NVIDIA Authorizes SLI for Centrino

by Michael Lin — Friday, July 28, 2006, 08:00 AM EDT

No doubt in a rebuttal to AMD's recent acquisition of ATI, HKEPC reports that NVIDIA has officially authorized Intel to have SLI functionality with the company's Centrino mobile platform. The first mobile chipset to have SLI support will be the i945GM/PM Express chipset and that functionality will be unlocked at the software level by Forceware 91.31 drivers. Obviously, this is a huge development for notebook ODM's as they can now address the wildly popular Centrino platform with their multi-GPU efforts. Perhaps more importantly, this is the first step towards Intel receiving SLI support for their own desktop chipsets. Despite the benefits of the AMD/ATI merger, one gets the feeling that this deal has angered an 800lb gorilla. More than likely, this bit of news is just the tip of the iceberg.

"During the time of interview to Vincent, he admitted that nVidia has authorized Intel mobile chipset for SLi support. The first support is given to i945GM/PM Express under Centrino or Napa Refresh platform. Centrino SLi Notebook is no longer impossible! Although i945GM/PM haven't got dual PCI-E x8/x16 interface, it's possible to make SLi form PCI-E x16 + x4 interface by the build-in PCI-E lanes of its south bridge. The i945GM/PM SLi function indeed is available in the official release of Forceware 91.31, although the product is no ready yet. For more information about whether i975X will be authorized to give SLi support, Vincent said the company is looking for more chance to cooperate, but nothing is confirmed yet."

Tags: Nvidia, sli, Centrino, id

NVIDIA Authorizes SLI for Centrino

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