Asus, Digit-Life break ATI NDA

UPDATE 19:37 BRITISH STANDARD ATI said: "We have now completed our investigation of the situation. As you know, we at ATI take NDAs (non disclosure agreements) very seriously. In this situation, there appeared to be a misunderstanding about dates. We explained this to the site owners, and they were more than happy to remove the pages until tomorrow's deadline".

RUSSIAN SITE Digit-Life has gone live with a review that includes the not yet launched ATi RADEON 9600XT graphics accelerator. All of the cards tested, including the 9600XT seem to have been supplied by new ATi customer ASUSTeK.

Channel sources confirm that the 9600XT NDA (Non Disclosure Agreement) for publication of such articles expires tomorrow, October 15th 2003 at 14:00 GMT.

Andrey Vorobiev of Digit-Life makes this point: "Right after the release of the RADEON 9800 XT, 9600 XT the Canadian company announced ASUSTeK Partner No1. Does such partnership mean unequal conditions for the its other partners? - We don't know."

Grabbing Asus from Nvidia's sole hold has been a major coup for ATi, but we wonder whether ATi is willing to sit by while a partner is instrumental in diluting the value of the NDAs in place with other partners?

We wondered so we asked.

ATi's Regional PR Manager Andrzej Bania said he would seek a full response but added: "NDAs are very important because they allow a broad cross-section of reviewers to evaluate new technology in a fair way."

If ATi doesn't take rapid action soon, this could open the floodgates, not only this time round, but also for future launches. µ

L'INQ
Digit-Life