Graphics wars heat up. (market outlook).(Industry Overview)

This is going to he one heck of an interesting time for graphics, with ATI's R300, Nvidia's NV30, 3Dlabs' P10, Trident's XP4, and Matrox's Parhelia--we haven't had so many great graphics chips all at once in many a year.

Nvidia may be a victim of its own success. By raising the awareness of the value and importance of good graphics, it has created a demand that has encouraged the competition and scared the OEMs, who don't want yet another 800-pound gorilla telling them what they should and shouldn't be doing.

Make no mistake, Nvidia is still way out in front. But consumers, in the PC market in particular, are a fickle group. Nvidia has done an unprecedented job of keeping the spotlight on itself with one stunning new product after another--on top of the highly coveted Xbox win. And Nvidia clearly gets credit for breaking Moore's Law, driving graphics to new heights and using more transistors than Intel. The forthcoming NV30 will continue that trend with a new GPU that will in all likelihood double or more the transistor count in a P4.

But transistors and benchmarks alone won't turn the trick, and Nvidia has another success to deal with: silicon budget. Intel, in its efforts to push the market and improve sales, has been ...