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Timeline 3d graphic12/21/2023 Poor yields meant actual clock speeds were 30% below expectations, and buggy drivers caused further problems. Sold well to OEMs mainly because of low price and excellent 2D-performance. ViRGE (no suffix), VX, DX, GX, GX2, Trio3D, Trio3D/2X - S3's first Windows 3D-accelerators.The 64 bit versions were S3's most successful product range. S3 Vision868, Vision968 - S3's first motion video accelerator (zoom and YUV→ RGB conversion).S3 Vision864, Vision964 (1994) - 2nd generation Windows accelerators (64-bit wide framebuffer).S3 928 - 24/32-bit true-color acceleration, DRAM or VRAM.S3 801, 805, 805i - mainstream DRAM VLB Windows accelerators (16/256-color, high-color acceleration).S3 924 - 24-bit true-color acceleration.S3 911, 911A (June 10, 1991) - S3's first Windows accelerators (16/256-color, high-color acceleration).In November, the United States International Trade Commission ruled against S3 in a patent dispute with Apple. In July 2011, HTC Corporation announced they were buying VIA Technologies' stake in S3 Graphics, thus becoming the majority owner of S3 Graphics. Subsequent discrete derivations carried the brand names DeltaChrome and GammaChrome. Savage-derived chips were integrated into numerous VIA motherboard chipsets. The resulting company renamed itself SONICblue, refocused on consumer electronics, and sold its graphics business to VIA Technologies. S3 bought Number Nine's assets in 1999, then merged with Diamond Multimedia. Their next design, the Savage 3D, was released early and suffered from driver issues, but it introduced S3TC, which became an industry standard. As S3 lost market share, their offerings competed in the mid-range market. In some cases, the chips performed worse than software-based solutions without an accelerator. ![]() S3's first 3D accelerator chips, the ViRGE series, controlled half of the market early on but could not compete against the high end 3D accelerators from ATI, Nvidia, and 3Dfx. S3 took over the high end 2D market just prior to the popularity of 3D accelerators. These chips were popular with video card manufacturers, and their followup designs, including the Trio64, made strong inroads with OEMs. ![]() The company's first products were among the earliest graphical user interface (GUI) accelerators. It was named S3 as it was Banatao's third startup company. S3 was founded and incorporated in January 1989 by Dado Banatao and Ronald Yara.
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