VIA releases chipset documentation [LWN.net]

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 23, 2008 23:26 UTC (Sun) by bryce (guest, #16388)
Parent article: VIA releases chipset documentation

This is excellent news, well done VIA. :-)

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VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 24, 2008 0:02 UTC (Mon) by einstein (subscriber, #2052) [Link] (3 responses)

BTW it's taipei not taipai

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 24, 2008 0:49 UTC (Mon) by Los__D (guest, #15263) [Link] (2 responses)

Not necessarily, a lot of Chinese names has several ways of spelling, since there are several different sinogram-to-latin systems.

(I haven't checked if it's the case here, but it's definitely a possibility)

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 24, 2008 2:31 UTC (Mon) by einstein (subscriber, #2052) [Link] (1 responses)

> Not necessarily, a lot of Chinese names has several ways of spelling, since there are several different sinogram-to-latin systems.

Wow, I'm really straying off topic here, but...

I lived in china. I've seen the names of chinese cities spelled several ways, according to the romanization method (taiwan uses wade-giles, the mainland uses pinyin, but IMHO yale gives the least incorrect pronunciation from an english speaker on the first try) but taipei (pronounced "tie bay") has never been spelled that way in any romanization method I've seen.

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 27, 2008 3:29 UTC (Thu) by oska (guest, #25556) [Link]

> taipei (pronounced "tie bay")

Actually the consonant at the start of the second syllable is "between" what English speakers think of as 'p' and 'b'. It is a bilabial plosive that is voiceless like 'p' but unaspirated like 'b'. It is a common mistake for monolinguals to interpret latin letters in the way they are pronounced in their own language, not realising that they are often mapped on to sounds that don't exist (or are not recognised as distinct sounds) in their own language.

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 24, 2008 5:55 UTC (Mon) by undefined (guest, #40876) [Link] (7 responses)

"excellent news"? what readily-available (eg newegg) products use a via/s3 onboard graphics chipset? this is too little, too late. a token of good will? yes. useful? not really.

i just searched newegg: one cheap amd motherboard (biostar), a few cheap intel motherboards (biostar & pc chips), and the hp via netbooks. there use to be more motherboards a year or two ago, when socket 939 boards were still plentiful, as that's when i bought mine, but not now. and the hp netbooks: afaik, it's yet to be seen if hp continues with via or if anybody else begins using via, as the market is dominated by intel.

via use to be the top-dog at supplying onboard graphics for motherboards. but now intel, amd/ati, and nvidia all offer onboard graphics and with better support than via.

for the record: i suffered through the (open|uni)chrome video driver confusion/hell for a year before i gave up and bought a cheap ati video card six months ago to use instead of the onboard via. so long, via.

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 24, 2008 6:25 UTC (Mon) by laf0rge (subscriber, #6469) [Link] (5 responses)

You seem to have missed the fact that VIA is no longer producing chipsets for Intel or AMD processors for about one year now. Also, VIA was always only putting their graphics in integrated chipsetes, i.e. not dedicated GPUs that you can attach to AGP or PCIe.

The only place where you will find VIA graphics units is either

1) old systems (Unichrome / Unichrome Pro core)
2) new systems with Via C7 or CN, using a VIA chipset (CX700/VX800) together with a VIA CPU.

So it's not surprising that there are no socket 939 boards vith VIA.

I disagree that it's too late. There are still a number of those systems, just look how popular the various VIA based EPIA / miniITX / nanoITX / ... boards are. There's also lots of custom embedded boards, used in inflight entertainment systems, firewall appliances (hardware crypto!) and the like.

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 24, 2008 9:59 UTC (Mon) by obi (guest, #5784) [Link] (4 responses)

I wouldn't have minded going for a netbook with a Nano, also considering the fact that I tend to use crypto on my disk and I've seen what difference it can make (VIA's marketing could exploit this argument better, I suppose).

But for some mysterious reason it seems like VIA is leaving the entire market to Intel's Atom (see hp mini-note 2133 -> hp mini 1000).

Anyways, this announcement is nice - but then they are competing with Intel, one of the better open-source participants out there.

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 24, 2008 10:30 UTC (Mon) by gnb (subscriber, #5132) [Link] (2 responses)

> But for some mysterious reason it seems like VIA is leaving the entire
>market to Intel's Atom (see hp mini-note 2133 -> hp mini 1000).
In fact I haven't seen any evidence of anyone shipping consumer
nano-based products, be it mini-ITX boards, laptops... which is odd
several months after the announcement. Which suggests either it's all
going to the industrial embedded market or they're having trouble
bringing something to production (either boards or CPUs) (or I'm looking
in the wrong places, always possible). It's a pity as I'd quite like one.
Anyone know anything more?

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 24, 2008 10:54 UTC (Mon) by Cato (guest, #7643) [Link] (1 responses)

The ITX market is pretty specialised - there are online retailers who just sell ITX kit but they are for specific niches including home built in-car computers, low power PCs, industrial applications, etc. See http://www.itx-warehouse.co.uk/ProductSearch.aspx?Filter=... for some Nano based products for example.

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 24, 2008 12:01 UTC (Mon) by gnb (subscriber, #5132) [Link]

There are a reasonable number of shops selling mini-ITX boards to end
users, but few of them seem to be carrying nano-based boards. In the link
you provided (thank you for looking that up by the way) none of the
boards seem to have a nano CPU. One has a "C7® 1.8GHz NanoBGA2 processor"
but that's just the previous-generation C7 in a smaller BGA package.

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 24, 2008 10:57 UTC (Mon) by nim-nim (subscriber, #34454) [Link]

There is no mysterious reason,
1. Via's best hardware opportunity is netbook, not laptop or desktop side,
2. Via botches its FLOSS Linux support,
3. Intel invests heavily in FLOSS Linux support
4. ~ 30% of netbook sales are Linux,
5. IHVs dump Via for Intel/Atom.

And now we see
6. Via discovers a new FLOSS religion and is trying to get itself supported Linux-side.

VIA releases chipset documentation

Posted Nov 27, 2008 12:44 UTC (Thu) by lysse (guest, #3190) [Link]

Unfortunately I'm stuck with a VIA chipset on my laptop, so I can't just go out and buy a different graphics card. So I for one find this useful and relevant.