Computex Report (1/2) Aside from ST Microelectronics' Kyro, there were very few genuinely new developments to be seen far as videocards are concerned at this year's Computex. Many companies were showing a host of NVIDIA cards, especially 64MB GeForce2 DDR boards, while boards using the SIS 300/301 chipset or S3's Savage for low cost solutions were infinitely harder to find. AOpen gets an honourable mention for the most innovative and interesting GeForce2 design. ASUS
ASUS was showing off its new Deluxe version of the V7700. In addition to the video in and outputs that we have come to expect from the ASUS' Deluxe boards, the V7700 Deluxe will also feature a TV tuner module as an option.
ASUS will be offering a 64MB version of the V7700 Pure that will not be using the Smart Doctor hardware-monitoring tools that the already available 32 MB version comes with. The Deluxe will only be available with 32MB, however, and will offer video in/out and a TV tuner. The company is particularly proud of their new video software, dubbed ASUS Live! 2000. It is supposed to allow real D1 timeshifting, bringing it another step closer to the goal of the digital VCR on the PC. Whether ASUS will be able to deliver on this promise remains to be seen, as the compression will still be handled in software. The demonstration at the booth was very impressive, though. ABIT
The ABIT guys (and pretty girls oc course!) showed their new GeForce2 card, which will be available exclusively with 64MB memory. It will be clocked in accordance with NVIDIA's specification (200/333) and is based on the reference design, as basically all 64 MB boards are currently. AOpen
AOpen had a real surprise ready with their line of GeForce2 based boards. It is the first company to offer mainstream boards with an adjustable/tweakable BIOS, a feature we were really expecting from a different company (can you spell SoftMenu???). Besides the BIOS, AOpen is also offering a new hardware monitoring solution that regulates the fan speed and constantly adjusts it to the needed levels. If the chip gets warmer, the fans will start spinning faster - makes sense! AOpen also had some other new cooling tricks up their sleeve: a cooling channel to keep the chip as cool as ever. If this is going to make much of a difference with today's 0.18 Micron chips remains to be seen. The Deluxe version of the PA256 will come with a TV tuner, using a Chrontel chip. A module based solution is also being considered.
AOpen sees its cooling-channel design as a prototype, so it is unclear whether the retail boards will actually be using it. |
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| Copyright: 25.06.2000 -
RIVA
Station 2000 - Lars Weinand URL of this Article: www.rivastation.com/computex_e.htm - If you want to link to it, please use this URL! :-) |
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