Charlie Demerjian Is A Biased Douchebag

[Mike D]

Update: GT200 still in mass production, say nVidia partners

I mentioned recently that Charlie said nVidia was "abandoning" the mid-range and high-end markets and canceling all their GT200 parts. Of course, we all know that nVidia is actually readying its high-end DX11 cards. But what about the GT200 parts? Are they really being canned? There were, after all, rumors of shortages.

Well, according to BrightSideofNews.com, nVidia's partners denied the rumors and insisted that the GT200 chips are still "in mass production, with internal refreshes coming up soon from a few of them." Incidentally, there were plenty of GT200 parts available on NewEgg today.

However, that's not the whole story. According to Anandtech, nVidia has indeed sent EOL notices out to some of its partners regarding the GT200b parts. They go on to say that "end users should be able to purchase GeForce GTX 260, 275 and 285 cards all the way up through February of next year."

So, I'm really not sure how all this became a big deal, because that sounds about normal to me. nVidia is readying their next-generation DX11 cards. Accordingly, they are phasing out their current cards. The current cards will still be widely available until around spring, when nVidia will presumably be fully on board with both the lower-end GT200 parts built on the new 40nm fab, and their higher-end DX11 cards.

Methinks, as usual, Charlie was full of douche. And frankly, I'm really at a loss as to why anyone would think that, if Charlie were right about nVidia abandoning the high-end GPU market, it would be good news for anyone. Last I checked, cards were damn expensive back when nVidia was cleaning ATI's clock with the G80 cards (anyone else remember those $800 8800 Ultra cards?). Once ATI came around with their excellent 4-series cards, nVidia was forced to drop prices and we consumers had lots of choices and could score amazing performance for relatively low costs. Competition means we win. Let's hope for our sake that nVidia gets their new cards out asap.


GT300 card was a fake! nVidia, doomed again!

Charlie actually got something right. I know, I know. Crazy. But credit given where credit is due.

nVidia, by their own admission, was not posing with an actual card. However, they insist that the performance numbers shown were done on a working card. I leave that to you whether you want to lose any sleep over that or not.

The implication Charlie insinuates is that the fake card is proof that nVidia is experiencing a total disaster, that the cards are weak/nonexistent/months behind schedule/whatever. Of course, as a casual browsing of this blog will show, Charlie has predicted the demise of nVidia on innumerable occasions. Somehow, nVidia still manages to have the majority market share in the discreet GPU market.

Rather than ramble on myself though, I spotted this great little op-ed over at brightsideofnews.com:

GT300 demo card was a dummy; does that really matter?

A quote:

So next you will hear that this means they must not have enough GPUs to go around [due to bad yields of course] but is this true? After all the 5870 [and 5870 X2] cards that AMD passed around for the press to handle were not live and working cards and 90% of the mainboards/Graphics cards shown at CES were not live and working either. Also, whenever you see a vendor claiming a breakthrough in the world of SSDs, bear in mind that those shiny casings or PCIe cards aren't functional, and yes - don't feature memory chips at all. Does this mean that those companies were having supply problems too? Does it mean they did not have working versions? No it does not. It simply means that a display demo does not need to be working to be used for its intended purpose.


nVidia yields not actually at 2%; Charlie's douchebaggery at 98%

Charlie wrote a colossally dumb article saying that Fermi yields were under 2%. As an alert reader notified me on Facebook, Google mistranslated September as 9, so it ends up reading as "NVIDIA GT300 is an Engineering sample of nine will be completed in January of this year's fastest 12 to begin shipping in January." Engrish WRONG!

Properly translated it would read, "NVIDIA will complete its GT300 engineering sample in September".


The truth about nVidia's shortages

Charlie douchily posted a FUD-filled post saying that nVidia's shortages are a ruse to keep the prices high against superior hardware from ATI, as if people are actually stupid enough to buy a chip because it's harder to find than one that is readily available and performs better.

Aside from the obvious idiocy of the post, it's a case of bending the truth until it's practically a lie. Fudzilla reports that nVidia does not want to sell the chips under cost. Rather than keep spitting out boards that will sell at a loss, nVidia will basically be laying low until Fermi hits.
Dear lord Charlie is a douche.

Thanks to Orlando R. for the heads-up.



