predicted revenue of $19.6 million. Transmeta blamed economic weakness in Japan, its primary market. |
| Truths...from the rumor mill | |
Dell-AMD 'deal' takes strange twistBy Mike Magee June 21, 2001 |
SOURCES CLOSE TO Dell Limerick are telling The Inquirer of a
strange twist in the continuing rumour that it may use AMD
microprocessors in some machines it makes. As with other similar rumours over the last two years it has to be taken with a big pinch of salt but at least it's not the usual Dell-AMD speculation. And if it's true, we'll have to get down on our knees in front of analyst Eric Ross at Wiesel and beg him for mercy. |
SiS, ALi push Intel to Sue ViaBy Mike Magee June 21, 2001 |
SOURCES CLOSE TO ALi say that the chipset firm is pushing
Intel to take legal action against Via over its Pentium 4 P4X
266 chipset. SiS too, wishes Intel to draw a line in the sand for the same reasons, with Via's P4X 266 expected to cost $28 at launch in August. Intel's own Brookdale DDR will tentatively be priced at $40, while ALi and SiS, both of which have licences from Intel, are forced to pay $5 per chipset over the odds to the chip giant. |
Intel to fight AMD 'til deathBy Mike Magee June 21, 2001 |
THE CEO OF INTEL told the massed ranks of British hackery
yesterday that the firm will continue its price war with AMD
and will even intensify it over the months to come. Craig Barrett, speaking in a Thameside location yesterday, told The Inquirer that Intel has no intention of relinquishing market share to AMD. Barrett said that Intel will continue to develop its technology while hanging on to its market share. "Our attitude is we've had 80 per cent market share for the last five years and our inten is to stay at that level or even move upward." |
Compaq Alpha team for sale?By Mike Magee June 22, 2001 |
LIKE OUR DELL story elsewhere, this clearly falls into the
class of rumour but there may well be some elements of truth
within the tale. According to an individual who works at Compaq, there are persistent rumours that the firm, which as we reveal elsewhere is in all kinds of bother, is considering selling off a set of jewels in its crown known as the Alpha design team. |
| June 21, 2001 | |
Transmeta Expects Q2 Revenue To Fall 45%June 20, 2001 |
Transmeta Corp. today said it expects its quarterly revenue to
decline 40 percent to 45 percent from the previous quarter’s
$18.6 million. Santa Clara, Calif.-based Transmeta (nasdaq: TMTA) cited a reduction in unit volume shipments to its major customers in the second quarter, ending June 30, as the chief reason for its sharp revenue decline. “Our business is presently based primarily in Japan, which now appears to be experiencing the economic weakness that affected other parts of the world earlier this year,” said Mark K. Allen, Transmeta’s president and chief executive officer, in a statement. “In conjunction with this projected revenue decrease and our planned transition to a new manufacturing process for the second half of 2001 using 0.13-micron technology, we are also analyzing our inventory levels of existing products and expect that we will take an inventory charge during the second quarter.” |
Intel delays Israel expansion due to economic woesBy Steven Scheer June 18, 2001 |
Intel Corp. chief executive Craig Barrett said on Monday that
a deceleration in the global computer industry had put off a
decision on whether to build a new chip plant in Israel. ``We have not made a decision to go forward for economic reasons,'' Barrett told reporters in Jerusalem. ``There is a slowdown in the industry and that's tempered the need for expansion. But we are still evaluating our options.'' Intel, the world's largest chip maker, said earlier this year it was considering building a new $3.5 billion chip plant next to its current facility in the southern city of Kiryat Gat and the Israeli government had said it would provide Intel with a grant to help finance the plant. |
Intel to consider cuts unless chip market recoversJune 20, 2001 |
U.S. semiconductor maker Intel said on Wednesday it needed to
see a recovery in the chip market within six months or it
would consider cutting capacity and investments next year. Intel Chief Executive Craig Barrett, travelling through Europe this week, also said delays in building factories in Israel and Ireland would not affect Intel's $7.5 billion investment plans this year, but could affect next year's budget. The U.S. company, by far the world's largest chip maker, stands out as the only semiconductor maker that has so far stuck to its investment plans, both in research as well as new factories and equipment. |
Worst Not Over For Chipmakers AMD And IntelJune 20, 2001 |
So much for optimism. Despite some upbeat comments in recent
weeks from leading PC chipmakers Advanced Micro Devices Inc.
and Intel, some industry watchers aren't convinced. Citing
concerns over weak demand, price pressures, and high channel
inventories, analysts at Merrill Lynch lowered sales estimates
for AMD after the close of markets Tuesday while Lehman Bros.
