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It made up to 80% of the system RAM available for graphics. It also highlighted the potential performance boost of a unified memory architecture (UMA), one where the graphics processor shared the system memory with the CPU. It was a massive chip for the time with over 1,000-pins, and it cost more than the standard CPU. SGI developed the Visual Workstation 320 and 540 workstations using an Intel Pentium processor and designed the Cobalt IGC. January 1999-In the late 1990s, workstation giant Silicon Graphics Inc (SGI), was trying to meet the threat of the popular and ever-improving x86 processors from Intel.
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SiS and ALi were the only two companies initially awarded licenses to produce third party chipsets for the Pentium 4. Most importantly, it proved what one could integrate into a small, low-cost chip. It offered UMA capability with SiS’s 551x UMA chipsets. The graphics controller offered an integrated VGA with resolution up to 1280 ×1024 × 16.8 million colors (but interlaced), a 64-bit BitBLT engine with an integrated Philips SAA 7110 Video Decoder Interface that provided YUV 4:2:2 support, color-key video overlay support, color space converter, integer video scaling in 1/64th unit increments and VESA DDC1 and DDC2B signaling support. SiS developed two IGCs, the 6204 for the 16-bit ISA bus, and the 6205 for the newer PCI bus. It combined the northbridge functions with a graphics controller and set the stage for a new category-the IGC. June 1995-Taiwan-based Silicon Integrated Systems introduced the SiS6204, the first PC-based integrated graphics controller (IGC) chipset for Intel processors. It ran at 40 MHz and was socket- and binary-compatible with the SPARC integer unit (IU) standard. The W8701 integrated a floating-point processor (FPP) into a SPARC RISC microprocessor. This chipset consisted of two parts: the W8701 SPARC microprocessor and the W8720 Integrated Graphics Controller (IGC). May 1995-One of the first examples of integrating a graphics controller with other components was the SPARC enhancement chipset from Weitek. In between, we saw clever and innovative designs from various suppliers, many of them no longer with us.
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AMD followed them with the Llano in 2011, but with a much bigger and more powerful GPU. Integrated graphics have evolved from being part of the chipset to being integrated within the CPU. They have now found their way into smartphones, tablets, cars, game consoles, and many other devices. Integrated graphics have been with us since 1991 in the workstation space, and since 1995 in the PC.