Nvidia ships GeForce 6150, 6100 North Bridges er... GPUs

When is an integrated graphics engine not integrated?

By Tony Smith • Get more from this author

Posted in System Builder, 20th September 2005 16:04 GMT

Free research: Application platforms, the state of play

Nvidia will launch 'C51', its first integrated chipset, later today, according to motherboard partner Foxconn.

Trumpeting its own WinFast 6150K8MA-8EKRS mobo, Foxconn said the board was based on Nvidia's GeForce 6150 North Bridge chip, which hooks up to the Nvidia's new nForce 430 South Bridge.

Since the AMD CPUs the chipset is designed to work with already contain most of the functionality you'd expect to find in a North Bridge chip, the 6150 is being labelled a GPU.

Whatever, it provides the mobo with GeForce 6 series-class graphics, including DirectX 9.0 Shader Model 3.0 support, and there's scope to connect a higher spec graphics engine through the North Bridge's 16 PCI Express lanes. The board also does TV out.

From the South Bridge, the WinFast gets Serial ATA 2 with RAID 0, 1, 0+1 and 5, parallel ATA-133, 7.1-channel audio, gigabit Ethernet, 1394 and the ability to host up to eight USB 2.0 ports. It's got Nvidia's hardware firewall.

Foxconn also announced the lower-end WinFast 6100K8MA-RS, which is based on the GeForce 6100 and nForce 410, and is being pitched specifically at system builders. Foxconn didn't provide pricing, but it did say both boards were available immediately. ®

Free research: Application platforms, the state of play