Can anyone here read Czech ?

[Dogbert]

If so, what do they sam here: http://www.cdr.cz/a/clanky/clanek/2089 ?

[thop]

i speak polish and it is similar, i can decipher some stuff when i concentrate but most of it is too difficult.

Matrox 800? have fun with us
... that G800s were already produced some time ago under the name G550 ....
and that this is the truth is proven by the fact that the program powerstrip for overclocking and adjusting graphic cards identified the G550 almost (? makes no sense but thats the word) as a G800.

....

Master of ... stuff is Dogbert ... ()

[UtwigMU]

Slovenian language is similiar to Czech language. It's similiar enough that I can understand Czech article on jumper setting on Plextor drives. I'm generally talented for languages (speaking fluently English, German, Croatian and Serbian and passively French)

Basicaly (disclaimer I might make mistakes):

"To shock you G800 is out for a long time but under name of G800. Perhaps you wonder but that's how it is. In 3D competition Matorx G800 chip would lag behind competition and would be hard to sell. They decided not to introduce G800 and introduced G550 instead. G550 is good in 2D but in 3D it's worse, being between TNT and TNT2.

To proove this the fact is the programe for tuning and overclovking of graphic boards Powerstrip identified G550 as G800. There are further prooves to be found in some Matrox internet presentations (presentors) in the time of speculations (for instance text in drivers) but they introduced G550 to market, I cannot understand, how strange the detection of G550 is in PowerStrip.

Now back to original intention of article. Early today I saw discussion on Matrox G800 on Raf's (hardware forum). Firstly on Sunday the press release/conference on Matrox newcommer and it's features (properties, Ger = Eigenschaften) was published on Raf's. Raf ... admittet:
This came in my mail today. The whole press relese/conference is not confirmed but because of ... information is correct. Where? ...
On Hardware World/Forum/counsel information on G800 came about but today I would not wonder ?how the source of all information would be Raf's?, but ŠM is writing how he came about a .... so we have to believe him.
[I]We have gotten information on this graphic chip by e-mail from one ?in the know? on this, but they cannot be found on internet. In the last/final attachment ther is .... on official information but because it's so ....

Both two more ... authors ....: Press release/conference is made up or falsified if you like? If I agree with this? ... from which news for our server are being prepared, MatroxUsers stands as source? But there with a lack of real information on new Matrox graphic boards fans started to make things up. The same can be assumed from ... (falsified set up press releases?)

(source?) of false press releases is Dogbert but (if my) wisdom (hasn't left me) ... wrote three...

What will the next Matrox graphic board be? No one knows for sure. As far as name is concerned it is (very) unlikely that it's going to be called G800, but it's possible, letter G won't be in the name. If Matrox (?suceeds) in preseting graphic board with satisfatcory/decent 3D (at least on par with GeForce3) it will be more loudly/importantly/notably announced, because between G400MAX (the best Matrox card in 3D so far) has passed a few generations. As far as specs?, date of introduction are conserned etc, these are speculations, which .... (relieved of NDA?) (Matrox employee?) they introduce graphic board, which is worth of waiting for, this year, but the fact is Matrox is going to be on CeBit and GDC. If something which is more credible (worth believing) is published, it's going to be avilable for reading with our comment."


Hope this helps. Were you speculating a lot on G800 release in Crystal Ball?

[Wombat]

These guys don't know what they are talking about. None of you (nor I, nor almost anyone) saw the G800. The G550 is definitely NOT the G800, and almost nobody even knows what the G800 was to be.

[TdB]

haha!
they actually fell for dogberts fake press releases.

the g550 being the g800 is old news.
the story(AFAIK) is that matrox got into some troubles during the development of the g800, And they had to drop one of their to future projects (the g800 and the parhelia).
they decided to drop the g800, but they didn´t want to waste all the efforts they put into the g800, but they couldn´t afford to release it in its current form, so they removed most of the expensive stuff on the gpu, to keep the cost down, and called it the g550, but the chip is still identified as a g800 by some utilities.

but the g550 is nowhere near what the g800 could have been, i have heard that it would have been competitative for its time, if it would have made it.

BTW wasn´t the g550 the first card with some kind of vertexshaders?

and now that Im in a speculation mood, wasn´t there some rumors about an extremely powerfull matrox-gpu for some console, that didn´t made it?
perhaps the g800 was meant for a console.... hmmm.

[Greebe]

The BBz know wtf the G800 was... and yes it was trimmed down into the G550.

Can't say more than that because of our NDA's. Besides it doesn't matter anymore anyway... but now as to why Wombat came off like that is beyond me... he also knows.

[Mehen]

G800: The Missing Link

so i guess this explains why matrox seemed to make no real improvemet since the g400 for such a long time, and there is such a big gap between the P and all their other cards

[Wombat]

Not really such a big gap. M tends to have about 3 years between big changes. Millenium -> G200 -> G400 -> Parhelia. Each of these is a drastic change from the basic card before it.

[UtwigMU]

Disclaimer: this is pure speculation

Originally posted by Ant
Well Matrox were once known for their overwhelming obsessive secrecy, now it seems they are only to happy to talk to anyone that will listen! The Tech Report has plied a Matrox rep with copious amounts of alcohol and got him to spill several cans of beans.


A Matrox rep at the AMD Tech Team dinner in Philadelphia tonight provided solid info regarding Matrox's current and future plans. To quote: '"G800 is completely dead." Apparently, the G800 was 'based on G400 design' and featured doubled pipelines, 128bit DDR memory, hardware transform and lighting, and some form of dual-chip technology. A slimmed down version will be hitting markets shortly, however. G550 is a single-chip solution featuring the same doubled rendering pipelines, 128-bit DDR support, but only a limited form of T&L. According to the rep, Matrox analyzed T&L and found only one feature which needed immediate implementation: four-vertex matrix skinning. For those who didn't read up on Radeon's new tech, this skinning method allows two polygon objects to be "glued" together, and the hardware provides an interpolated join, resulting in smoother looking joints in 3D models, especially when moving.

