Intel delays jump to Rambus

Bowing to requests from PC makers and memory manufacturers, Intel is backing away from plans to jump directly from supporting the current memory standard to the Rambus architecture.

Instead instead of leaping directly into the more costly and somewhat controversial memory design, the company will likely release a PC 133 chipset by the first half of next year, analysts said.

Intel has designated Rambus for high-end computers, but the relatively high manufacturing and royalty costs have caused some backlash within the industry. Manufacturers de-emphasized their investment in equipment to make Rambus memory after RAM prices collapsed in the first part of 1999. Earlier, both Intel and memory makers had difficulty in ironing out bugs in memory chips and the corresponding chipset.

Current plans still have Intel releasing in September an 820 chipset, code-named Camino, that will work with Rambus or, with the addition of another chip called the MTH, standard 100MHz SDRAM memory.

The 820 chipset also allows PC makers for the first time to adopt the next-generation AGP, a dedicated data path that improves graphics performance.

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