Charlie makes his douchiest post ever

Holy cow, it's been a while! But this one is just too good. From Charlie's "news" site semiaccurate:

"With the cancellation of the GTX285, GTX275, and GTX260, possibly the GTX295 too, Nvidia is abandoning the entire high end and mid-range graphics market. Expect a reprise in January on the low end. The company is badly mismanaged and hated by the very partners it needs to throw it a life preserver."

I couldn't help but notice that Charlie's site is peppered with AMD and ATI advertisements. Shocking. What did nVidia have to say about this article? From [H]ardOCP:

"There is no truth to this. Charlie has become a sponsored site of his sole advertiser. It's no coincidence his website looks like an AMD ad." - Ken Brown, nVidia PR.

Anyone who reads actual tech news sites should know that nVidia's next generation "Fermi" chip has already taped out and is supposed to hit toward the end of the year. Logically, nVidia will be phasing out their current generation chips. Fermi is a totally new architecture built from the ground up, and it seems most reputable pundits are expecting a G80-type performance leap. Time will tell, of course.


On an ironic note, generally reliable actual-news site Fudzilla.com reported that nVidia does not plan to make any more AMD chipsets because AMD is tanking so badly. Their market share has shrunk to the point that it doesn't make any sense for nVidia to make chipsets for them. Which is, like, duh, because obviously Intel is absolutely destroying AMD in the performance department. AMD has recently been put on a list of 20 corporations most likely to declare bankruptcy. Charlie didn't report that though, did he? Of course not. You know why? Because he's a douchebag.

[Mike D]

A Charlie twofer, and commentary

Charlie posted two retarded articles today, the first of which is an unconfirmed and unsubstantiated assertion that nVidia's 40nm parts have been delayed "again". Funny, since I haven't been able to find any reference to nVidia actually specifying a date for these things, it's kind of odd to call them delayed. Bit-tech last month reported that nVidia is on track with three 40nm chips for this year.

The second one is actually true, but has a lot of FUD in it, of course. AMD today unveiled working DX11 silicon, and it's not yet known when nVidia will show their hand. Charlie again repeats his mistake of asserting that nVidia "has yet to tape out a chip", which is patently false as the GT300 taped out last month.


So, a quick commentary is warranted here. Charlie makes a big deal out of ATI beating nVidia to market with 40nm parts. He's talking about the 4770, a low-end part. Problem is that because of TSMC's 40nm yield problems, ATI can't produce adequate supplies of their new card. Besides, consumers do not give a flying shit what size fabrication process a GPU was a built on. They care about performance and value. The 4770 is a good card for the money, but if ATI can't supply it, it's a moot point. To put things in perspective, consider that ATI had the HD2xxx series on 80nm dies while nVidia's 8800 cards were on 90nm dies, and ATI was also the first to market with 55nm chips while nVidia was focusing on their 65nm lineup. Did anyone care? Did ATI have some huge performance advantage by being on a small fab? Did it affect sales or either company's market share significantly? No, no, and no.


Now, rumors also have it that ATI may indeed beat nVidia to market with DX11 parts. To which I reply, um, so the fuck what? Now, if nVidia suffers the kind of delay and performance disaster like ATI did with R600 (which ol' Charlie seems to be desperately hoping for, for whatever reason he loathes nVidia so greatly), being late to market is a bad thing indeed. But if they're within weeks of each other and nVidia's performance is either competitive or superior, the long term picture is not going to be affected significantly by who got to market first. Besides, right now, with the TSMC's problems just being ironed out, there's no telling how things will pan out.

As an aside, it's worth pondering whether anyone will actually care about fancy new GPUs that support DX11. There aren't any DX11 games, and probably won't be for a good while. Hell, there aren't really even all that many DX10 games. What's more, gaming engines are not really pushing modern graphics cards very hard right now. I run two GTX 260s in SLI, and I play Crysis Warhead at maximum settings with 4xAA and transparency supersampling (yes, those are legit screenshots from my PC). Considering that's the most advanced engine out there and you can run it very well with a relatively inexpensive setup, I can't see a huge demand for expensive new high end parts right now. All this rush to get to market might be a bit premature.


nVidia trying to sell itself, apparently in big trouble despite dominant market share, says Charlie

Newsflash: Charlie "Huh?" Demerjian no longer writes for The Inquirer! Suffice to say that the British tech tabloid just got a major boost to its credibility, though it's still no Fudzilla. The Inquirer's gain, however, is Semiaccurate.com's loss, as Charlie now writes for this obscure online tech rag.