The G550 will, of course, feature Matrox's great eDualHead tech and their renowned 2D clarity. The card is expected to fall between the GeForce 2 MX 400 and the GeForce 2 Pro in speed, most often falling just behind a GeForce 2 GTS. The G550 is expected to run in the $150 to 200 price range and be available within the next few weeks, "end of May at the latest."

In a more nebulous statement, the rep said, "Remember when G400 MAX first came out, and it was fastest thing and looked best? We are doing that again in first half 2002. We will be kings of 3D again, until someone jumps past us again. You know how 3D is." Sounds like G1000 will be a kicker next spring. Here's hoping Matrox can field a six-month cycle and get back in the game.

Originally posted by Ant
PowerVR Revolution throw their hat into the Matrox rumour mill. Apparently the G800 ain't dead, but how can it be it was only ever the figment of a deranged webmasters mind Also supposedly Matrox are to release not one but two cards this year. As usual it ain't so until...


As a follow-up to the previous post regarding Matrox news, I would like to add that the G800 is NOT dead. The card, which apparently boosts some very impressive features, has simply been rescheduled for 2002. On the other hand, two cards are to be released soon. The first one is the G550. I have no information about this card, unfortunately. The second card will use a new technology called Parhelia. Parhelia is a completely redesigned graphics engine, which we can guess will be used in their future cards.

Originally posted by Ant
The Register is reporting that Matrox are to launch their next gen chip in June, which is quite amusing as they say that boards using it will ship in May As usual it ain't so until the fat Canadian sings.
....
However, according to a Matrox representative, cited by The Tech Report last month, the G800 is "completely dead".

The trouble appears to have been that G800 was a dual-chip solution and, like 3dfx's problematic multi-chip VSA-100, Matrox may have run into difficulty making the chip pay. Two chips per board hits costs hard, especially when the silicon yields are low, as they always are in the early days of a new chip.

Instead, Matrox is thought to be working on a single-chip version, the G550. It is said to offer the same 128-bit DDR support and dual rendering pipeline with three texture units per pipeline, but cuts back the T&L engine to provide just one or two commonly used features. There's matrix skinning and displacement mapping.

From www.matrox.com
...design centers in Ontario and Florida...

Matrox's Toronto based R & D centre maintains the same positive team environment that has worked successfully for our Montreal head Office.

This and what I heard would imply that Matrox has two R&D teams.

It's possible:
- one team worked on G550 and other on G800, G800 being scraped.
- both teams worked on G800 and slower version vas choosen
- one team worked on parhelia and other on G800, the later was canned and released as crippled G550

From what I know the design of GPU and PCB takes 1-2 years (depends on things going as planned and deviation from previous core)
G400 was released in Q2 1999. We can assume that work on next core revision (G800) and possibly even core (parhelia) began soon (or even prior) after that.

G400MAX being late and not widely available (slower acceptance), Radeon and GeForceDDR being released H1 2000 and trouble of 3dfx signaled Matrox that hardcore gaming market is not very stable and profitable.

From specifications of concurrent competition:
G800 should be faster than G400 and slower than parhelia
This translates to roughly GeForce2 class speeds.

It is obvious that G550 which is rumoured to be stripped down G800 was late. Was multichip with external T&L the reason?

Pros:
- this would allow for stripped down G550 version for business desktops competing with GeForce2MX (nVidia introduced nView to their MX line) and full G800 to compete with GeForce2 in gaming/low-midrange workstation markets.
- this would allow for fabrication (design, tapeout, cost) of only one GPU, thus lowering the cost.
- Matrox is inovative so they might try new things.
- Rampage and nV30 had external T&L rumours

Cons:
- Matrox strives for unified drivers and integrated cores
- RageFuryMAXX was molested by driver problems and multi GPU Vodoos were unprofitable (shared ram)

IMO not likely since the slower business market would be well served by G450.

At that time nVidia who fought for gaming supremacy with 3dfx was choosen for XBOX GPU which translates to financial injection from Microsoft.

By the time G550 was released GeForce3 was out. Since every new Matrox videocard is expensive (G550 now costs more than Radeon8500) they would not sell sufficient volumes (G800 would likely be expensive) to cover R&D. A stripped down busines solution was much more suitable.

At that time parhelia was likely in the works and it was better to focus on the new core.

Wombat:
So is nVidia (2-3 year cycle)
GeForceSDR, DDR, 2, 3, 4Ti and nV28 are all evolutional improovements of the same core. nV30 will be a new design most likely incorporating 3dfx technology

Similiar: G200, G400, G450, G550, (G800) were all derived from the same core.

Perhaps while GeForce and Radeon were designed with hardware T&L in mind this was harder to implement on GXXX.

[impact]

Hey Dogbert, I actually happen to understand Czech (suprise, suprise ) and I can tell you that the article is in fact - brace yourself - about you. I won't go into details but it has to do a lot with some fake Matrox press releases about the G800.

[sube]

Yes, Impact is right

This article is quite old, so it's not importatnt today, when Parhelia is out.
Maybe for Dogbert, who is "The Master of false press releases"

[UtwigMU]

Sube, how accurate was my translation?

[sube]

Pretty close
Good work

[Dogbert]

That's great news guys cause it means we are considered quite a credible source of information about [M]atrox. A fake news report here and there can stir the pot quite nicely

[Kuba2k]

Hi guys,

I'm from Czech rep and I can tell you: It was joke :-)) It's from the past, when many of fables was flying around (it's from February 25)

Kuba