cut estimates for both companies Wednesday morning. In a research bulletin, Merrill Lynch's Joe Osha predicts AMD will sell 1 million fewer chips in the second quarter compared with the first, down to 6.3 million units. As a result, Osha says, AMD will likely post per-share second-quarter earnings of only 22 cents, five cents below the consensus estimate of 27 cents. Last year, AMD reported second-quarter earnings of $1.21 on record revenue of $1.17 billion. Earlier this month, AMD president and chief operating officer Hector Ruiz said he expects the company to post modest revenue growth this year. AMD is expected to report second-quarter earnings on July 12. |
Intel is confident on end to chip slumpBy Fiona Harvey June 20, 2001 |
Intel has reached the bottom of the downturn in the
semiconductor business, Craig Barrett, chief executive, said
on Wednesday. "We think the bottom of the trough and seasonality in the second half should give some uptick," he said. While admitting that he could not give firm evidence for his "feeling" about the end of the downturn, he repeated: "We are bouncing along what we perceive to be the bottom." |
| Truths...from the rumor mill | |
Magee writes positive Itanic storyBy Mike Magee June 18, 2001 |
INTEL ITANIC processors are in short supply and that's because
there's demand for them in the channel, The Inquirer can
report. But the reason why there's demand for them in the channel is complicated and involves system integrators' most unfavourite company right now, API. As we have reported here earlier, Samsung, which together with Compaq made that joint venture called Alpha Processors Ink, wants to spin API off, hopefully late summer or perhaps in autumn, when everything is looking rosier. |
AMD chips carry health warningBy Andrew Thomas June 18, 2001 |
ON A number of occasions, stories failing to show AMD in an
exclusively-positive light have resulted in readers offering
to pop round and help me install a Pentium 4 in what sounds
like a very uncomfortable place. Not only are all those pins very sharp, but installing a heatsink would certainly bring tears to the eyes. No amount of thermal grease would help here, we suspect. But at least we've finally discovered why Athlons and Durons aren't deemed suitable for rectal fitment. Whilst leafing through the spec sheet for AMD's 762 chip, we came across the following caveat: ... |
RMBS price teeters on $10 brinkBy Eva Glass June 19, 2001 |
WE HAVE WATCHED the downward decline of the Rambus share price
with some interest over the last several years. Yesterday, the share price closed on Wall Street at $10.19 - it dropped by over seven per cent over the day at volumes of 2.3 million - its average volume is over the 5 million mark. We suspect that RMBS will manage to avoid dropping below the psychologically tense $10 mark today, largely as a result of a fake market recovery sparked by Oracle. |
Transmeta transmittas profit alertBy Drew Cullen June 20, 2001 |
Here comes another profit warning, this time from Transmeta,
the low-power Crusoe CPU designer. Sales in Q2 (ending June
30) will be 40-45 per cent down on Q1's $18.6m t/o. The
company is also transitioning in the second half of the year
to 0.13micron production. The upshot will be an inventory
charge - amount so far unspecified. Transmeta blames a slowdown in Japan - most of its customers are Japanese hardware vendors and, presumably, most of their customers are Japanese also. |
Price of 1GHz Pentium III slumpsBy Marco Fumagalli June 18, 2001 |
ALTHOUGH INTEL CONFIRMED the price of some Celeronicas
decreased first thing today, there are sharp decreases in the
price of several top-end Pentium III models. In the spot market, the 1GHz Pentium III fell to $175, the 933MHz to $170 and the 866MHz to $150. And, although there seem to be no official changes in prices for AMD 1GHz and 1.2GHz Athlons, there is heavy pressure on their prices too in the spot market, with the 1GHz priced at a ridiculous $95 and the 1.2GHz Athlon at an equally ridiculous $105-$110. |
Via to price P4 chipset lowBy Mike Magee June 20, 2001 |
REPORTS in the Taiwanese press said that Via will introduce
its Pentium 4 chipset at no more than $35, a move set to
further irritate the chip giant. The P42X66 double data rate (DDR) chipset is expected to be introduced in August and Via hopes motherboard makers will adopt it wholesale. Intel's own Brookdale DDR chipset is not expected to be available until the first quarter of next year, although it will have the i845 chipset which uses synchronous memory out by September. |
AMD Hammer gets very predictiveBy Eva Glass June 19, 2001 |
ACE'S HARDWARE is always good at the kind of in-depth thingie
you find at few other places in such detail. Over here, the
lads are chatting about the branch prediction AMD's sixty four
bit Hammerchip will have, which is well worth a read. Meanwhile, Tom's Hardware Guide is declaring it has the exclusive on the grafficky things that SiS and Trident are doing. Anandtech, which has turned into a large corporate site according to Tech Report, has got a great big comparison of IDE Raid systems and you can find that ici la. |
