WEBVTT - Graphics and Nvidia 0:00:04.120 --> 0:00:07.160 Get in touch with technology with tech Stuff from how 0:00:07.200 --> 0:00:13.800 stuff works dot com. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. 0:00:13.840 --> 0:00:16.360 I'm your host, Jonathan Strickling. I'm an executive producer with 0:00:16.360 --> 0:00:19.440 how Stuff Works in love all Things Tech, and I 0:00:19.480 --> 0:00:23.000 have received lots of requests over the years to cover 0:00:23.160 --> 0:00:26.880 the company in Video and the products they make, and 0:00:26.920 --> 0:00:30.600 in Video is chiefly known for their GPUs, or graphics 0:00:30.680 --> 0:00:34.680 processing units. So before we jump into the history of 0:00:34.800 --> 0:00:38.160 Nvidia and how it helped define the evolution of computers 0:00:38.320 --> 0:00:42.440 and how it created the term GPU, how about we 0:00:42.479 --> 0:00:45.879 explore the concept of graphics cards and GPUs in general. 0:00:45.920 --> 0:00:50.440 A and just a note for you guys, this gets 0:00:50.440 --> 0:00:53.640 super technical, super fast. So I am going to take 0:00:53.720 --> 0:00:57.000 a very high level on all of this because if 0:00:57.040 --> 0:01:00.760 you really want to know and have a but understanding 0:01:00.840 --> 0:01:04.479 of the history of GPUs and graphics cards, you also 0:01:04.600 --> 0:01:08.959 have to have an understanding of the evolution of how 0:01:09.760 --> 0:01:14.560 we program graphics, things like application programmer interfaces or a 0:01:14.640 --> 0:01:17.840 p I s um that kind of stuff. You need 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:21.759 to know about that evolution in addition to the evolution 0:01:21.959 --> 0:01:27.399 of the technology itself. And it gets super technical. And 0:01:28.000 --> 0:01:30.640 while it might be interesting to a subset of tech 0:01:30.640 --> 0:01:33.360 stuff listeners. I feel like for a lot of people, 0:01:33.520 --> 0:01:35.959 I would lose them very quickly. I have a feeling 0:01:35.959 --> 0:01:38.839 this These episodes are going to lose some folks anyway, 0:01:39.080 --> 0:01:41.960 and that's okay. But for those who are interested in 0:01:42.360 --> 0:01:45.720 in video and graphics cards, stick around. We're gonna learn 0:01:45.800 --> 0:01:50.640 some interesting stuff. So to understand in video's role, we 0:01:50.720 --> 0:01:55.240 actually have to dial way back before the founding of Nvidio, 0:01:55.320 --> 0:01:59.640 which was We're gonna go all the way back to 0:01:59.760 --> 0:02:03.800 nine teen fifty one, just briefly, because that's when the U. S. 0:02:03.920 --> 0:02:06.920 Navy awarded a contract to M I T to design 0:02:06.960 --> 0:02:10.360 a flight simulator, and M I T created a simulator 0:02:10.440 --> 0:02:15.320 called Whirlwind. That system had an early three D graphics system, 0:02:15.360 --> 0:02:18.239 but the architecture of Whirlwind wouldn't become the basis for 0:02:18.320 --> 0:02:21.040 the graphics card of the future. However, it's important to 0:02:21.120 --> 0:02:26.360 note that people were thinking about trying to create graphics 0:02:26.360 --> 0:02:30.760 that would represent three dimensional objects using computer systems as 0:02:30.800 --> 0:02:34.760 early as the nineteen fifties. But to look at the 0:02:34.840 --> 0:02:38.720 kind of technology that eventually evolved into the realm where 0:02:38.760 --> 0:02:41.519 in video got involved, we have to look really more 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:44.760 at the birth of Arcades home video game consoles and 0:02:44.840 --> 0:02:48.440 the personal computer, so this would be the mid nineteen seventies. 