3Dlabs Announces GLINT MX 3D Graphics Processor; New high-end member of the GLINT family delivers 1600x1200 true-color resolution and Viewperf CDRS-03 score close to 30.NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 7, 1997--3Dlabs(R) Inc. (NASDAQ NASDAQ in full National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations U.S. market for over-the-counter securities. Established in 1971 by the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD), NASDAQ is an automated quotation system that reports on : TDDDF) today announced the GLINT(R) MX - a new high-end member of its award-winning GLINT 3D graphics processor family. GLINT is the leading merchant graphics processor shipping in personal workstations and professional-class graphics boards on the PC. The GLINT MX extends the rasterization performance of the GLINT family for both AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port) A high-speed 32-bit port from Intel for attaching a display adapter to a PC. It provides a direct connection between the card and memory, and only one AGP slot is on the motherboard. and PCI (1) (Payment Card Industry) See PCI DSS. (2) (Peripheral Component Interconnect) The most widely used I/O bus (peripheral bus). systems while retaining hardware and software compatibility with existing designs. High-end systems and boards using GLINT MX are expected to complement current mid-range GLINT 500TX designs - enabling GLINT-based vendors to significantly extend their range of price/performance offerings. In a separate release, 3Dlabs today announced a number of design wins for the GLINT MX with a range of accelerator board An add-in board that replaces the existing CPU with a higher performance CPU. See graphics accelerator. and Pentium(R) II-based system vendors. These include board manufacturers such as AccelGraphics, Canopus Corporation Canopus Corporation is a manufacturer of video editing cards and video editing software. Their competitors include Matrox and Pinnacle Systems. When 3dfx's Voodoo series of PC-gaming-oriented 3D graphics cards became popular in the mid-1990s, Canopus was well-known for , Diamond Multimedia, ELSA, Omnicomp Graphics Corporation, Radius and Symmetric (an STB See set-top box. STB - set-top box Company) and system vendors such as Dell, Digital Equipment Corporation, NeTpower and TriStar. GLINT MX-based boards and systems are expected to start shipping in volume in the second half of 1997. GLINT MX's 3D performance is designed to further strengthen 3Dlabs' leadership position in the professional 3D graphics market. True color (1) Specifically, refers to 16,777,216 colors (24-bit color). See high color. (2) Generically, refers to photo-realistic color (typically requires 24-bit color as a minimum). Viewperf results using a single GLINT MX when measured on a 266MHz (MegaHertZ) One million cycles per second. It is used to measure the transmission speed of electronic devices, including channels, buses and the computer's internal clock. A one-megahertz clock (1 MHz) means some number of bits (16, 32, 64, etc. Pentium II The successor to the Pentium Pro from Intel. Pentium II refers to the CPU chip or the PC that uses it. Code named "Klamath," the Pentium II was a Pentium Pro with MMX multimedia instructions. with 32Mbytes of system memory were 29.21 for CDRS-03, 7.65 for Advanced Visualizer vi·su·al·iz·er n. One who visualizes, especially a person whose mental images are predominantly visual. Noun 1. visualizer - one whose prevailing mental imagery is visual visualiser and 6.39 for Data Explorer. GLINT MX directly accelerates 3Dlabs' extensive range of software drivers that have been developed for the GLINT and Permedia(R) chip families. These robust and highly optimized drivers include an OpenGL(R) Installable Client Driver and Heidi for Windows(R) NT 3.51, Windows NT (Windows New Technology) A 32-bit operating system from Microsoft for Intel x86 CPUs. NT is the core technology in Windows 2000 and Windows XP (see Windows). Available in separate client and server versions, it includes built-in networking and preemptive multitasking. 