| June 18, 2001 | |
Intel will lag behind competitors in DDRBy Sara Sowah June 15, 2001 |
Intel's double data rate (DDR) version of the Brookdale
Chipset could be behind the times before it even hits the
market. Intel's first foray into DDR will hit 200 or 266Mbit/s when it is launched early next year. But it will be slower than offerings from other memory manufacturers, competitors claim. Dean Klein, vice-president of Micron Technology's integrated technology group, says next year the focus for DDR activity will shift to DDR300: "DDR 333 will be the most likely stopping point, where a number of platforms will come to rest for 2002." |
Past, Present, and Future Of Intel's Pentium ProcessorBy Chris Angelini June 15, 2001 |
It is hard to believe that Intel's Pentium moniker has taken the consumer desktop market from 60MHz to nearly 2GHz, all in the course of eight years. Spanning three micro-architectures and twelve product lines, the Pentium brand name commands recognition on a worldwide basis in value, mid-range, and performance systems. As such, it is highly unlikely that Intel will relinquish the name of their signature processor line any time soon. What, then, can be expected from Intel's Pentium in today's highly competitive marketplace? Where will the Pentium be this time next year? For a clearer understanding of how Intel intends to position their Pentium line, lets first take a look at where the Pentium has already been. |
Transmeta Aims at 1 GHzMartyn Williams June 14, 2001 |
Transmeta is raising the stakes in the battle of the notebook
processors. The company plans to begin shipping a 1-GHz version of its Crusoe processor in the third quarter of this year, a spokesperson for the company said Thursday. The plans were divulged during Transmeta's Crusoe Seminar in Tokyo. Intel, which currently dominates the market , plans to begin shipping a low-power version of its Pentium 3 chip during the third quarter. Code-named Tualatin, the new chip will be produced using a 0.13 micron process. Samples of a notebook based on a 1.16-GHz version of the chip were on display by Intel at the recent Computex show in Taiwan. |
Intel's Brookdale chip set will cause Pentium 4-based motherboards to fall by 25%June 15, 2001 |
Prices for PC motherboards based on Intel Corp.'s Pentium 4
microprocessor are expected to tumble by 25% or more--that is
for products built around the company's new SDRAM-enabled
Brookdale chip set, according to Asian board makers. The Brookdale-enabled Pentium 4 boards are expected to narrow the wide and troublesome price gap between these products and motherboards built around the aging Pentium III processor, according to analysts. |
| Truths...from the rumor mill | |
Bastard Pentium IIIs outperform Xeon FostersBy Mike Magee June 15, 2001 |
NOT ONLY do the latest Tualatin microprocessors run cool as
cool can be, but if you bung them in a dual processor
configuration they will thrash the pants off dual Foster
Xeons, The Inquirer can reveal. Sources at La Intella tell us that because of this strange and uncomfortable fact, Intel will never produce or allow to be produced any such configurations. One engineer who saw the results of the systems La had put together for herself, told us that the benchmarks from the dual Tualatin "were quite astonishing". |
Intel politics screws up Tualatin launchBy Mike Magee June 14, 2001 |
THE INQUIRER is pleased to put on record that the whole world
- including Santa Clara chip giant La Intella - is confused
about where it is positioning its .13 micron Tualatin
processors. That's the bad news. The good news (for INTC shareholders, at least), is that the delays, wishy-washiness about its plans, and the internal politics haven't affected The Firm's ability to move to .13 micron processing, That has gone very well, as we reported here before. |
Qualcomm disses IntelBy Tony Dennis June 15, 2001 |
INTEL WILL come up against "a blue wall of Qualcomm" if it
attempts to enter the mobile handset space, according to Ed
Knowlton, senior director for marcomms with Qualcomm. The company claims nearly 50 handset manufacturers worldwide are presently using its products including even Nokia which finally accepted its fate and has used some Qualcomm components. This makes Qualcomm the largest 'fab-less' chip manufacturer in the world - an interesting claim since many of its offerings are ARM based. |
ATI unleashes cunning plansBy Mike Magee June 17, 2001 |
CANADIAN OUTFIT ATI, which has a 'special relationship' with
Intel which Nvidia will never have, has plans to implement
fresh graphics adventures as a counter to Nvidia and AMD, we
have learned. It will further integrate UMA after experiments with ALi chipsets, such as the 1535. But here it all gets too political, because as far as we can tell, both Via and Intel are privy to these parts and to these plans. |
Fanless Athlon mystery continuesBy Andrew Thomas June 15, 2001 |
