April. Intel started losing its ground fast. Firstly, an intermediate 700MHz DR DRAM specification was ratified as an attempt to increase valid chips output. A reasonable step, as 600MHz DR DRAM was not interesting to anyone in the industry while 800MHz might be too much for some manufacturers. Well, when there are such changes half a year before the final product release and after a few years of development, we can't possibly call it a stable design. But Intel and Rambus still claimed that whatever the difficulties, i820/DR DRAM was coming out in September. DR DRAM success was questioned more then. Samsung heroically covered the flank for Intel/Rambus and told everybody and everyone that PC133 SDRAM was a baby toy while 128bit DR DRAM chip market was expected to reach 50 million pieces in 1999. But at the same time the company still supported PC133.

Secondly, as people were concerned that there will be no opportunity to use the Coppermine with 133MHz FSB, Intel started giving away DR DRAM architecture, too. Paul Otellini, senior manager of Intel architecture business group, said: "I wouldn't consider it [Rambus] a must. 133MHz bus can be used apart of Rambus". And if it can be used, why not use it? But Intel will make this step a few months later.

Late April - Early May. VIA rolled out its Apollo Pro133, in spite of Intel's brandishing GTL+ license and claiming it didn't cover the 133MHz system bus. Well, there should be the last warning, so one of Intel's advocate offices sued VIA for all possible and impossible sins. The suit was taken back the same day, as it was merely a threat. Meanwhile SiS announced SiS630, an integrated chipset with built-in AGP 4x, UltraDMA/66,133MHz system bus and PC133 SDRAM support.

May. Intel rolls out an error-ridden i810. VIA continues shipping Apollo Pro133. Memory makers are polishing off the technological process, reduce DR DRAM chip size and produce PC133 SDRAM chips. By September, by the arrival of i820, most manufacturers will use 0.20micron technology already. There are a lot of AGP 4x graphics cards with no systems to use them on in this mode. The manufacturers of RIMM module connectors are increasing their production volumes. They have already got facilities to produce 800 thousand a month, are going to hit 1.5 million a month by September and are perfectly sure about the mass demand.

Seems familiar, doesn't it? Yeah, that's exactly what we saw in December-January. The same hurry, the same last preparations, the same wish to be the first to offer products for i820. Only then the companies invested their money relying upon Intel's promise to roll out i820 in June, and now - in September.

Intel already had the A1 version of i820 chipset. Mainboard makers referred to it as a flawed, slow, and too raw chipset. What's more, it required expensive equipment to design and test mainboards, which most manufacturers just didn't have. Taiwan was far from being delightful. As the situation with Rambus was not quite clear, memory makers continued working on DDR DRAM and developing 128, 256, 512MB and even 1GB chips. Moreover, 128MB samples were already available. The situation with i820/DR DRAM was just the opposite: memory makers were ready to start mass production of DDR DRAM and were only waiting for chipsets to support it.