Bij Silicon Investor staat een nieuwsberichtje met wat info over de nieuwe generatie 3dfx videokaarten. Een daarvan is Rampage, waar helaas nog geen info over bekend is behalve dan dat release nog dit jaar zou zijn. Napalm LC zal een low-end versie van de VSA-100 chip zijn met dezelfde eigenschappen. Het model moet erg prijsgunstig worden en dus interessant voor het lagere marktsegment en de OEM's.
1) Next Generation product ("Rampage")
I'll have to listen closely, but I do not think that Dave Zacarias ever called it "Rampage". He did joke that 3dfx's code names seem to get around. I asked if marketing or a serious threat of missing the year was why it was not discussed in the Q1 conference call. He said that marketing was the main reason, that the V5 5500 shipment announcement had been made just the day before and 3dfx wanted to focus attention on the launch, not on upcoming products.
Dave stressed that there always is the real risk of schedule slippage. 3dfx has not discussed timelines for the next generation product, but it is assumed that it is sometime late this year, but Dave repeated that there is always the risk that they will not finish in time for the end of the year.
He did give a few details about the design (it is modular and it sounded like he didn't mean a bunch of different chips), but no specs and no real detailed discussion on the chip. He is the CFO, so he's not the best person for all the technical details. I was more interested in the fact that he was reasonably confident they'll make it out this year.
2) Napalm LC. A cost reduction (presumably to .18u) of the VSA-100 with the similar functionality. Will lower the cost of the chip and should allow them to also lower the total board cost. This will allow them to target a lower end retail segment as well as OEMs where cost is the most important.
Verderop in het het verhaal nog wat geblaat over de V5-5500 recall van een tijdje terug en wordt de release voor de V5-6000 stroommonster nogmaals vastgepint op 'ergens deze zomer'. Thanks Underdog voor de link.