Isonics, whose 'Super Silicon' Si-28 wafers promise chips
running cooler than an ice-cool beer at a Fun Lovin' Criminals
gig in Antarctica, this week refused to confirm or deny an AMD
connection with its wonder wafers. In an open letter to shareholders, James E. Alexander, Isonics' president and CEO begins: "Dear Shareholder, ... |
Intel on horns of Via P4 dilemmaBy Mike Magee June 16, 2001 |
HOW FAST CAN Via get its Pentium 4 DDR chipset designs out the
door, and should Intel wheel its Dunlap engine into action
against the plucky Taiwanese firm? These are the questions Intel executives should be asking if they're not already, the INQUIRER thinks. When a senior VP blew several fuses and described the Via performance results at Computex as "bogus", we expected the Dunlap tumbrils to wheel swiftly into action, puncturing balloons and ripping down flags while simultaneously issuing writs in every geography and even in some geographies that haven't been colonised yet - the so-called virgin territories. |
VIA preps August launch for Pentium 4 DDR chipsetBy Tony Smith June 15, 2001 |
VIA will launch its Pentium 4-oriented DDR SDRAM-based
chipset, the P4X266, in August and is busy signing up mobo
makers in time for the big day. The Taiwanese chip maker officially announced the product earlier this month. VIA wants to ensure it's ahead of other Taiwanese chip makers who have been granted P4 licences by Intel. Intel-backed chipset vendors SIS and Acer Labs are known to be working on P4 DDR chipsets, but they are not expected to ship them in volume until Q4. |
VIA C4 to hit 2GHz during 2H 2002By Tony Smith June 15, 2001 |
VIA will take its x86-compatible processor line to 2GHz and
beyond during the second half of 2002 with Esther (the latest
of its biblically inspired codenames), the second chip to
sport the C4 brand. Little is known about the newest addition to VIA's roadmap, but VIA Hardware has been able to glean the following information: Esther's core is called the C5Y and that it will be a 0.1 micron part. Esther will be the successor to the already-roadmapped Nehemiah, aka the C5X, or the VIA C4, to give it its new official name. Nehemiah will be fabbed at 0.13 micron and debut during Q4. It will ship at 1.2GHz. |
Acer eyes Rambus chipset marketBy Tony Smith June 15, 2001 |
Acer Labs has formed an R&D team to produce Rambus-based
chipsets and has already begun consulting mobo makers about
what they would like to see in the company's RDRAM products. So claim sources cited by DigiTimes. Acer Labs is one of the few companies to have a licence from Rambus to develop RDRAM-based chipsets. Does the world need another Rambus chipset though? Certainly Intel's Pentium 4 price cuts have led to an increase in demand for Rambus-based motherboards, but since that market is well catered for by Intel's 850 chipset, and with SDR and DDR SDRAM chipsets coming for the P4, demand for RDRAM chipsets seems unlikely to grow significantly. |
Intel fusing die on Tualatin cacheBy Mike Magee June 15, 2001 |
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN a Tualatin Pentium III with 512K and
256K is that the latter has been subjected to the type of
treatment stone subs imposed on type in the old days of hot
metal. When a page was laid out in the form and an error was subsequently discovered in the type, the stone sub would get out her or his hammer and chisel out the offending letters. Apparently, Intel has been clever enough to create masses of Tualatin's with 512K cache but wants to differentiate the desktop models by charging different sums for what is, essentially, the same chip. |
AMD sloes down its 1.8GHz gintrapBy Mike Magee June 17, 2001 |
THAT LAD JC at JC's has spotted a piece at Akiba reckoning AMD
is slowing down its Athlon gintrap and intro-ing several
different lesser revs between now and Yule. This is nothing to do with technology, we can confidently report, and everything to do with market demand, which is far slower than AMD expected or for that matter anticipated. Course it's true to say that Intel had already delivered Megahurts Hell to AMD by delivering a 1.7 Pentium 4, but the benchmarketing seemed to suggest that most Athlons could trash a P4 at that speed. AMD has only just delivered a 1.4GHz Athlon and that is in scanty quantity so far, although as little as a month ago it was able to speak loudly about 1.8GHz Athlons this year. Well, you're just going to have to wait for them - maybe. |
Jonathan Dowling: AMD's MP wizardBy Mike Magee June 16, 2001 |
IS IT POSSIBLE TO be a poet and a signal integrity engineer? Certainly, it appears to be possible if you are a Mr J. Dowling, an engineer at Advanced Micro Devices in Austin, who not only appears to be the wizard that has brought point-to-point multiprocessing to the AMD Athlon platform, but is also capable of drafting job ads that would make Bill Shakespeare hesitate before he picked up his goose feather and scratched a sonnet out once more. |
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