Wednesday, February 18th 2009
Intel Sues NVIDIA Over Chipset License, NVIDIA Responds
In a surprising move by Intel, the silicon giant filed a lawsuit against NVIDIA corporation at the Court of Chancery in the State of Delaware, over the chipset licensing agreement between the two companies, that allows NVIDIA to make core-logic (chipset) for Intel microprocessors. Intel's contention states that the licensing agreement signed between the two companies about four years ago, that allowed NVIDIA to make nForce series chipset supporting Intel processors, does not cover the the privileges required by NVIDIA to prepare chipsets for Intel's new generation of processors that feature integrated memory controllers.
As of now, NVIDIA does not stand at the receiving end of any legal action, since the company has no chipset products either released, or in production, that supports Intel's Core i7 series processors. The legal-spat in the making, between the two companies, may however affect NVIDIA's possible plans to develop chipset products for Intel's new 45 nm and 32 nm processors. NVIDIA on its part, defends its position, dismissing Intel's claims. Jen-Hsun Huang, NVIDIA's president and CEO maintained that the license agreement negotiated earlier would still apply, though he did not miss the opportunity to affirm his beliefs that the focus on CPU being the soul (if not the heart) of the PC, is slowly yet surely shifting towards the GPU. "This is clearly an attempt to stifle innovation to protect a decaying CPU business" he said. According to the NVIDIA CEO, it is obvious that Intel fears the competition NVIDIA poses with its platform core-logic innovations, that it had to file the complaint. This spat between the two major computer hardware companies could get uglier in the days to come. The press-release from NVIDIA in response to Intel's charges follows:
NVIDIA Responds To INTEL Court Filing
NVIDIA Corporation today responded to a Monday court filing (Court of Chancery in the State of Delaware) in which Intel alleged that the four-year-old chipset license agreement the companies signed does not extend to Intel's future generation CPUs with "integrated" memory controllers, such as Nehalem. The filing does not impact NVIDIA chipsets that are currently being shipped.
"We are confident that our license, as negotiated, applies," said Jen-Hsun Huang, president and CEO of NVIDIA. "At the heart of this issue is that the CPU has run its course and the soul of the PC is shifting quickly to the GPU. This is clearly an attempt to stifle innovation to protect a decaying CPU business."
NVIDIA entered into the agreement in 2004 in order to bring platform innovations to Intel CPU based systems. In return, Intel took a license to NVIDIA's rich portfolio of 3D, GPU, and other computing patents.
Since signing the agreement, NVIDIA has offered innovations such as SLI, Hybrid power, and CUDA parallel processing. ION, the most recent innovation, integrates a powerful NVIDIA GPU, north bridge and south bridge into one compact die. When combined with a CPU, ION enables a two-chip PC architecture for Intel processors two years ahead of Intel's own solution. In addition, the ION platform offers 10x the performance of Intel's current three chip design.
The industry and consumers now count on innovations from NVIDIA. Microsoft recently endorsed ION because it offers consumers the first truly affordable premium Windows experience. Late last year Apple selected NVIDIA's chipset for its entire new line of notebooks including the MacBook Classic, MacBook Air, MacBook and MacBook Pro. Today, companies like Acer, Alienware, Asus, Dell, Falcon Northwest, Fujitsu, Gigabyte, HP, Lenovo, MSI, NEC, and Toshiba all ship exciting innovations created by NVIDIA as a result of its agreement with Intel.
Huang said that, given the broad and growing adoption of NVIDIA's platform innovations, it is not surprising that Intel is now initiating a dispute over a contract signed four years ago. Innovations like ION, SLI, Hybrid power, and CUDA threaten Intel's ability to control the PC platform.
NVIDIA has been attempting to resolve the disagreement with Intel in a fair and reasonable manner for over a year. NVIDIA's chipsets for Intel's current CPU bus interface are not affected by the dispute.