0:02:49.000 --> 0:02:52.960 Arcade machines and consoles had specialized chips in them, and 0:02:53.000 --> 0:02:55.760 we typically would refer to them as things like video 0:02:55.840 --> 0:03:01.040 address generators or video shifters, and the chips or circuits 0:03:01.040 --> 0:03:05.840 in some cases would take information from a processor and 0:03:05.919 --> 0:03:08.799 relay that in a meaningful way to a display in 0:03:08.960 --> 0:03:10.760 order to create the images you would see on a 0:03:10.760 --> 0:03:15.480 computer monitor or a television. So remember that a processor 0:03:15.520 --> 0:03:19.239 like a CPU central processing unit, will take in data 0:03:19.639 --> 0:03:24.040 from a source. You get input that goes into the CPU. 0:03:24.120 --> 0:03:28.600 The CPU will perform various operations on that data according 0:03:28.639 --> 0:03:32.440 to a program running on the machine, and then produce 0:03:32.560 --> 0:03:36.560 output that is meaningful based upon the combination of the 0:03:36.600 --> 0:03:41.520 program and the input. And then that output will go somewhere. 0:03:41.920 --> 0:03:44.720 It might feed into a new process, it might go 0:03:44.840 --> 0:03:48.600 to an output device, and this is in good old 0:03:48.680 --> 0:03:54.200 machine code. So the graphics chips or circuits their purpose 0:03:54.320 --> 0:03:58.640 was to receive output data from the CPU that was 0:03:58.920 --> 0:04:02.960 specially scifically intended to go toward a display and then 0:04:03.280 --> 0:04:05.680 to take it from there. So graphics card act as 0:04:05.720 --> 0:04:08.839 sort of a translator. They take the data from the CPU, 0:04:08.920 --> 0:04:11.360 and they turn it into something that's meaningful for a 0:04:11.400 --> 0:04:14.800 display to show a bunch of points of light on 0:04:14.840 --> 0:04:18.240 a screen. Remember, the images we see on screens are 0:04:18.240 --> 0:04:21.520 made up of pixels, and pixels are points of light. 0:04:22.320 --> 0:04:25.440 And the smaller the pixels, the more you can fit 0:04:25.520 --> 0:04:29.039 on a screen, the greater the resolution, just generally speaking. 0:04:29.320 --> 0:04:31.760 So computers need a graphics card or some sort of 0:04:31.760 --> 0:04:36.920 graphics processing unit or interface on the computer's motherboard itself 0:04:37.720 --> 0:04:41.000 or in an expansion card in order to do this. Now, 0:04:41.040 --> 0:04:44.040 those early chips in the nineteen seventies had names like 0:04:44.360 --> 0:04:47.320 the c d P eighteen sixty one from our c 0:04:47.520 --> 0:04:50.200 A or the T I A one A which was 0:04:50.480 --> 0:04:56.120 used in the ATAR in Motorola debut. The MC six 0:04:56.160 --> 0:05:00.200 eight four or five video address generator. That chip give 0:05:00.240 --> 0:05:03.120 instructions to a display that would include information such as 0:05:03.200 --> 0:05:06.840 luminants or how bright the image should be, that pixel 0:05:06.880 --> 0:05:11.000 should be, color, and position. And so the pixels new 0:05:11.320 --> 0:05:13.640 quote unquote knew how bright they need to be, what 0:05:13.680 --> 0:05:15.799 color they needed to be, and the display new which 0:05:15.800 --> 0:05:19.000 pixels needed to be shown it or be activated at 0:05:19.040 --> 0:05:23.560 any given time. More importantly for our story, the MC 0:05:23.839 --> 0:05:26.520 six eight four or five chip for Motorola served as 0:05:26.560 --> 0:05:29.880 the foundation for the first video card for a personal computer, 0:05:30.279 --> 0:05:34.240 which was IBMS Monochrome Display Adapter, which was introduced in 0:05:36.120 --> 0:05:38.880 Now that could not really generate graphics the same way 0:05:39.200 --> 0:05:41.359 we would talk about today, but it could display text 0:05:41.400 --> 0:05:46.080 and characters in monochrome initially. Eventually you also had a 0:05:46.120 --> 0:05:49.800 color one. Intel built a graphics chip called the eight 0:05:50.040 --> 0:05:54.320 two seven twenty which could display up to eight colors. Wow, 0:05:54.839 --> 0:05:57.760 can also support a resolution of two hundred fifty six 0:05:57.760 --> 0:06:01.160 by two fifty six pixels. Now, if you swopped over 0:06:01.200 --> 0:06:04.279 to monochrome, you could actually have a better resolution of 0:06:04.279 --> 0:06:08.200 five twelve by five twelve pixels. And for