ATI gets a clue.

Li-Ta Lo ollie at lanl.gov
Mon Feb 9 18:58:01 CET 2004


On Mon, 2004-02-09 at 16:18, Terry Blunt wrote:
> "Hendricks David W." <dwh at lanl.gov> wrote:
> 
> > We don't need to with nVidia, we can run their VGA BIOS using testbios.
> > 
> > Though in the perfect world, they'd be more forthcoming with specs so that
> > someone can make an LB port for their nForce boards.
> > 
> > On Mon, 9 Feb 2004, Carlos Silva wrote:
> > 
> > > Really nice news... i'll keep dreaming that nvidia will do the same.
> 
> Maybe I'm missing something, but I can never understand hardware
> manufacturers being cagey about their specs. I would have thought it would
> save them a lot of hassle if they *didn't* have to write drivers themselves.
> If they made the information available with suggestions and worked examples,
> the software industry would do it all for them.
> 

>From my previous experience working for some chipset company, there are 
reasons not to release the spec.

1. For software guys, if the software can be written by outside
parties, most of the people in the software dept. are going to be
laid off.

2. For hardware guys, they made bugs too. They need software guys
to save their ass. Of course they want as few people know they are
stupid as possible.

3. For marketing guys, it is a rule in efficient market theory.
The less information avaliable in the market the more profit
an insider can make from the market. Why should the company
release those inside information to hurt its own profit ?


Ollie





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