Cycle of Reincarnation (see Cycle of Reincarnation)

Apparently AMD has announced plans to put a GPU on the same silicon as a CPU.
That's the next step in the classic cycle of reincarnation.

I was thinking about this a few months ago as SLi became popular. The recent progression has gone: specialized proprietary graphics bus ("local bus") => standardized graphics bus ("VESA local bus") => high-speed general bus ("PCI") => standardized graphics bus ("AGP") (3 upgrades) => specialized variant of general bus ("PCI Express") and now it looks like even that isn't fast enough, and the graphics system will head straight back to the CPU.

Oy.

In the meantime, non-gamers have it made: even a $35 card has enough power to render fantastic 2D graphics and movies. Even some integrated-on-the-motherboard chipsets, traditionally the dumping grounds for barely-competent leftovers, are doing pretty well (especially in Intel land, where the 945G and successors have carved out very nice niches for themselves).

Cycle of Reincarnation (see Cycle of Reincarnation)

Apparently AMD has announced plans to put a GPU on the same silicon as a CPU.
That's the next step in the classic cycle of reincarnation.

I was thinking about this a few months ago as SLi became popular. The recent progression has gone: specialized proprietary graphics bus ("local bus") => standardized graphics bus ("VESA local bus") => high-speed general bus ("PCI") => standardized graphics bus ("AGP") (3 upgrades) => specialized variant of general bus ("PCI Express") and now it looks like even that isn't fast enough, and the graphics system will head straight back to the CPU.

Oy.

In the meantime, non-gamers have it made: even a $35 card has enough power to render fantastic 2D graphics and movies. Even some integrated-on-the-motherboard chipsets, traditionally the dumping grounds for barely-competent leftovers, are doing pretty well (especially in Intel land, where the 945G and successors have carved out very nice niches for themselves).