Nvidia piles on graphics pain

* THE PESKY table at the bottom reproduces data in a table sent to us by JPR. But AMD is listed as in position number two, although the figures don't reflect this. Surely Nvidia is in number two?

FABLESS SEMI FIRM Nvidia has continued to increase its graphics market share but all firms didn't see a huge growth in PC sales.

According to market research from Jon Peddie, desktop graphics fell by four per cent in the fourth quarter of last year compared to the earlier quarter. Discrete desktop graphics sals fell by six per cent compared to Q3 2006, and 8.9 per cent year on year, QoQ.

But Peddie Research reckons that Microsoft Vista, ATI's R600 and Nvidia add in boards will give the desktop discrete market a boost.

Possibly.

It's the notebook market where all the action is, said the firm, with quarterly shipments soaring by 13.8% compared to the previous quarter, and 34.1 per cent year on year.

Discrete mobile ships grew by 16.2% during the quarter. Why? Jon Peddie reckons the laptop market has gone large screen and multimedia-ish. "The criterion for performance is being able to play a full length movie on one battery charge," he said. Obviously he means Hollywood rather than Bollywood movies. The latter are considerably longer than the former, by and large.

Nearly 26 million mobile graphics devices shipped in the fourth quarter, with 19.7 million of those being integrtated chipsets. Intel's share was 49.8% (Q3 51.4%), AMD 23.4%, and Nvidia had a 22.9% share for this quarter and for this market. That must worry AMD a tad.

On the discrete mobile side, AMD's (really ATI's) segment share fell to 40.9% in Q4 (47% Q3), Nvidia grew its share to 59.1% (53%).

Here is a map of the overall position in Q4, Q3 2006, courtesy of Jon Peddie Research:

Position	Vendor	Q3 2006	Q4 2006
1	Intel	37.1%	37.4%
2	AMD	20.9%	23%
3	Nvidia	28.8%	28.5%
4	Via	8.7%	6.7%
5	SIS	4.5%	4.5%
6	Others	<1%	<1%

So what are we to make of this? Laptop discrete shipments are very high, Intel is flat, AMD has gained a little, but Nvidia only lost ground in the add in board front. µ

L'INQ
Jon Peddie Research