As graphics kingpin Nvidia tries to reshape itself into a broad-based computing company, it is taking big gambles with potentially big payoffs, while it fends off challenges from rivals Intel and Advanced Micro Devices. The world's largest supplier of standalone graphics chips for PCs needs to grow. Established markets have matured and Nvidia must seek out other ways to make money.<\/p>\n
\nEnter supercomputing and Nvidia's brand-new Fermi architecture. “That's a huge market and big margins,” said Peddie. Fermi was announced last week at an Nvidia conference to great fanfare when prestigious Oak Ridge National Laboratory said it plans to use Fermi in a future supercomputer. It would be an understatement to say that the Fermi chip potentially packs a computing wallop. The chip integrates an astounding 3 billion transistors, about three times the number of transistors in Nvidia's most powerful graphics chip now on the market, and it has been designed with features that make it more suitable for high-performance computers, the first time that Nvidia has architected a chip this way.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
As graphics kingpin Nvidia tries to reshape itself into a broad-based computing company, it is taking big gambles with potentially big payoffs, while it fends off challenges from rivals Intel and Advanced Micro Devices. The world's largest supplier of standalone graphics chips for PCs needs to grow. Established markets have matured and Nvidia must seek out other ways to make money.<\/p>\n
\nEnter supercomputing and Nvidia's brand-new Fermi architecture. “That's a huge market and big margins,” said Peddie. Fermi was announced last week at an Nvidia conference to great fanfare when prestigious Oak Ridge National Laboratory said it plans to use Fermi in a future supercomputer. It would be an understatement to say that the Fermi chip potentially packs a computing wallop. The chip integrates an astounding 3 billion transistors, about three times the number of transistors in Nvidia's most powerful graphics chip now on the market, and it has been designed with features that make it more suitable for high-performance computers, the first time that Nvidia has architected a chip this way.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n