Sources:
TechConnect Magazine, NVIDIA
As of now, NVIDIA does not stand at the receiving end of any legal action, since the company has no chipset products either released, or in production, that supports Intel's Core i7 series processors. The legal-spat in the making, between the two companies, may however affect NVIDIA's possible plans to develop chipset products for Intel's new 45 nm and 32 nm processors. NVIDIA on its part, defends its position, dismissing Intel's claims. Jen-Hsun Huang, NVIDIA's president and CEO maintained that the license agreement negotiated earlier would still apply, though he did not miss the opportunity to affirm his beliefs that the focus on CPU being the soul (if not the heart) of the PC, is slowly yet surely shifting towards the GPU. "This is clearly an attempt to stifle innovation to protect a decaying CPU business" he said. According to the NVIDIA CEO, it is obvious that Intel fears the competition NVIDIA poses with its platform core-logic innovations, that it had to file the complaint. This spat between the two major computer hardware companies could get uglier in the days to come. The press-release from NVIDIA in response to Intel's charges follows:
NVIDIA Responds To INTEL Court Filing
NVIDIA Corporation today responded to a Monday court filing (Court of Chancery in the State of Delaware) in which Intel alleged that the four-year-old chipset license agreement the companies signed does not extend to Intel's future generation CPUs with "integrated" memory controllers, such as Nehalem. The filing does not impact NVIDIA chipsets that are currently being shipped.
"We are confident that our license, as negotiated, applies," said Jen-Hsun Huang, president and CEO of NVIDIA. "At the heart of this issue is that the CPU has run its course and the soul of the PC is shifting quickly to the GPU. This is clearly an attempt to stifle innovation to protect a decaying CPU business."
NVIDIA entered into the agreement in 2004 in order to bring platform innovations to Intel CPU based systems. In return, Intel took a license to NVIDIA's rich portfolio of 3D, GPU, and other computing patents.
Since signing the agreement, NVIDIA has offered innovations such as SLI, Hybrid power, and CUDA parallel processing. ION, the most recent innovation, integrates a powerful NVIDIA GPU, north bridge and south bridge into one compact die. When combined with a CPU, ION enables a two-chip PC architecture for Intel processors two years ahead of Intel's own solution. In addition, the ION platform offers 10x the performance of Intel's current three chip design.
The industry and consumers now count on innovations from NVIDIA. Microsoft recently endorsed ION because it offers consumers the first truly affordable premium Windows experience. Late last year Apple selected NVIDIA's chipset for its entire new line of notebooks including the MacBook Classic, MacBook Air, MacBook and MacBook Pro. Today, companies like Acer, Alienware, Asus, Dell, Falcon Northwest, Fujitsu, Gigabyte, HP, Lenovo, MSI, NEC, and Toshiba all ship exciting innovations created by NVIDIA as a result of its agreement with Intel.
Huang said that, given the broad and growing adoption of NVIDIA's platform innovations, it is not surprising that Intel is now initiating a dispute over a contract signed four years ago. Innovations like ION, SLI, Hybrid power, and CUDA threaten Intel's ability to control the PC platform.
NVIDIA has been attempting to resolve the disagreement with Intel in a fair and reasonable manner for over a year. NVIDIA's chipsets for Intel's current CPU bus interface are not affected by the dispute.
65 Comments on Intel Sues NVIDIA Over Chipset License, NVIDIA Responds
But well, you are comparing an OCed $1000 CPU to a $100 GPU on the first attempt by TMGENC to do GPU transcoding. If that doesn't tell you something about my point I don't know what you want to hear...
I have performed some test on a small file with and without CUDA 2.0 enabled and some different filters and the results have been around the same: 7 mins 30 s with CUDA disabled and 5 mins with CUDA enabled, with a 25% of MAX CUDA usage. I usually get more usage on longer videos and a better ratio of performance in favor to the GT.
Personally I think it's pretty silly that Intel "can" even make a suit concerning Nvidia making hardware that will make use of their hardware...
Why doesn't GM just say nobody can make tires for their cars... :slap:
The CPU is like an engine in a car; without it, you won't get anywhere. The GPU is like a radio in the dash; without it, using your car just got a little bit more boring (still does what it has to though). A CPU can run a console interface without trouble but a GPU is dead in the water without a CPU to spoon feed it information. It was very stupid of NVIDIA to say to Intel that their product is useless. NVIDIA is in hot water and all they accomplished was to make it boil. Stupid NVIDIA.
Now you're off on a tangent, trying to support your rash comments about Intel, by trying to prove that a GPU succeeding a CPU as a the primary core component is essentially hogwash.
