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Author Topic: What's happening with Matrox?  (Read 4815 times)

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What's happening with Matrox?
« on: December 30, 2002, 01:20:06 PM »
I thought Matrox were partners with Amiga Inc, yet I see AmigaOne's being sold with Radeon and Voodoo cards because that's what cards OS4 will be supporting.

What's happened?
 

Offline Minion

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #1 on: December 30, 2002, 01:44:27 PM »
Maybe M$ have been teaching Amiga what to do with "partners"
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Offline takemehomegrandma

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #2 on: December 30, 2002, 02:02:19 PM »
Hehe, well, AmigaInc is "partners" with every single interesting IT related company on this entire planet. At least you get that picture when you read their hype style written "press releases" and "excecutive updates". But most of it has proven to be nothing else but dreams and promises; talk instead of action. Do yourself a favour - forget about AmigaInc(ompetent). They have lost it.
MorphOS is Amiga done right! :)
 

Offline SidMan

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Re: What
« Reply #3 on: December 30, 2002, 02:25:41 PM »
I'm sure it will be supported at some point. A lot of things appear to be happening now.
 

Offline jd997uk

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #4 on: December 30, 2002, 02:40:06 PM »
@SmartAlec
Quote
What's happened?

All this partnership really is about is to enable Amiga to access Matrox' stuff earlier than say a member of the public.
Example would be that Hyperion had a Parhelia card ages before we the public knew anything at all (if you search theRegister.co.uk you'll see a quote there from Ben). Support from hardware makers is hugely important, without it (ie NVidea) no drivers. Support docs from the likes of ATI and Matrox could/will enable drivers to be written.
Matrox support has been promised, but whether it makes the initial OS4 release I've not yet seen, I suspect a BoingBag release could be favorite.

Any of these sort of 'partnerships' are not to be sniffed at, getting early access to data and hardware enables drivers to be ready on release, instead of always lagging behind.

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Offline BlackMonk

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #5 on: December 30, 2002, 03:39:08 PM »
Matrox has delivered their next-gen part, the Parhelia.  It is expensive and not a great performer.  It is trying to compete based on features but I believe it costs more than the latest high-end offerings from nvidia and ATI.

In addition, their vaunted image quality took a horrible blow when they had banding artifacts on the cards (some HARDWARE issue) and Matrox's reputation among their customers went down the crapper when they DENIED THE EXISTENCE OF THIS PROBLEM.  I think they are also refusing to RMA the defective cards.  The kicker is apparently they KNEW about the problem but shipped the cards anyway.

There is supposedly an AGP 8X "refresh" of the current hardware that has a fix for this but word on the street is that Matrox made too many of the current defective 4X parts and wants to clear inventory--so the 8X refresh won't happen soon, if at all.

There's supposed to be a Parhelia 2 (Pauva?  Or something?) that is supposed to take the relatively solid Parhelia core (it is just somewhat slow by today's standards) and turn it into a real competitor.  However, word on the street is that due to Matrox's financial woes and layoffs, this product will never see the light of day even though it had already been designed(?)

My info is sketchy.  There used to be insider rumors posted at http://www.matroxusers.com/ but Matrox lawyers threatened the site maintainer and had him edit ALL of his content.  Since then, no new info.

The messageboard is a decent place to find out the latest info on Matrox.  They are still making driver updates so at least they aren't dead yet, but as a privately-held company they are under absolutely no obligation to release financial info or strategic plans--and they don't.  How they are doing is honestly anyone's guess.

What Matrox's relationship with Amiga is, I don't know.  How Amiga wants to use the (overpriced) Matrox card, I don't know.  But I do know that Matrox is really taking a beating by its longtime, loyal fans.  Their lack of information is leaving the Matrox community disenchanted and looking elsewhere.

Heh, does this sound familiar?

Matrox is not ONLY tied to PC graphics, they also do medical imaging and audio/video stuff, I believe.  No idea what THOSE divisions are doing or how well.

And that, my friend, is what's happening with Matrox.
 

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #6 on: December 30, 2002, 06:32:02 PM »
What happened to their nextgen G800 card?
Did it ever get released, as a while back I remember reading in a magazine that the G800 was to be the card used in the AmigaOne.

The last I heard of Matrox (quite a while ago) they had released their G550 card, as a sort of bridge card from the existing G400 card to the G800.
 

Offline seer

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #7 on: December 30, 2002, 07:02:38 PM »
Ok, I give up.. I'll keep posting here from time to time.. Damn you all ! ;-)

@Blackmonk

Strange.. I've been using a Parhelia (3 monitor setup) since the card was released and have no real  probs whatsoever. Have you used a Parhelia ?