several years, 0:06:08.320 --> 0:06:12.479 video game consoles and arcade machines were miles ahead of 0:06:12.480 --> 0:06:17.280 personal computers when it came to graphic quality. The circuits 0:06:17.279 --> 0:06:20.920 in the gaming machines were dedicated to that task, and 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:25.400 early arcade games had systems that were essentially hard coded 0:06:25.480 --> 0:06:28.680 onto circuits, which meant if you wanted to change a 0:06:28.760 --> 0:06:31.240 game out in an arcade cabinet. Let's say that you've 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:34.479 got an arcade cabinet, and inside that cabinet you have 0:06:35.160 --> 0:06:37.720 I don't know, let's say it's Galica and you want 0:06:37.720 --> 0:06:41.279 to swap out Galaga for pac Man, Well, you can't 0:06:41.320 --> 0:06:44.000 just take a chip out and replace it with another chip. 0:06:44.040 --> 0:06:46.839 You would actually have to essentially gut the whole cabinet 0:06:47.200 --> 0:06:51.919 and replace the INNERDS with the new ones from pac Man. 0:06:52.200 --> 0:06:54.920 There was no swapping a flash drive or anything like that. 0:06:55.480 --> 0:07:01.120 The advantage of the dedicated systems was that a could 0:07:01.160 --> 0:07:05.440 really create pretty good graphics, especially compared to the stuff 0:07:05.480 --> 0:07:08.360 you would see on computers. You get really good results. 0:07:08.640 --> 0:07:11.480 But the downside was it was not a viable approach 0:07:11.480 --> 0:07:14.000 if you wanted to create a general purpose machine like 0:07:14.040 --> 0:07:16.800 a personal computer, and so PCs for the most part, 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:21.400 lagged behind these specialty machines, at least in the graphics department. 0:07:21.720 --> 0:07:24.320 In the mid nineteen eighties, a company called A t 0:07:24.600 --> 0:07:27.560 I began to manufacture graphics cards. They would end up 0:07:27.600 --> 0:07:32.040 becoming incredibly important in that realm. Their early products were 0:07:32.080 --> 0:07:36.760 o e M, or original equipment manufacturer cards, which meant 0:07:37.160 --> 0:07:40.120 they were producing chips that were meant to be included 0:07:40.280 --> 0:07:43.520 in finished products that other companies were making. So they 0:07:43.520 --> 0:07:46.560 were they were making a component that would be included 0:07:46.640 --> 0:07:50.520 in a larger product that some other manufacturer was producing. 0:07:51.200 --> 0:07:56.240 Um they were not selling directly to the end customers, 0:07:56.320 --> 0:08:00.320 So you wouldn't go into a store and buy an 0:08:00.320 --> 0:08:04.760 a TI chip back in the mid nineteen eighties. Instead 0:08:04.760 --> 0:08:07.880 you would go and buy a computer that had an 0:08:07.880 --> 0:08:11.440 a TI chip in it, or maybe a card that 0:08:11.560 --> 0:08:14.560 had an a TI chip incorporated in it. That would 0:08:14.640 --> 0:08:17.480 change in the late nineteen eighties. You would start seeing 0:08:17.520 --> 0:08:21.200 a t I producing its own cards supporting stuff like 0:08:21.280 --> 0:08:23.440 e G A and v G A graphics and I'm 0:08:23.480 --> 0:08:27.119 not going to go into those. It would be ridiculously 0:08:27.560 --> 0:08:30.600 long winded to go into all those different graphics and 0:08:30.760 --> 0:08:33.280 they largely are unimportant by the time we get around 0:08:33.280 --> 0:08:37.120 to talking about in video anyway. So this, however, was 0:08:37.160 --> 0:08:38.520 one of the big moves that led to the birth 0:08:38.559 --> 0:08:41.920 of the graphics card industry as a consumer facing business. 