State of the Industry: Graphics in 2004

Zardon · Dec 17, 2004, 05:34 PM

For those missed this a few days ago, makes an interesting read.

t's been an exciting year for graphics. Then again, we could say that every year. The simple fact of the matter is that PC graphics is one of the fastest-moving segments in the industry. Improvements in the speed and feature sets of video cards happen at a much faster rate than CPUs, motherboard, hard drives, optical drives, or memory.

There are only two major players in PC graphics technology left standing amidst the rubble of numerous companies who had more ambition than ability: nVidia and ATI. Both companies battle over single-digit swings in market share, are roughly the same size, and for the time being, have very comparable products. They recruit so heavily and invest so much money in research and development that it's nearly impossible for a different graphics company to compete. Sure, Intel has its integrated graphics products, and other players like XGI produce its own technology, but it's increasingly turning into a two-horse race.

This two-company dominance now extends outside the PC as well. From televisions to game consoles, PDAs to cell phones, everything has a graphics chip. And both of these companies are aggressively pursuing all those markets. The last year wasn't only about graphics hardware, though. It saw many exciting developments in the software that makes it all worthwhile. Let's review the year and see how far we've come

extremetech

pr0digal jenius · Dec 17, 2004, 05:41 PM

very very good read indeed

hats off the the ET guys on that one

Dec 17, 2004, 05:34 PM	#1
Zardon DriverHeaven Founder Join Date: May 2002 Posts: 32,480 Rep Power: 179	State of the Industry: Graphics in 2004 For those missed this a few days ago, makes an interesting read. t's been an exciting year for graphics. Then again, we could say that every year. The simple fact of the matter is that PC graphics is one of the fastest-moving segments in the industry. Improvements in the speed and feature sets of video cards happen at a much faster rate than CPUs, motherboard, hard drives, optical drives, or memory. There are only two major players in PC graphics technology left standing amidst the rubble of numerous companies who had more ambition than ability: nVidia and ATI. Both companies battle over single-digit swings in market share, are roughly the same size, and for the time being, have very comparable products. They recruit so heavily and invest so much money in research and development that it's nearly impossible for a different graphics company to compete. Sure, Intel has its integrated graphics products, and other players like XGI produce its own technology, but it's increasingly turning into a two-horse race. This two-company dominance now extends outside the PC as well. From televisions to game consoles, PDAs to cell phones, everything has a graphics chip. And both of these companies are aggressively pursuing all those markets. The last year wasn't only about graphics hardware, though. It saw many exciting developments in the software that makes it all worthwhile. Let's review the year and see how far we've come extremetech

Dec 17, 2004, 05:41 PM	#2
pr0digal jenius Delete Me Join Date: Mar 2004 Posts: 14,648 Rep Power: 0	very very good read indeed hats off the the ET guys on that one