4.0 and Windows 95 and Direct 3D for Windows 95. Windows NT 5.0 and Memphis drivers are also being developed. GLINT MX is fully scalable, allowing up to eight GLINT MX processors to be used in parallel to provide some of the fastest rasterization performance available on the PC platform today. For example, a twin GLINT MX board can display up to 2 million visible polygons per second and provides a texturing rate of up to 55 million pixels per second with full per-pixel mip-mapping and high-quality texture filtering In computer graphics, texture filtering is the method used to determine the texture color for a texture mapped pixel, using the colors of nearby texels (pixels of the texture). In short, it blends the texture pixels together by breaking them up into tinier pixels. . GLINT MX is fully compatible with both the GLINT Delta and the previously announced GLINT Gamma geometry accelerators. With GLINT Gamma, it is expected that GLINT MX will be able to be used in AGP systems. AGP is needed to deliver higher polygon rates than is possible over the PCI bus PCI bus - Peripheral Component Interconnect , which currently limits performance to about 1.5 million polygons per second. GLINT MX provides 100% OpenGL 1.1 acceleration in hardware, including the new OpenGL 1.1 texturing modes, ensuring robust acceleration for the latest 3D applications. GLINT MX is the first merchant graphics device to provide full OpenGL 1.1 functionality over the earlier OpenGL 1.0 specification. GLINT MX uses high-accuracy texture engines with true per-pixel mip-mapping and full tri-linear filtering to deliver extremely high quality textured imagery. The texturing capabilities of GLINT MX can also be used in high-end video processing Video processing techniques are used in video codecs, video players and other devices. For example—commonly only design and video processing is different in TV sets of different manufactures. applications. GLINT MX supports up to 70Mbytes of texture and framebuffer memory, allowing board designers to support extremely high-resolution, true-color displays and to provide high-capacity on-board texture storage. Designs containing 16Mbytes of framebuffer memory allow 32 bit true-color, double-buffered displays up to a resolution of 1600x1200. GLINT MX utilizes commodity VRAM See video RAM. VRAM - video random-access memory and EDO DRAM See EDO RAM. EDO DRAM - Extended Data Out Dynamic Random Access Memory memory parts, making it unnecessary to become dependent on specialized, single-sourced memory devices. GLINT MX provides complete support for HDTV (High Definition TV) A set of digital television (DTV) standards that offer the highest resolution and sharpest picture. Although some HDTV sets are available in standard (rather square) screen sizes, the overwhelming majority of sets are wide screen, which eliminates resolution displays and can drive a horizontal resolution The number of elements, dots or columns from left to right on a printed page, display screen or fixed area such as one inch. Contrast with "vertical resolution," which is the number of rows, dots or lines from top to bottom.  of 1920 pixels in a linear framebuffer - making GLINT MX-based boards the only professional 3D processor on the PC that can drive the new generation of high-resolution HDTV displays. As well as extending 3Dlabs' 3D performance lead, GLINT MX significantly enhances the 2D performance of the GLINT family. GLINT MX's integrated 2D/3D graphics engine includes faster blits, faster 2D fill rates and advanced blit functionality -- enabling the GLINT MX to support an extremely fast 2D driver set. GLINT MX further extends the range of graphics price/performance options that can be implemented with 3Dlabs silicon. Permedia and Permedia NT-based boards are targeted at the consumer and entry-level professional market, while boards with GLINT Delta and GLINT 500TX are used in mid-range professional configurations. It is expected that single or multiple GLINT MX's will be used with GLINT Delta or GLINT Gamma for high-end professional performance. All boards using 3Dlabs silicon, from Permedia to a multi-GLINT MX design, use the same driver binaries for Windows 95 and Windows NT, including the highly optimized drivers for OpenGL, Direct 3D and Heidi. This makes it straightforward for OEMs to offer wide range of price/performance options while supporting just a single set of drivers. Quotes "GLINT MX enables GLINT-based board and system vendors to address the high-end professional market and further widen their range of performance options with the minimum of engineering effort," said Neil Trevett Neil Trevett is currently Vice President of Embedded Content at NVIDIA. He is responsible for enabling and encouraging compelling applications on non-PC platforms, including cell phones and automobiles. Prior to joining NVIDIA, Mr. , vice president of marketing at 3Dlabs. "GLINT MX teamed with 3Dlabs' geometry acceleration and a Pentium II processor is