True to form, Charlie has wasted no time spreading feces all over the walls, now claiming that a desperate nVidia is looking for buyers.

First, let's state the obvious — that Charlie doesn't actually cite any sources. His source is some anonymous guy who allegedly works for some anonymous company who allegedly was approached by nVidia. Anonymous sources aren't necessarily wrong, but Charlie's record is so atrociously inaccurate that there's no reason to believe he's not just lying like he usually is.

Charlie repeats his doom and gloom assessment of nVidia, sarcastically saying, "They may not have a DX11 part until after the back to school season, Windows 7 launch, and Christmas, but ahead to victory!" Once again, Charlie seems unaware that the GT300 taped out last month, ahead of schedule.

He goes on, lyingly: "Nvidia is facing down at least three lawsuits that we are aware of, has a chipset business that won't exist in a little over a year, and a few quarters of very rough sales for GPUs ahead. One could speculate that management sees what is coming and wants to cash out while the corporate net value is still colored black."

First of all, the only person who has ever "reported" that nVidia will stop making chipsets is Charlie Demerjian, and as usual his "sources" are completely anonymous. There's no reason to believe this is true, especially since nVidia's chipsets are very popular among enthusiasts; in fact, it's worth noting that Apple is replacing Intel chipsets with nVidia chipsets in the MacBook.

Secondly, Charlie's only basis for the "rough sales for GPUs" is the same nonsense he's always spouted. Remember that this clown said the R600 would be faster than the G80, that the GT200 would get demolished by the R700, yadda yadda yadda. Then he said a June tapeout for the DX11 GPUs was unrealistic, and predicted delays. It taped out in May.

Thirdly, lawsuits are like white on rice for multinational corporations. Microsoft, Intel, Sony, Nintendo, and just about every other mega-corporation has been sued. If nVidia actually loses any of these lawsuits, there might be something worth talking about, although it will probably not be the demise of the company.

And finally, it's just plain ridiculous to assume that nVidia, with nearly 70% of the discreet GPU market, is really on the brink of collapse. Charlie's just spreading more FUD, and my money says that his "reporting" will not even live up to the half-assed namesake of his new employer.

Hmm. I can't help but wonder if Charlie is pathological enough to really believe what he writes.

[aaronspink]

oh how sweet, charlie has his own personal raging lunatic stalker. I bet he feels all Hollywood now. Don't let it get to your head charlie, we still expect you to act like a normal person, so don't even think about ordering off menu.

[Copper]

Sorry guys, I just couldn't bring myself to delete it without Charlie getting a chance to laugh. I'll remove it in a bit. I'm dumping it in the flamewars for now, just so you guys have something to laugh about.

Enjoy

Copper

[OroSaiwa]

Too bad he got most things right. From bumpgate to Fermi tapeout and later spins and release dates and production problems. Just luck?

And yes there are shortages of gt200 parts. They're as hard to find as the 5800 parts. Wait the latest have been coming in regularly recently.
At least here in Italy. And I do sell hardware for a job. Needless to say what we're selling more. Now that we received the low-end ATi parts, we've been selling them like hot cakes, with nvidia g2xx sales dropping at the speed of sound.

Charlie's way of writing may be trolling but he got them right.
So like it or not, the one biased here is the author of this thread.
At least he doesn't hide the truth about release dates, production problems or even benchmark numbers.

Keep going Charlie. Let's hope nvidia guys wake up and get rid of the current administration and start doing what they used to do best. Graphic cards ._.

[distinctively]

I didn't read the post. I didn't want to give him that much credit after the first line.

[OroSaiwa]

Do it for the lulz

[Copper]

Sorry, I didn't think the poll had the right options available. It was too erm, limited

[OroSaiwa]

LOLOL @nvidia not making chipsets for AMD because they're tanking.
I missed that part. Dude is so biased.

The truth is that ATi chipsets kick ass and nVidia just can't keep up with them.
And yes they're selling like hot cakes too.

[Copper]

Originally Posted by OroSaiwa

LOLOL @nvidia not making chipsets for AMD because they're tanking.
I missed that part. Dude is so biased.

The truth is that ATi chipsets kick ass and nVidia just can't keep up with them.
And yes they're selling like hot cakes too.

wasn't there something about a little lawsuit? Chipset license from Intel and all that jazz?