Thomson launches the Firecoder Blu, a graphics card with dedicated video encoding (MPEG2, MPEG4, AVCHD, H.264,…). First, the term “graphics card” is misleading. This is not a graphics card in the sense that most of us understand. It does not have a monitor plug. It’s more a dedicated adapter with functions of encoding-decoding video. To transcode (convert from one format to another) it can save your time, if it’s programmed in a right way.

Decoding is easy: Nvidia, ATI and Intel have all graphics chips for that cost within $10 (wholesale prices). Between the three, Nvidia can transcode video with Bababoom, Intel passes through the central processor.

With a price of $539 (¥52,290 in Japan) for the Firecoder Blu, we have questions. Who would be crazy to buy a co-processor which is twice slower than the CPU of the PS3, while the GeForce GTX 280 is within $450? We would like to know what are the forecasts for sales…

There are not only Nvidia and ATI: S3 Graphics, graphics division of VIA, introduced its new generation of chips, Chrome 500. The strategy of S3 Graphics is the same as that applied for the new Nano processor, ie avoid fighting against the giants of the sector in the area of performance, but rather on the price/functions/consumption.

The first graphics card announced is the Chrome 530GT and will be sold for a price of $45, without further details on its memory capacity. Anyway, it is likely that S3 declines its technology to integrate it on its EPIA mini, pico and nano ITX platforms.

NVIDIA has launched its new graphics card Quadro FX 5800 and announced that it’s “the graphics card for professional the most powerful in the history of graphics cards”. Price: $3500.

The specifications include:

• 240 CUDA Parallel Processor Cores
• 4 GB of Graphics Memory
• 102 GB/s of Memory Bandwidth
• Maximum Power Consumption of 189W
• OpenGL 2.1
• Shader Model 4.0
• Microsoft DirectX 10
• SLI Frame Rendering Support
• Genlock/Framelock