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And yet again I am reminded of how SGI was so far ahead of the graphics game and yet was absolutely demolished because others could see the potential for domest

And yet again I am reminded of how SGI was so far ahead of the graphics game and yet was absolutely demolished because others could see the potential for domestic add-on cards when SGI was focusing on entire work stations. 3DFX and Nvidia ultimately put them out of business.

corysama 3mo ago
I’m not a scholar of the fall of SGI. But, I’m sure it has been documented in detail. AFAICT, SGI was a textbook Innovator’s Dilemma case with an expensive enterprise product that’s hard to give up in the face of cheap, low-margin competition.
- ColdStream 3mo ago
  Spot on. They had the tech advantages but the high margins of full work stations blinded them to the changing winds in the industry. I remember at the time seeing some folks blown away that they could do SGI like stuff on a PC with a $199 add on card. It wasn't identical but it was close enough and you didn't have to switch to out of the Windows ecosystem. That kind of scaling and software inertia is just too hard to compete against.
  - RetroTechie 3mo ago
    > That kind of scaling and software inertia is just too hard to compete against. What stopped SGI from offering such $199 add-on cards, but with their name on it?
    - aa-jv 3mo ago
      Hubris. And Microsoft.
    - mike_hearn 3mo ago
      It's very unclear in that era that there is a big market for 3D graphics at home. So their big customers would buy the cheap cards but in low volumes -> bankruptcy. And maybe there's either no big consumer market, or it grows too slowly to replace the loss of their main business.
    - ahartmetz 3mo ago
      They were offered one mass-market opportunity on a silver platter, which they took: When Nintendo asked them to design the N64 GPU. It didn't seem to be very profitable for them.
- JSR_FDED 3mo ago
  This is true. I was at SGI, and their entire business was optimized to serving the needs of very sophisticated customers who were themselves pushing the envelope. Absolutely great customers to work with. But SGI’s DNA couldn’t adjust to the low margin high volume consumer space. They built an incredible Windows NT system (for the time) but couldn’t keep up with the 6 month release cycle their competitors were on. SGI was an incredible place to work while it lasted.
pishpash 3mo ago
3dfx and nVidia even put Matrox out of business. The 1990's were a true competitive paradise up and down the stack, not like today.

corysama 3mo ago

I’m not a scholar of the fall of SGI. But, I’m sure it has been documented in detail. AFAICT, SGI was a textbook Innovator’s Dilemma case with an expensive enterprise product that’s hard to give up in the face of cheap, low-margin competition.

ColdStream 3mo ago
Spot on. They had the tech advantages but the high margins of full work stations blinded them to the changing winds in the industry. I remember at the time seeing some folks blown away that they could do SGI like stuff on a PC with a $199 add on card. It wasn't identical but it was close enough and you didn't have to switch to out of the Windows ecosystem. That kind of scaling and software inertia is just too hard to compete against.
- RetroTechie 3mo ago
  > That kind of scaling and software inertia is just too hard to compete against. What stopped SGI from offering such $199 add-on cards, but with their name on it?
  - aa-jv 3mo ago
    Hubris. And Microsoft.
  - mike_hearn 3mo ago
    It's very unclear in that era that there is a big market for 3D graphics at home. So their big customers would buy the cheap cards but in low volumes -> bankruptcy. And maybe there's either no big consumer market, or it grows too slowly to replace the loss of their main business.
  - ahartmetz 3mo ago
    They were offered one mass-market opportunity on a silver platter, which they took: When Nintendo asked them to design the N64 GPU. It didn't seem to be very profitable for them.
JSR_FDED 3mo ago
This is true. I was at SGI, and their entire business was optimized to serving the needs of very sophisticated customers who were themselves pushing the envelope. Absolutely great customers to work with. But SGI’s DNA couldn’t adjust to the low margin high volume consumer space. They built an incredible Windows NT system (for the time) but couldn’t keep up with the 6 month release cycle their competitors were on. SGI was an incredible place to work while it lasted.

pishpash 3mo ago

3dfx and nVidia even put Matrox out of business. The 1990's were a true competitive paradise up and down the stack, not like today.