VIA Chips May Hit 2GHz By Year End

KingFishKingFish
edited January 2005 in Science & Tech
It has been reported that VIA, who commands a whopping 2% of the microprocessor market, is planning to hit the 2GHz mark by the end of the year.
Every once in a while I almost forget there are other players in the desktop microprocessor business besides Intel, AMD, and IBM. But still standing strong with less than 2% marketshare is VIA (through its acquisition of Cyrix). It has been reported that VIA is planning to hit the 2GHz mark by the end of the year, a milestone that will definitely be appreciated by its customers, who have to be at least tempted to check out low power/mobile offerings from Intel and AMD. Manufactured using IBM's 90 nm SOI process technology, VIA's current 1.4GHz chips consume about 20 watts, certainly more efficient than current Athlon and Prescott offerings from AMD and Intel, but providing nothing near the performance. Besides, Centrino (and perhaps Turion) will soon be ubiquitous brands in most low-power conversations. VIA plans to release this new core, dubbed the C7, at clock speeds of 1.5GHz, 1.6GHz, 1.7GHz, 1.8GHz, and 2GHz.
Source: GEEK.com

Comments

  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited January 2005
    WHEEEEEE!! Then they'll have 2GHz chips that STILL get their ass kicked by sub-1GHz P3s, Athlons, and PPC G4s. Woohooo!!!

    /me snickers ;D;D
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited January 2005
    WHEEEEEEEE!! They'll still be the king of the ULV HTPC market! Woohooo!!!
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited January 2005
    Everything I've ever heard is that the EPIA boards are too slow to handle playing DVDs without dropping frames. :p
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited January 2005
    They aren't. I have personal experience with them. They're fully capable of processing DVD bitrates.
  • PirateNinjaPirateNinja Icrontian
    edited January 2005
    Via boards/cpus are bitchin for making tiny media computers. Absolutely bitchin. Cheap, and cold. Bitchin eh?
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited January 2005
    Personally, when I'm after cheap & cool-running, I go for Tualatin-core Celerons. Far, far faster, just as cheap, and with a maximum TDP of 20-30w, they run more than cool enough. But that's just me. :)
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited January 2005
    Yes, but they aren't anywhere near as small. That's the point.
  • Geeky1Geeky1 University of the Pacific (Stockton, CA, USA)
    edited January 2005
    *shrugs* There are mini-ITX and Flex ATX Tualatin P3/Celeron boards out there... the ITX ones are expensive (~$250) as they're really not consumer-level boards, but they are indeed the same size as the via EPIA boards. Hell, they have Pentium M and P4 ITX boards too.

    It all depends on what you want and how much you're willing to pay for it, of course. micro ATX is small enough for a HTPC for me, and like the C3, they can be air cooled silently without a problem. The additional power that the Celeron/P3 provides is more important to me than an 11w TDP and a 170x170mm motherboard. I'm not saying that the C3 doesn't have its place, nor would I rule out buying one (one more thing for me to play around with, after all :D) but in general, imo, the Tualatin is a better solution for low noise/low power applications.
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