You state that GPUs are too simplistic, well so was a Pentium 133 compared to Nehalem. What's your point really? GPUs have evolved, and will continue to do so, to the point where all they need is the proper interfacing capibilities and we're good to go.
Why so much love for the CPU, it's just a damned piece of computing hardware.
"Nvidia" (you'll understand why it's quoted when you read the link) said: news.softpedia.com/news/Nvidia-Trumpets-Death-of-the-CPU-84407.shtml
On the other hand Intel said: news.softpedia.com/newsImage/Intel-Powerful-GPUs-Are-Useless-You-039-d-better-Upgrade-Your-CPU-2.jpg/
Now look at the list Intel themself prepared, now who really has the edge at this moment that CUDA and Stream are more mainstream?
- Convert your music: the CPU, definately or a sound card anyway. CPU 1 - 0 GPU
- Edit and publish photos: when it comes to editing PS CS4 shows how much better the GPU is to handle big photos. CPU 1 - 1 GPU
- Render Pictures and animations: if we are speaking about speed, Gelato is so much faster than anything else... CPU 1 - 2 GPU
- Playing games: depends on the game, but come on Intel... CPU 1 - 3 GPU
- Edit and encode videos: after repeating the same test that I have done above with my quad running @1200 Mhz, CUDA enabled and after seeing the result. CPU 1 - 4 GPU
So IMHO Intel just got owned in their own slides. And when it comes to who said what he shouldn't, we have personal e-mail that should have never come to light against a public slide. Who talked too much in reality??? In reality, by what the links tell, it was not Intel's fault, it was not Nvidia's fault, it is The Inq.'s fault, messing with Nvidia as always. Pff. What is sad is that both Intel and Nvidia fell into the game.
Seriously?Hence why the confusion over whether this is about business ethics or? Because none of us are a stranger to greed in the supposed 'free market.'
If we're trying to keep it about technology and computing architecture, then there really isn't an arguement. GPUs are lapping CPUs. It doesn't mean the CPU is dead, it just means it's priority might change.
But how that equates to whether Nvidia or Intel is 'in the wrong', makes no sense.
CPU: CPU does all the work (ALU) for for rendering pictures. All the GPU does is convert binary -> image. That's something a CPU can easily do but it hasn't done it for two decades.
CPU: 2D Animations (lots of ALU work) are almost always CPU derived just like pictures, the GPU only takes care of the menial task of binary -> display.
TIE: Games are a two way street. CPUs handle caching of map information, physics, audio, AI, etc. The GPU handles the work it is handed by the CPU (everything to create a 3D scene). They are both stressed and both necessary (unless you're talking 2D games).
GPU: Encoding videos are also a heavy FPU task so GPUs have the advantage there (still needs assistance from the CPU though in communication with the HDD and system RAM).
I figure CPU 2, GPU 1. In any case the GPU has the advantage, it still couldn't do anything without the aid of the CPU. The CPU could be made to do everything a GPU can do with the only penalty being time.
About rendering, GPUs can do the work very well and much faster. Nvidia's Gelato is a ultra fast renderer. Sure it's pretty much worthless for the professionals as it is now (haven't tried the last two versions anyway), but it demostrates the potential is there. Once that GPUs start supporting 64bit (G300 will and I suppose RV870 too) better they will hadle that kind of tasks even much better.
And about games, imagine you have a E6600 and a HD3850. You want to upgrade for better gaming and have $200-300. What do you buy?
The slide and my comments about it, they were not about who does what (again the CPU is necessary, a very fast $500+ one no), but in an upgrade scenario which will give the better results in a near future, when GPGPU is better handled? When GPUs are MIMD instead of SIMD? (G300 again)
Off course, CPUs can evolve too, but unless they are able to do the same work that GPUs do today (comparatively) you will always need a discrete GPU for demanding shoftware and games. In that scenario (which is wider everyday) you would have a lot of FPUs wasting die area most of the times. GPGPU solves this better, as when that highly demanding work is not being performed, they can simply shut down and let the CPU do the ALU work.
Even for those who don't game, it's a better solution. For them it's the same if they have to pay for the die area in the CPU or in the GPU, and there's no miracles in the silicon, performance would be similar. A GPU can always be replaced, replacing the CPU is much more difficult and it would also be much more costly if it had to be >>500mm^2 to contain the CPU+GPU substitute.