GFX quality is superior to that of a Geforce4 4600, and only marginal slower then the GF4 (Used both cards here, same setup.. Well except for 1 monitor) depending on the game and the setup. And it's well known that the Parhelia supports only AGP4 when it was released and this was said by Matrox several times ! (It can do AGP8, but this is "disabled").

Matrox is a very helpful company, much better then nvidia, I have no experience with ATI on this.(Matrox own forums are a great place with people from matrox being really patience and helpfull even when "Idiots" refusing to listen to what's being said".. I remember a fellow who kept on arguing that the product data where wrong/misleading, when it was obvious it was not. Even tho it was a tech forum, not a customer service forum, the Matrox people kept trying to help him). Besides, if my card goes faulty, it goes back to the dealer, not to matrox. It's the dealer's job to sort things out.. If they don't, kick the dealer ;-)
 
Sure their are some driver isues, but ever used the first ATI or nvidia drivers ?  

As for the financial problems, any links on that ?

Matrox is not ONLY tied to PC graphics, they also do medical imaging and audio/video stuff, I believe. No idea what THOSE divisions are doing or how well.

AFAIK they are doing well.. But it doesn't seem to be something Matrox talks about alot.
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Offline seer

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #8 on: December 30, 2002, 08:32:52 PM »
Did it ever get released, as a while back I remember reading in a magazine that the G800 was to be the card used in the AmigaOne

The G800 is death, or was what is now the G550. The G550 is a "cutdown" G800. Not that anybody except Matrox really knows the real story but;

MURC 1

This thread by "Amiga Blitter"... have some info.. Use Google for more info..

Most references related to the G800 are either gone, hard to find, or only rumor related, no facts.. Hmm.. The G800 is the AAA of Matrox..

(Sorry 'bout the late reply, been reading these forums ;-)
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Offline The_Editor

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #9 on: December 30, 2002, 09:07:18 PM »
Yeah .. Murc is a pretty good forum...  Even got to read some "Gurm"  :-D

The Reluctant Pom
 

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #10 on: December 30, 2002, 09:46:25 PM »
I am a video editor - compositor in a Greek TV STATION since September 1990.
I have used ANY KIND OF VIDEO or COMPUTER machinery you can imagine.
I have used products from Pinnacle, Newtek, Matrox, Fast multimedia, and even an EDITBOX from Quantel.
As you can see I believe I can say something MORE about what Matrox is...
You may don't know it but matrox's Digisuite is used in MANY, MANY TV STATION not only for editing (news etc.) but also for the "Multiple Windows" effect on live transmisions!
I am using it for 3 years now, and I can assure you that you CANNOT FIND ANYTHING MORE STABLE out there!
Matrox is a well respected company on the PROFESSIONAL - BROADCAST category.
If you want to play games, get an ATI or an NVIDIA.
LET THE PROFESSIONAL USERS WORK THE WAY THEY SHOULD BE!
If you are a gamer.... PLAY!
Sorry but, we DON'T play...
We prefer more professional products.

P.S. If you had ever used a MATROX, I believe that you would have more respect for a company that makes everyday our professional dreams come true.
I am not a True Matrox Fun.  I just believe that gamers should talk about games.... not professional stuff!
 

Offline BlackMonk

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #11 on: December 31, 2002, 03:23:18 PM »
I'm sorry, but... so what?  THIS IS NOT ABOUT THE PROFESSIONAL DIVISIONS OF MATROX.  THIS IS ABOUT THE CARDS MOST PEOPLE CAN AFFORD.

Thanks for paying attention, eh.  Matrox WAS a well-respected company in the PC market, too, well-renowned for their image quality.  Now, however, that reputation has taken a severe beating.

The mumblings that I have heards is that Matrox's other divisions, while traditionally being rather strong, are weakening as of late.

As for the financial info, well, MURC used to have some posts and articles written by laid-off employees that the MURC news poster (VigilAnt) flew to Canadia to personally interview.  They had talk about how the G800 project was a total boondoggle, how the fabrication technology at Matrox was ancient due to lack of understanding by the owners in investing in process equipment, how more and more Matrox employees were being laid off, how morale was low, how all types of projects were cancelled, etc.

Somehow I don't think that is the sign of a healthy company, financially-wise.  Now this appears to only be the PC video division, I do not have any info on the other divisions.

