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Hey guys, I have a bit of a question here.

Is there anything besides the reasoning of, "You're my rival company in one of my other main segments" as to why AMD isn't/can't release chipsets for Intel processors?

I'll be the first to admit that I don't understand the finer details of business particularly well, nor am I saavy on the specifics on any of these companies' business models. Nonetheless, I can't help but think what a somewhat dire situation the PC industry seems to find itself in. For one, I don't see any VIA or SiS chipsets for any Intel chips, and I think they're beginning to fall by the wayside for AMD chips as well. I know that, in recent years, both of these companies didn't really deliver industry-shattering products (in fact, they were often considered of lower quality), but they were cheap and they filled a niche of people who wanted to build a budget desktop. Anyways, this pretty much leaves us with [Platform Brand]+Nvidia as the only chipset manufacturers for any given platform (AMD or Intel).

Maybe I'm off-base here, but... I basically don't trust anything Nvidia, mostly because of driver quality. I have seen more bluescreens on Nvidia-powered motherboards, usually involving some nv_____.sys in some way or another on damn near every single Nvidia-chipset machine that I've used in recent days. I really hate to sound like a fanboy, but... I can't really challenge my own experiences.

I'd love to have an HD 3200 paired with a Core 2 Duo Quad, and given AMD's current place as far as CPU's go... it seems like they might be able to make some extra bucks off of the overwhelming support for the Intel crowd at the moment. It doesn't look (to me, anyways) like they're going to regain the CPU performance or power efficiency crown ANYTIME in the near future, and so, it begs the question: Wouldn't the Intel platform really benefit from having AMD chipsets as an option? I know I'd love 'em -- Intel's chipsets are nice, but AMD's have some really kickass features, they're hella stable and get high quality driver revisions every month.

wouldn't AMD have to pay Intel a licence fee every time they sold an Intel supporting chipset? Paying money to your biggest rival would be pretty painful. It would also make Intel's chips even more appealing than they already are since you'd have a wider choice of chipsets with Intel than with AMD.

Personally I tend to stick with nVidia because of driver quality (OK that's because I'm usually thinking of Linux). The AMD 690 boards I've used recently have all had problems + I personally find AMD site is very confusing when looking for the latest drivers for motherboards. Though that is probably more to do with me knowing the nVidia model numbers better.

A_Pickle wrote:

I'll be the first to admit that I don't understand the finer details of business particularly well, nor am I saavy on the specifics on any of these companies' business models. Nonetheless, I can't help but think what a somewhat dire situation the PC industry seems to find itself in. For one, I don't see any VIA or SiS chipsets for any Intel chips, and I think they're beginning to fall by the wayside for AMD chips as well. I know that, in recent years, both of these companies didn't really deliver industry-shattering products (in fact, they were often considered of lower quality), but they were cheap and they filled a niche of people who wanted to build a budget desktop. Anyways, this pretty much leaves us with [Platform Brand]+Nvidia as the only chipset manufacturers for any given platform (AMD or Intel).

You do raise a very good point, though this isn't the first time that the chipset market has really thinned out. The last time it happened are during the time of the original Pentium and the Triton chipsets. Before then there was a myriad of chipset makers from UMC, Opti (market leader until the Triton), VLSI, ALi ,SiS , Chips & Technologies and VIA etc. It all thinned out untill there was basically just Intel, VIA, Ali and SiS left. It did seem like some of these others were making a come back, but they seem to have all slipped away now, with Ali/ULi being bought out my nVidia, VIA giving up other than its own CPUs and SiS running along in the background, though still going.

A_Pickle wrote:

Maybe I'm off-base here, but... I basically don't trust anything Nvidia, mostly because of driver quality. I have seen more bluescreens on Nvidia-powered motherboards, usually involving some nv_____.sys in some way or another on damn near every single Nvidia-chipset machine that I've used in recent days. I really hate to sound like a fanboy, but... I can't really challenge my own experiences.

I personally don't trust nVidia either, even as a Linux user. Mainly because I fell that apart from their high end graphics chips, nVidia stuff just doesn't feel like a quality product. Their chipsets especially seem to have had a lot of hardware bugs down the line from data corruption with some hard disks to networking features that are broken in hardware, not to mention being hot running. It seems to me that since after the nForce4 era, quality has dropped. I do also have a similar feeling about AMD/Ati's southbridges too, but other than that they are okay.

I jive with pretty much all of that post...

I do also have a similar feeling about AMD/Ati's southbridges too, but other than that they are okay.

Honestly, with their southbridges I've never had stability issues. They're a little weak compared to the competition (still are, in my mind -- they need to fix that SATA performance someday), but they're not horrifically slow or anything, and they run like champs for a long time. AMD puts out a good product, especially in chipsets -- I'd just hate to have to go with, frankly, such an anemic processor to enjoy those advantages.

It just seems to me like the only people buying AMD are either fanboys or budget-hunters (<3 the price of A64 X2's), both of whom they wouldn't lose if they started an Intel chipset business. It just seems like something that could certainly help with their somewhat dire situation, and it'd show a bit of maturity and, despite corporate rivalry, a willingness to cooperate with said rival(s).

A_Pickle wrote:

Honestly, with their southbridges I've never had stability issues. They're a little weak compared to the competition (still are, in my mind -- they need to fix that SATA performance someday), but they're not horrifically slow or anything, and they run like champs for a long time. AMD puts out a good product, especially in chipsets -- I'd just hate to have to go with, frankly, such an anemic processor to enjoy those advantages.

hmmm well a friend of mine did have a SB600 go south on him, well the SATA controller would suddenly refuse to run in SATA2 mode. But other than that, they're pretty stable. If I was to build an AMD system in the future, I'd use one, they are great when it comes to power consumption.

A_Pickle wrote:

It just seems to me like the only people buying AMD are either fanboys or budget-hunters (<3 the price of A64 X2's), both of whom they wouldn't lose if they started an Intel chipset business. It just seems like something that could certainly help with their somewhat dire situation, and it'd show a bit of maturity and, despite corporate rivalry, a willingness to cooperate with said rival(s).

It does seem like that to me too, if you want the best technology, then buy intel, but if you're on a budget then go AMD. I would say though that they are a fair bargain for what you get, though hardly earth shattering. I wouldn't even bother with the moribund old X2 for a new machine, just Phenoms. It is true that they would have to get a license from Intel, not sure how much maturity there is in the two companies though.