a very well balanced 3D pipeline -- capable of delivering a substantial increase in application-level 3D performance." "GLINT MX combined with the power of the Pentium II processor delivers superior 3D performance to the workstation market segment," said Andre Wolper, director of Workstation Industry Marketing at Intel (INTC INTC Intel (NASDAQ symbol) INTC Intercept INTC Interrupt Controller .O). "3Dlabs is committed to the workstation marketplace and is working closely with Intel to fuel the trend toward Intel architecture-based workstations for visual computing, by enabling high performance OpenGL graphics." "3Dlabs continues to be a market leader in delivering 3D graphics for the personal workstation market," said Tom Copeland, Director of Workstation Research at International Data Corporation (IDC). "The GLINT MX will be an excellent 3D accelerator for graphics professionals who require the highest levels of performance with Windows NT." About 3Dlabs Founded in 1994, 3Dlabs is a leading innovator and a fabless supplier of high-performance graphics semiconductors, software, and related technologies designed to bring cost-effective 3D graphics to the personal computer. The Company markets and sells its award-winning merchant 3D graphics processors to PC and graphics board OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) The rebranding of equipment and selling it. The term initially referred to the company that made the products (the "original" manufacturer), but eventually became widely used to refer to the organization that buys the products and customers and selectively licenses its embeddable graphics processor cores on a royalty-bearing basis to strategic technology partners such as Texas Instruments. Companies using 3Dlabs' graphics processors in their computers include Compaq, Digital Equipment Corporation, Hewlett-Packard, NEC (NEC Corporation, Tokyo, www.nec.com, www.necus.com) An electronics conglomerate known in the U.S. for its monitors. In Japan, it had the lion's share of the PC market until the late 1990s (see PC 98). NEC was founded in Tokyo in 1899 as Nippon Electric Company, Ltd. , NeTpower and Siemens. Leading board manufacturers using 3Dlabs' graphics processors include AccelGraphics, Creative Labs, Diamond Multimedia, ELSA and STB/Symmetric. -0- Various matters set forth in this press release, such as statements (i) relating to the Company's ability to drive technological developments; (ii) the Company's growth and expansion into markets; (iii) the ability of the Company to successfully develop, integrate and market new technologies and products such as GLINT MX and GLINT Gamma on any specific timescales, if at all; (iv) the proposed features and uses of new products; and (v) the proposed timing of the introduction of new products are forward looking statements. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, including without limitation, the Company's ability to complete development of new products and technologies in a commercially viable manner; the ability of the Company to continue to obtain and keep design wins for its current and future products; the ability of Company's current and future products to adequately meet the price/performance requirements of its customers; the success of the Company's customers in achieving sustained demand for systems incorporating the company's current and future products if at all; the impact and pricing of competitive products, including those from Company's licensees; the introduction of alternative technological advances and other risks detailed from time to time in 3Dlabs' SEC reports. -0- Notes to Editors -- Please note that 3Dlabs is written as one word, without a space and with a capital D. The recommended way of writing GLINT is all capitals and for Permedia we recommend small caps or all caps depending on the medium. -0- 3Dlabs, GLINT and Permedia are registered trademarks and GLINT MX, GLINT Delta, GLINT Gamma and Permedia NT are trademarks of 3Dlabs Inc. Ltd. Microsoft, Windows and Direct3D are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United States and/or other countries. Pentium is a registered trademark of the Intel Corporation. OpenGL is a registered trademark of Silicon Graphics, Inc. All other trademarks are acknowledged and recognized. CONTACT: 3Dlabs Inc. Neil Trevett, 408/436-3455 neil.trevett@3dlabs.com http://www.3dlabs.com or Horizon Communications Jonathan Hirshon, 408/969-4888, x101 jh@horizonpr.com http://www.horizonpr.com |
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