The owners also were removed from Canadia's "top 100 richest people" where they used to be around the 80th position or so.  That would imply that their fortunes are tied into their company and those fortunes are greatly reduced.  While the IT industry as a whole is in pain, with the diversification (right, Animagic?) of their products you'd think they would be able to better weather any PC product problems.  If most of their revenue, though, comes from the PC division (doesn't seem likely?) then that would explain why they are laying off people and being removed from "richest in Canadia" lists.  

I honestly don't think the PC division is THAT important overall, but who knows.  I suspect that the other divisions are also hurting.

The insiders also blame marketing for pushing out the Parhelia when they KNEW it had defects.  And for idiotic focus of, say, HeadCasting.  To sell a product.  While other companies were adding T&L and anti-aliasing and a bevy of other features.

The Parhelia's defects apparently do not show up under DVI-based monitors nor do they show up in all cards.  They are, however, extremely noticable if you have them--read the MURC forums to see the complaints.

Matrox's support group is unto gods, apparently, and they are the sole reason many people still stick around to buy and support Matrox.  But the support people are of course hamstrung by the owners, the lack of information from the company, the driver team, etc. etc. etc.

The main thing that people are pissed about is that the Parhelia has problems--confirmed, real problems, and Matrox is denying that these problems even exist (the banding is what I am referring to).

Now you get a card with a 256 bit memory interface and as many texture units as the Parhelia has and you'd THINK it would perform well for complex shader programs.  Well, in many tests the damn thing is slower than a GeForce3.  I've seen some tests where it has been beaten by a Kyro2 or a GeForce2.  The chipset clockspeed is 200 MHz, I think (I believe they clocked it at both 225 and 200 but don't tell you the difference), and it just isn't pushing out the performance needed to compete--this card was slower than the competition the second it was released.

I'm not complaining about the Parhelia only doing AGP 4x, it's just that the rumored "fixed" Parhelia was to be marketed as the "AGP 8x" version.  AGP 4x has little to no performance benefit over AGP 2x--and by the time applications will NEED the extra bandwidth anyway, the system you're trying to run the application in will be the bottleneck more than the AGP speed.

I wish I had more solid info for you, but the most solid info was from former (and current) employees of Matrox and those comments were lawyered away from MURC.  So... you only have second-hand recollections from me and I didn't follow things too closely.

The only Matrox cards I have ever had were a Mystique for a short while--it didn't work in my system for reasons unrelated to Matrox, a G200 which I currently have and don't really use, and some Millennium II cards that I don't really use.  All of my information has been gleaned from online sources, not first-hand.
 

Offline BlackMonk

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #12 on: December 31, 2002, 03:29:45 PM »
BTW, on the financial front, I fully realize that laying off people does not necessarily indicate that a company is in financial trouble.  Hey, reorganizations ALWAYS help, right?  But the fact that they seem to be cancelling any future products along with cutting down on R&D, driver programmers, and chip fabrication investment seems to me to indicate that they are STUPIDLY cutting costs for short-term gains.

If you shoot yourself in the foot by removing your ability to make your next product competitive, well, you're only setting yourself up for failure.  Combined with the fact that the employees felt as though the company was leaderless and the owners were taking out personal vendettas on some people doesn't make me too optimistic.

As always, there's no way to know for SURE.  Matrox sure isn't talking and all of this is heresay.  I'd like to believe that Matrox has a kickass product waiting in the wings that will save them and restore faith in the company, but I just don't think that is the case.  That's what I thought Parhelia was going to be.  While Parhelia is nice and has some nice features, it isn't fast enough nor the features mainstream enough to justify the high price--especially when you may or may not get a defective card that Matrox may or may not RMA.

I think many of the MURC blokes did mail-order or direct from Matrox or only noticed the banding after the dealer 30-day return policies ran out or something.  Or maybe they used European distributors who don't have a return policy, I honestly do not know.  But the angry customers seem to be blaming Matrox rather than just taking the cards back for a refund.  Odd, that.
 

Offline The_Editor

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #13 on: December 31, 2002, 03:33:53 PM »
I can't talk about the Parhelia as I haven't seen one in action.  I have read on Murcs forums about the banding probs though.

I run a G550,  Which I think does a great job, but then... This system is for NLE.  My daughter does use it  for some mild gaming... Namely

GTA III
simms
Delta force II ( Net multiplayer).

To which end.... The G550 seems to do ... OK
The Reluctant Pom
 

Offline BlackMonk

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Re: What's happening with Matrox?
« Reply #14 on: December 31, 2002, 03:45:26 PM »
BTW, if I had the money, I actually WOULD buy a Parhelia and one of either of these:

http://www.panoramtech.com/products/pv230.html

http://www.panoramtech.com/products/pv290.html

Heh, surround gaming would kick ass!