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Nvidia does run any fabs, yet is successful. AMD didn't invent x86, yet is successful. ARM isn't compatible with x86, yet is successful. There are more...

by mbell 14y ago

astrodust 14y ago
All three of these companies have the finances to buy large volumes at low cost and to market their products to the right people. Whatever happened to Transmeta?
- sp332 14y ago
  Transmeta couldn't convince enough people (at the time) that it was worth trading computing power for longer battery life. They never sold enough hardware units to stay afloat. But I consider them a success because they sold their IP to Intel who actually used it in the Pentium M which became the basis for all their processors starting with the Core line. So Intel chips today use at least some of the power management features that were patented by Transmeta.
  - sp332 14y ago
    OK a correction: technically an intellectual ventures firm owns most of the patents now. But some were sold or licensed to Intel, some were already perpetually licensed to nvidia, and AMD had invested in them in order to use the patents as well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmeta#Timeline https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmeta#Timeline
- tedunangst 14y ago
  Transmeta offered 50% of the performance at 75% of the power. That's a far cry from being 10x, let alone 1000x, better.
- mbell 14y ago
  I don't follow. What does "these cases were successful and others were not" have to do with the discussion. AMD wasn't around when x86 was developed, Nvidia wasn't the first 3D graphics company and ARM wasn't the first low power micro-processor development company. In all cases, just as with web startups, they executed better than most or all of the rest, so they lived on. They didn't miraculously over night have the finances to "buy large volumes".
  - astrodust 14y ago
    I'm saying "better" does not equal "successful". AMD lived for years in Intel's shadow and barely scraped by, surviving only because they were willing to price their chips lower than Intel wanted to. Their success came only when Intel fumbled and, to their credit, the Athlon series of chips was in its prime. I'd argue they were only successful at that point because they were better and cheaper than the Intel chips at the time which were unusually under-performing and over-priced. They were only cheaper because they had years of experience in surviving at the bottom end of the market. They also marketed like their life depended on it. ARM is something of an anomaly. They were as much as left for dead, with conventional wisdom thinking one of Motorola, IBM or even Intel would run them over like a bug on the road. That didn't come to pass because none of those companies ever seriously committed to building a modern but very low power CPU. They squeaked through a hole. To credit NVidia with the success of 3Dfx is misleading. It was the Voodoo card that was marketed aggressively to consumers which, at the time, cared little for 3D performance. NVidia picked them up at a yard sale when they were run out of the market by more successful companies like ATI and, at the time, Matrox. It was NVidia's acquisition of 3Dfx that showed they were serious about the consumer market and not just ultra high-end applications. Making one GPU for both consumer and professional markets gave them the edge to remain competitive. All three of these companies got lucky. They say you can engineer your own luck, and with that I can't disagree, but they never had a "better" product until the other guy dropped the ball or they could crack open a new market.
    - mbell 14y ago
      > AMD lived for years in Intel's shadow and barely scraped by, surviving only because they were willing to price their chips lower than Intel wanted to. You mean cutting margins to survive while they didn't have the luxury of massive volume pricing? Isn't this exactly what you were arguing can not possibly happen? > ARM is something of an anomaly. They were as much as left for dead, with conventional wisdom thinking one of Motorola, IBM or even Intel would run them over like a bug on the road. Which architectures from each of those companies was in competition with ARM in its early days? I don't think that competition came till much later when ARM had already proven itself in the micro-controller market. > To credit NVidia with the success of 3Dfx is misleading. It was the Voodoo card that was marketed aggressively to consumers which Nvidia bought them because Nvidia created a part that performed on par or better than the 3Dfx part but also did 2D, which was a flat out revolution in the graphics card market. > All three of these companies got lucky. Sorry, that is just an incredibly egotistical comment to make.

Nvidia does run any fabs, yet is successful. AMD didn't invent x86, yet is successful. ARM isn't compatible with x86, yet is successful. There are more...

by mbell 14y ago

Nvidia does run any fabs, yet is successful. AMD didn't invent x86, yet is successful. ARM isn't compatible with x86, yet is successful. There are more...

astrodust 14y ago

All three of these companies have the finances to buy large volumes at low cost and to market their products to the right people. Whatever happened to Transmeta?

sp332 14y ago
Transmeta couldn't convince enough people (at the time) that it was worth trading computing power for longer battery life. They never sold enough hardware units to stay afloat. But I consider them a success because they sold their IP to Intel who actually used it in the Pentium M which became the basis for all their processors starting with the Core line. So Intel chips today use at least some of the power management features that were patented by Transmeta.
- sp332 14y ago
  OK a correction: technically an intellectual ventures firm owns most of the patents now. But some were sold or licensed to Intel, some were already perpetually licensed to nvidia, and AMD had invested in them in order to use the patents as well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmeta#Timeline https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transmeta#Timeline
tedunangst 14y ago
Transmeta offered 50% of the performance at 75% of the power. That's a far cry from being 10x, let alone 1000x, better.
mbell 14y ago
I don't follow. What does "these cases were successful and others were not" have to do with the discussion. AMD wasn't around when x86 was developed, Nvidia wasn't the first 3D graphics company and ARM wasn't the first low power micro-processor development company. In all cases, just as with web startups, they executed better than most or all of the rest, so they lived on. They didn't miraculously over night have the finances to "buy large volumes".
- astrodust 14y ago
  I'm saying "better" does not equal "successful". AMD lived for years in Intel's shadow and barely scraped by, surviving only because they were willing to price their chips lower than Intel wanted to. Their success came only when Intel fumbled and, to their credit, the Athlon series of chips was in its prime. I'd argue they were only successful at that point because they were better and cheaper than the Intel chips at the time which were unusually under-performing and over-priced. They were only cheaper because they had years of experience in surviving at the bottom end of the market. They also marketed like their life depended on it. ARM is something of an anomaly. They were as much as left for dead, with conventional wisdom thinking one of Motorola, IBM or even Intel would run them over like a bug on the road. That didn't come to pass because none of those companies ever seriously committed to building a modern but very low power CPU. They squeaked through a hole. To credit NVidia with the success of 3Dfx is misleading. It was the Voodoo card that was marketed aggressively to consumers which, at the time, cared little for 3D performance. NVidia picked them up at a yard sale when they were run out of the market by more successful companies like ATI and, at the time, Matrox. It was NVidia's acquisition of 3Dfx that showed they were serious about the consumer market and not just ultra high-end applications. Making one GPU for both consumer and professional markets gave them the edge to remain competitive. All three of these companies got lucky. They say you can engineer your own luck, and with that I can't disagree, but they never had a "better" product until the other guy dropped the ball or they could crack open a new market.
  - mbell 14y ago
    > AMD lived for years in Intel's shadow and barely scraped by, surviving only because they were willing to price their chips lower than Intel wanted to. You mean cutting margins to survive while they didn't have the luxury of massive volume pricing? Isn't this exactly what you were arguing can not possibly happen? > ARM is something of an anomaly. They were as much as left for dead, with conventional wisdom thinking one of Motorola, IBM or even Intel would run them over like a bug on the road. Which architectures from each of those companies was in competition with ARM in its early days? I don't think that competition came till much later when ARM had already proven itself in the micro-controller market. > To credit NVidia with the success of 3Dfx is misleading. It was the Voodoo card that was marketed aggressively to consumers which Nvidia bought them because Nvidia created a part that performed on par or better than the 3Dfx part but also did 2D, which was a flat out revolution in the graphics card market. > All three of these companies got lucky. Sorry, that is just an incredibly egotistical comment to make.