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Has Nvidia really bought out VIA the eastern based hardware company? Well No! The CEO of Nvidia Jen-Hsun Huang today told Cnet that they have no interest what so ever in buying VIA. I can imagine why the hype was created within the hardware community, with Intel and AMD looking to offer integrated chipset graphics Nvidia need to strategically move into the C.P.U markets.

As we are aware VIA have pushed newer technology to all sectors of the computer market by moving ISA into PCI based bus systems. They have also created memory, motherboard based architecture and even processors.

Now I can imagine why speculation was created between the two companies. Huang had to disagree with the comment. He stated that his motive was to be totally devoted to the graphics market and that Nvidia is a visual computing technology company to which they are completely focused on.

With this said, what will happen to Nvidia’s future? Did Jen-Hsun feel interrogated and pressured by the community? Is the CEO under a lot of pressure because of competition?

Well, with Intels larrabee graphics on the horizon, could Intel take Nvidia’s share of the graphics market? With raytracing being implemented by multiple vendors could this affect nvidia markets further?

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The long awaited Service Pack 3 for Windows XP has proved to be a headache for most AMD PC users. One day after the release Users were complaining of system crashing. The problems have been published over Microsoft support websites.

One user reported

“After Installing SP3 and restarting XP would not load. Once the system had rebooted the system would freeze at the XP splash screen and then restart”

Angry users have reported that safe mode isnt even available for a backup means to booting up their systems. Jesper Johansson a former employee at Microsoft explained possible issues.

Affects AMD only related Hardware sold by Hewlett-Packard. HP deploys the same Intel based image on AMD machine causing conflicts. The two systems both have the intelppm.sys driver. The driver provides power management for Intel based systems. The AMD system should use the amdk8.sys driver, which is causing the problems.

You can fine numerous fixes on his blog website Jesper’s Blog

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Bill Gates has announced that the internet will face big changes., coming from the same bloke who said the internet would not amount to anything. He states that there is a drastic change over the next decade.

He predicts that the quality of software will accelerate within the next couple of years. A pretty general assumption if you ask me. He then elaborates his theory by stating, there will be a natural interaction between hardware and software. With regards to input and processing this would amount to voice commands for example “Shut Down” this would command the computer to shut down.

I’ve had speculation over Bill Gate’s ability to look into the future. The first instance I came across was the requirements of 1 yes ONE kilobyte of memory needed by the operating system. Laptops now run a estimated 1 gigabyte of ram!

years later, Bill Gates created a touch screen operating system, again thinking his estimates were correct well in fact we know this is un-true. Do you ever see these systems today? The system basically reminded me of the home cinema OS from Microsoft but was highly catered for touching devices and applications.
As you can imagine the ideas and estimates were all negative. So now I must ask, do you believe in the so called “natural interaction?” I can’t see it some how, not for the consumer market anyway.

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I’m un-aware where Fusion actually sits within the hardware community but AMD has an interesting future ahead of them. Apparently The Director of Sales and Marketing at AMD ATi stated that the next-generation architecture of their C.P.U will change dramatically.

AMD are currently behind in the Processing race with Intel. I imagine Intel is already heading onto the 32nm fabrication running 8 core processors the Nehlem if I remember correctly. Currently AMD are not making a stand within the market and I imagine this is the next step.

AMD Fusion is the name for their future architecture which has arisen due to the merge between AMD and ATi. The processor code named ‘bulldozer/ bobcat’ will combine general computer processing as well as 3D geometry/ Physics processing. At first glance this is what I though Intel intended for their Larrabee product but I was mistaken. The design is actually ingenious! I mentioned in a previous post the basis of computer architecture and how the ideal design should be used viewed collision of the top players the post also covers my initial thought of Larrabee!
AMD are moving to a modular core design which is called M-Space. The next generation architecture is designed so cores can be combined to increase performance for single threaded tasks and then revert back into multi-core mode obviously for multi threaded software such as gaming environments. The architecture is so unique that the k8 architecture used for the majority of AMD processors will be obsolete.

AMD seem to be on the right track here with their intended architecture. Will they be able to get the fund needed to research and develop their product? Are AMD already in the process of building these processors to take Intel within the first quarters of 2009? It’s along wait but save up for the new-year, I’ve got a good feeling about up-coming products!

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