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Re: Great earnings numbers from Intel and Goldman Sachs? A closer look
WT,
Couple of notes:
1) From a professional IT perspective, the netbook discussion is almost irrelevant. Even though I would argue that the majority of non-technical corporate users clearly fall into the email/MS Office/internet category, sheer ego combined with corporate IT budgets would almost certainly prevent laptop replacement with netbooks.
2) nVidia is one of two companies making graphics processors (AMD is the other via its 'acquisition' of ATI). The split between graphics processing and general processing happened long ago - a more obvious example is the Sony Playstation. Basically the inherently crappy x86 instruction processing is made more efficient via massively parallel plus predictive circuits - but these in turn lend less relative power to specialized applications like graphics. As a result there is a market (primarily with gamers and professional graphics folks) for add-on processors to add graphics power.
3) nVidia is a sweat shop. I have a close friend who has worked in nVidia off and on for many years ever since being acquired via the failed 3dfx. He works there until he cannot stand it anymore, then quits or switches to another company. Eventually he goes back.
The good news is that nVidia is a very merit based internal system. The bad news is that even the VPs tend to be extremely hands-on and technical; this leaves little if any slack for the grunts who tend to burn out in massive quantities.
WT,
Couple of notes:
1) From a professional IT perspective, the netbook discussion is almost irrelevant. Even though I would argue that the majority of non-technical corporate users clearly fall into the email/MS Office/internet category, sheer ego combined with corporate IT budgets would almost certainly prevent laptop replacement with netbooks.
2) nVidia is one of two companies making graphics processors (AMD is the other via its 'acquisition' of ATI). The split between graphics processing and general processing happened long ago - a more obvious example is the Sony Playstation. Basically the inherently crappy x86 instruction processing is made more efficient via massively parallel plus predictive circuits - but these in turn lend less relative power to specialized applications like graphics. As a result there is a market (primarily with gamers and professional graphics folks) for add-on processors to add graphics power.
3) nVidia is a sweat shop. I have a close friend who has worked in nVidia off and on for many years ever since being acquired via the failed 3dfx. He works there until he cannot stand it anymore, then quits or switches to another company. Eventually he goes back.
The good news is that nVidia is a very merit based internal system. The bad news is that even the VPs tend to be extremely hands-on and technical; this leaves little if any slack for the grunts who tend to burn out in massive quantities.
But, eee pc's are pretty nice little net books and they look pretty nice...
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