Next Version Of Parhelia

[candyman]

Sounds awesome, Rimfaxe!
But I'm actually conserned about how the new 256mb Parhelia will perform. I believe the only situation you want 256mb of memory is when you are playing games that have more than 128mb of textures, and I cannot se any game in the near future that do that. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I guess the performance is not gonna be better in any way, as long as Matrox ain't gonna speed up the chip and it seems to me that there is not much of oc-potential in current Parhelia. They will probably be able to get up the speed with no more than 10%.

So in order to be able to compete with performance of other cards Matrox has to go over to a lower-micron process technology. I dont say that the card based on .13u will come out within 2 weeks or so, but I strongly believe they are currently developing a new chip which will be probably available around new year.

But then again, a slightly oc:ed Parhelia with 256Mb for $350 aint bad at all

So I guess I should not complain afterall.

[Kuba2k]

$350 for 256MB Parhelia and $250 for 128 MB version is very acceptable price for me.

[Goc]

Those are the prices that sound reasonable to me... And if it's true I 'll shoot myself for ordering a P128 for 325$ two days ago...

[Pyrophos]

Originally posted by candyman
Sounds awesome, Rimfaxe!
I believe the only situation you want 256mb of memory is when you are playing games that have more than 128mb of textures, and I cannot se any game in the near future that do that.

UT2003 can use something like 180MB if you enable "ultra high" texture quality settings from the .ini...

Quote from that article:

"The rumor is false. The German magazine misunderstood texture detail
settings. If you set texture detail to ultra-high (something you can do
in the INI but not in the game) then there are situations where you have
as much as 180Mb of geometry and textures stored in the video card.
Obviously today's video cards can't handle that but future cards that
have 256Mb of RAM could. We originally had the setting available in the
in-game settings menu but we took it out to prevent people from setting
something that no current video card could handle."

[candyman]

Wow, that means that the Parhelia could be an interesting choise even for gamers now. High-end gamers I mean, the ones that prefere 180mb textures and great antialiasing instead of 300fps.

[knirfie]

what if the current chips on the 128mb retail arent the best coming from the production line, and matrox have been keeping the best for the 256mb version clocked at 300/330??
UT2003, ultra high textures, 16xFAA and high frame rates

edit: with the worst chips going into the 64mb version, the little better ones into the 128mb bulk, the normal into the 128mb retail and 256mb bulk, and the best into the 256mb retail.

[candyman]

Originally posted by knirfie
what if the current chips on the 128mb retail arent the best coming from the production line

Sounds like we all have same dream

[Rimfaxe]

I just love that dream

[Strahd]

Originally posted by candyman
Strahd, I really hope you're wrong on this one, but I'm also affraid the whole story could be made up as well.



As from a russian site (trademaster.ru) rumours say that a Taiwanese microchip-manufacturer UMC is currently preparing for starting mass-production of a series Parhelia gpu's with .13u architecture. It also says that it is likely that big amount of these will be ready in a month or two and that Matrox is planning on releasing a series of cards on this chip with AGP8x support and including mentioned 64/256mb-cards.

UMC would be under NDA and would not be allowed to divulge such information. If Matrox hasn't announced anything, then UMC certainly can't. Which leads me to believe this is false. Someone knew that UMC was working with Matrox and decided to start a new rumor.

Originally posted by Chrono_Wanderer
Anyways, explinations of why big M cancelled the P64 (hmm.. we have N64, IA64, x86-64... what's next...) project can be:

1) The great amount of criticisms here about P64 at MURC threads
2) Mr. Dan Wood read This
3) Recent riot against matrox marketting department by the MURCers
4) MURCers stole the P64 card thus causing NDA breakings (ahh... back to the good old days when MURCers were speculating P128 having RSN.)
5) The marketing boys finally understand the importance of listening to the market and demand.

It's certainly not because of what everyone has been saying on MURC. I would put my hand in the fire on that one.


