Intel has announced the cancellation of its plan to launch the 975X chipset line in Q2 2007, leaving the high-end chipset market open for other manufacturers.
According to previous plans, Intel was set to unveil an upgraded version of the 975X chipset in the first half of 2007 to replace the recently introduced 965X series.
However, according to sources from Taiwanese motherboard manufacturers, this plan has been scrapped to allow other companies to develop their own dual graphics technologies, such as Nvidia’s SLI or ATI Technologies’ CrossFire.
Intel hopes that Nvidia and ATI will develop chipset solutions that support the Intel platform, thereby reducing their interest in the AMD platform.
Additionally, although Intel has reached a licensing agreement with ATI allowing the 955X and 975X chipsets to support CrossFire dual graphics technology, this license has not been extended to other chipset lines. Meanwhile, SLI technology has not been officially announced to support any Intel chipset.
Alongside the launch of Intel’s Conroe processors, ATI will also introduce a PCI Express X16 chipset compatible with CrossFire technology (RD600).
On the other hand, Nvidia’s nForce 590 SLI Intel Edition platform is expected to hit the market soon, with support for Intel’s upcoming Conroe processors.
In Q4 of this year, Nvidia will release an upgraded version of the C51XE (C55 Northbridge chip), which will support FSB 1333MHz and DDR2-800 memory.
