chips

AMD-Intel dispute over patent licensing heats up

This post was updated at 8:23 a.m. PDT with comments from Intel and AMD and at 8:33 a.m. PDT with The Foundry Company's new name, Globalfoundries.

Advanced Micro Devices announced Monday that Intel plans to pull its 2001 cross-licensing patent agreement in the next 60 days, unless concerns surrounding AMD's joint venture chip foundry are addressed.

Intel's warning is an escalation of concerns it expressed more than five months ago, following AMD's announcement it planned to spin off its manufacturing assets to a joint venture with the Abu Dhabi government.

The joint-chip … Read more

Report: iPod Shuffle accessories to get Apple 'tax'

In not-so-shocking news, iLounge is reporting that third-party headphones and headphone adapters for the new buttonless iPod Shuffle will require an Apple-licensed authentication chip.

This doesn't come as any great surprise to us because exacting licensing revenue from iPod accessory makers has become a brilliant way for Apple to add to the company's bottom line. But that "Apple tax," so to speak, does get passed on to consumers, and iLounge and others are now assuming that Apple headphone adapters will cost a minimum of $19 and possibly as much as $29. The handful of VoiceOver-compatible headphones … Read more

SanDisk shares soar on buyout rumors

SanDisk shares rose sharply Friday morning, as speculation surfaced that Samsung and Toshiba are interested in a buyout of the company.

SanDisk soared 11 percent to close at $11.05 a share, following a report in the EETimes.

The article, citing unnamed sources, said Samsung, which last year launched an unsuccessful bid for the company, and SanDisk's joint-manufacturing partner Toshiba are both interested in making a bid for the flash memory maker.

Last year, when Samsung made an unsolicited bid for the company, it offered SanDisk $5.85 billion for the company. SanDisk had rejected Samsung's overtures, citing … Read more

Are you ready for the spychip driver's license?

I was sent this link Tuesday night by the venerable sports radio personality and onetime host of the E! Entertainment TV show "Digital Turf," Patrick Mauro.

The article, from World Net Daily, suggests that, sooner than some might wish, we might all have driver's licenses that are embedded with a very clever chip. Clever in the kind of way Heath Ledger's Joker is.

It's an article with many words, some of them technical and some political. The gist, however, seems to be that your driver's license could soon be adorned by a radio frequency … Read more

Get smokin' on a gas grill

There is nothing quite like grilling food over an open flame, using all that deep smoke to impart flavor. As fat melts away, smoke and heat combine to form delicious flavor that cannot be achieved in any other way. For charcoal fires, the solution is easy: soak some wood chips in water and then place on the burning coals. However, for those with a gas grill, getting that smoky goodness is not as easy.

Luckily, there is the Charcoal Companion Platinum Grid with Smoker Trays Set for people with gas grills. Simply fill the adjustable smoking chambers with wood chips … Read more

U.S. Supreme Court hands Rambus a win

The U.S. Supreme Court handed chip designer Rambus a victory Monday, when it refused to hear an appeal by the Federal Trade Commission that alleged the chip designer violated antitrust laws under the Sherman Act.

For Rambus, it ends a seven-year battle with the Federal Trade Commission over its Sherman Act litigation, which alleged in 2002 that the chipmaker intentionally withheld its patent plans from a standards body, which later gave the green light to some of its technology that is now found in the vast majority of PCs and servers around the world.

"It's a good … Read more

Intel takes chipset dispute with Nvidia to court

Updated at 9:15 a.m. PST with official comment from Intel.

Bit-tech.net tipped us off Wednesday morning that Intel has sued Nvidia over the latter's right to create and sell motherboard chipsets that support Intel's Nehalem (aka Core i7) class of desktop processors.

We haven't heard much about this fight since May 2008, although since that time Nehalem has come to market and Intel remains the only manufacturer with a supporting chipset.

We spoke to Derek Perez, Nvidia's head of public relations, Wednesday morning, and he provided some clarity on the nature of the court filing, as well as Nvidia's take on the filing, which he says is actually a request for an injunction to prevent Nvidia from manufacturing a Nehalem chipset.

"We have a cross-licensing agreement with Intel, entered into about four and a half years ago. Intel is now basically saying the cross-license agreement doesn't apply to future bus interfaces, specifically DMI, (the direct media interface Intel uses to link the Nehalem CPU to a system's memory, a new feature for Nehalem chipsets). Intel has now filed an injunction against us, basically trying to stop us from innovating on DMI.… Read more

Toshiba buys Fujitsu hard disk drive business

Japanese electronics manufacturer Toshiba has agreed to buy over Fujitsu's hard disk drive (HDD) business, in a move aimed at expanding its footprint in the enterprise storage market.

In a statement released Tuesday, Fujitsu did not reveal how much the deal is worth but said the transaction is targeted to be completed in the first quarter of its fiscal 2009, ending June 30 this year.

Under the agreement, Fujitsu will transfer all its HDD-related businesses and functions to the new company, including HDD design, development, manufacturing and sales. It will retain a 20 percent share for "a certain … Read more

Nvidia's sinking sales spur $150M charge, cost cutting

Updated at 12:20 p.m. PST with additional information about salary cuts.

Nvidia is buying up underwater stock options from employees and cutting salaries across the company amid a steep revenue falloff.

On Tuesday, the graphics chip supplier posted a fourth-quarter loss of just under $148 million and a 60 percent drop in revenue as demand for its graphics chips dried up.

"November fell off a cliff," said CEO Jen-Hsun Huang, addressing the decrease in demand, during an earnings conference call Tuesday. Chief Financial Officer Marvin Burkett added that "December was worse."

In the aftermath … Read more