If what VigilAnt said in his State Of Matrox; A VigilAnt Perspective editorial, I would say they can't decide what to do, what to put out, what to can etc.

[candyman]

Originally posted by Strahd

Someone knew that UMC was working with Matrox and decided to start a new rumor.

Well, it maybe is a false rumor, but this info may also come from any employee on Matrox or UMC. Who knows?

The time will show.

P.S. Intel did the same thing, they started the P4 production on what, like .18 micron? because their .13 production line was not ready. Then in a few months they changed to the .13 architecture in no-time.

/ candyman

[FormerEx-SalesSoup]

Originally posted by ElDonAntonio
me neither! let's march over Matrox, their security people aren't too big and by the time the police gets there we'll have had the information we want

i don't think you've actually seen our security people.

[MetalCartman]

- so long Sales, hello Marketing

And now we know, who's listening to the customers....

Wish you a good start in your new department!

Cartman

[VJ]

Yep, I second that !
euhm, es-salessoup: would any future launches also be preceded by a nifty flash-intro on the website ?
(hope you don't mind me asking; I know you can't comment on *if* there is something coming, *what* it might be, and *when*)

Jörg

[Kuba2k]

Originally posted by ex-SalesSoup


i don't think you've actually seen our security people.

and you didn't seen us

[GT98]

Found this on Xbit labs web page news.....at least someone is reading the front page LOL

Quo Vadis, Matrox? [7:01 am] Anton

A lot of time ago, maybe a year or two, all the web-sites dedicated to computer-hardware started to say that Matrox Graphics will soon exit the market of consumer’s graphics cards. With the Millenium G550 graphics card it was pretty likely – the newcomer from Matrox was not a good solution for 3D-games, while most of consumers nowadays choose their graphics cards based on performance in 3D-applications. Of course, Matrox was able to sell its products to system integrators, who supply personal computers to conservative customers, like banks, offices, designers and so on. Although this part of the market is quite reliable, it rapidly decreases nowadays since integrated core-logic sets become more and more popular, just like LCD monitors.

Matrox currently has only two trumps – highest 2D quality on CRT monitors and a lot of multi-display features. In fact, LCD monitors are going to crowd out CRT monitors very soon, as a result, Matrox will loose its first trump. Moreover, NVIDIA and ATI-based graphics adapters are not less feature-rich at all – both also have very powerful software that is constantly improved. So, what remains to Matrox? Very narrow and niche market of certain dedicated devices? It seems so. Moreover, the company fully realises it. Recently they issued a special Parhelia drivers for DCC applications, certain CAD/CAM software, video-software and so on. They now try to make the products more feature-rich in terms of software and certifications. Unfortunately, as our tests proved, Matrox Parhelia with the so-called “professional” drivers still cannot compete with NVIDIA’s consumer oriented GeForce4 Ti4600 in terms of speed in applications like 3ds max! It seems that professional market is also not going to meet Matrox warmly.

Meanwhile Matrox continues to go away from gamers. As I have read over here, Matrox Graphics will soon launch a 64MB version of the Parhelia. The newcomer will offer lower performance than the predecessor does, it will also lack the FAA feature of Parhelia, which is one of the key features of the Parhelia 128 MB. There will be no additional video / 3D features which are to be included in a release driver from Matrox. What is the most ridiculous about it is the cost - $250, according to the web-site. The graphics card that can boast with performance similar to than that of the RADEON 8500 or GeForce4 Ti4200 will cost more than the RADEON 9500 and very close to the GeForce4 Ti4600. Who is going to buy this graphics card? Well, definitely system integrators, who sell their computers to conservative customers and so on. However, we should understand the fact that more and more people buy LCD displays accompanied by mainboards based on the chipsets with integrated graphics core. As a result, those, who know how to spend money will never buy a $250 graphics card that has no clear advantages over the rivals at all.

Quo Vadis, Matrox?