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x86 Weekly News Collected By Robert R. Collins |
Week of November 23, 1998 |
Older News |
November 25, 1998 | ||
Microsoft Exec recommends buying AMD or NatSemiBy John Lettice November 25, 1998 |
Microsoft OEM division senior VP Joachim
Kempin seems to be a specialist in thinking the
unthinkable, being a loose cannon, or both. Last week his
radical recommendation that Microsoft move over to a
rental model for its software became public, and now it
emerges that at the same time he was suggesting Microsoft
buy NatSemi or AMD. Given the timing (December 1997, in a suggestion to Gates), our verdict on Kempin has to start tilting towards loose cannon. Microsoft was immersed in the Windows 95/Internet Explorer integration battle with the DoJ, and had for quite some time been taking a heads down view of major acquisitions. The high tide came when the DoJ effectively warned it off from buying Intuit, and although the company slipped WebTV in afterwards, that didnt necessarily look such a big deal at the time. |
See Related Stories |
AMD advises K6-2 buyers of Windows 95 glitchBy Richard Richtmyer November 25, 1998 |
Advanced Micro Devices Inc. is advising
buyers of the latest versions of its K6-2 processors that
there is a compatibility problem between the processors
and some versions of Windows 95. The problem, which is intermittent at 350 MHz but occurs more frequently at higher speeds, stems from a software timing loop that is sensitive to processor frequency, AMD is reporting in an advisory on its Web site. |
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RAM speed set to increaseHoward News Service November 23, 1998 |
Next year's computers will run
significantly faster, not just because Intel, the world's
largest chip manufacturer, plans to deliver faster
versions of the Pentium processor, but because PC
manufacturers will start to move to a faster type of
memory known as RDRam (Rambus Direct Random Access
Memory). Rambus of California has been developing RDRam for several years, but the first samples have only just been delivered to PC manufacturers. However, 15 memory manufacturers have signed licenses to produce the chips, including Fujitsu, NEC and Toshiba from Japan, Siemens from Germany, LG Electronics and Samsung from South Korea and IBM. RDRam chips should appear in reasonable volumes in the second half of 1999. |
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November 23, 1998 | ||
AMD issues K6-2 advisoryBy Lisa DiCarlo November 20, 1998 |
Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) has
advised customers of an incompatibility between the
latest versions of its K6-2 processors and certain
versions of Windows 95. If the incompatibility occurs,
systems will fail to boot. The Sunnyvale, Calif., company posted an advisory on its Web site stating that "when you are starting Windows 95 OSR [OEM Service Release] 2, 2.1 or 2.5 on a computer with an AMD K6-2 processor running at speeds of 350MHz and above, you may receive one of the following error messages: Device IOS failed to initialize. Windows Protection Error. You must reboot your computer. Windows Protection Error. You must reboot your computer." |
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Intel demo shows Rambus getting ready to rollBy David Lammers November 20, 1998 |
Taking its Rambus program closer to the
goal of having next-generation systems on the market next
summer, Intel Corp. booted a Windows machine based on the
Rambus memory architecture at Comdex earlier this week. The demo, which ran a game called Forsaken, came as PC makers are knee deep in the process of testing newly received samples of the processors, chip sets and memory modules that are expected to drive the new memory architecture forward. |
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Intel
Sacrifices Share on ASP Altar
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We have all seen reports of plummeting
PC prices. Some indicate that the average selling price
(ASP) of desktop PCs has fallen by 20% or more during the
past two years. Yet Intel continues to report that the
ASP of its processors has dropped only slightly during
this period. How can the largest PC processor maker defy
gravity so brazenly? The first part of the trick is that PC prices and processor prices are not directly related. Most of the drop in PC prices has been due to falling prices of DRAM and disk drives. During the first half of this year, an overstuffed channel resulted in even more price competition than usual, leaving PC makers with dwindling margins. As a result, processor vendors saw only a fraction of the decline in system price. |