0:08:42.640 --> 0:08:46.800 By the early nineteen nineties, when Nvidio would debut, more 0:08:46.880 --> 0:08:50.840 companies started making two D graphics cards for computers and 0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:55.240 three D accelerators typically paired with those two D graphics cards, 0:08:55.960 --> 0:08:58.040 and then a t I came out with the Mack 0:08:58.160 --> 0:09:02.480 sixty four that was the the graphics card that also 0:09:02.520 --> 0:09:06.800 included support for a TV tuner and full motion video playback. Acceleration, 0:09:07.320 --> 0:09:09.520 and things were really starting to pick up in those 0:09:09.520 --> 0:09:12.480 early nineties. Now let's take a step back and consider 0:09:12.520 --> 0:09:14.880 why this is a big deal. When you're looking at 0:09:14.920 --> 0:09:18.560 a three D image on a computer screen, meaning one 0:09:18.559 --> 0:09:22.079 that uses various techniques to simulate depths, a lot has 0:09:22.120 --> 0:09:24.839 to happen to produce those results. Because what you're looking 0:09:24.840 --> 0:09:29.200 at is a two dimensional representation of a three dimensional object. 0:09:30.040 --> 0:09:34.200 The graphics processing unit has to construct a wire frame 0:09:34.559 --> 0:09:37.360 for the shape you're looking at, to build out sort 0:09:37.400 --> 0:09:42.720 of a an exoskeleton, if you will, for the entire scene, 0:09:43.080 --> 0:09:46.839 everything from characters in it to backgrounds, et cetera. If 0:09:46.840 --> 0:09:51.200 it's doing a full three dimensional h field of view, 0:09:51.880 --> 0:09:55.840 that frame ultimately consists of a bunch of straight lines typically, 0:09:56.160 --> 0:09:58.959 but the lines can be really short and at angles, 0:09:59.320 --> 0:10:03.880 and if you have the lines small enough and at 0:10:04.400 --> 0:10:07.640 slight enough angles from each other, you can simulate curved shapes. 0:10:08.320 --> 0:10:10.880 And once the wire frame is there, the graphics card 0:10:11.120 --> 0:10:14.200 raster rises the image, which means it fills in the 0:10:14.200 --> 0:10:17.520 pixels kind of like a coloring book. You're filling in 0:10:18.040 --> 0:10:22.200 the spaces for that wire frame. Next, it adds elements 0:10:22.240 --> 0:10:26.080 like color and texture and lighting effects. And that's just 0:10:26.240 --> 0:10:30.640 for one moment, one instance of that image. So if 0:10:30.640 --> 0:10:34.000 you're playing a game, typically you're having stuff change on 0:10:34.120 --> 0:10:38.160 screen pretty regularly and sometimes quickly, so the image needs 0:10:38.160 --> 0:10:42.400 to be updated frequently, and a fast paced shooter, for example, 0:10:42.679 --> 0:10:45.040 will not be a fun experience. If your computer can 0:10:45.080 --> 0:10:48.320 only display a couple of new images every second, you'd 0:10:48.320 --> 0:10:51.560 be toast. If it were a competitive game, thirty frames 0:10:51.559 --> 0:10:55.280 per second is considered slow or at least subpar, But 0:10:55.360 --> 0:10:58.360 if you can get thirty frames per second regularly, tend 0:10:58.520 --> 0:11:01.000 things tend to be playable. You really want something that's 0:11:01.000 --> 0:11:04.520 sixty frames per second at least for a smooth experience. 0:11:04.880 --> 0:11:08.040 And the more graphically rich the image, the more work 0:11:08.120 --> 0:11:11.280 that entails. Right, the more detail you have in your 0:11:11.360 --> 0:11:15.480 in your individual images, the more work your your graphics 0:11:15.480 --> 0:11:18.240 processor is going to have to do in order to 0:11:18.360 --> 0:11:23.000 refresh that sixty times a second. So the graphics processing 0:11:23.080 --> 0:11:25.440 unit has to be able to relay the appropriate information 0:11:25.440 --> 0:11:28.280 at a bandwidth large enough and a speed fast enough 0:11:28.320 --> 0:11:31.440 to produce those results, and it's a big job. Graphics 0:11:31.480 --> 0:11:36.240 cards typically have four main components. They have a motherboard, 0:11:36.360 --> 0:11:38.960 which is a circuit board upon which all the other 0:11:39.040 --> 0:11:44.760 components are on top of UH. The graphics processor and 0:11:44.840 --> 0:11:48.880 other connections are all sitting on this circuit board, and 0:11:48.960 --> 0:11:51.920 the motherboard also has a connector to plug into a computer, 0:11:52.320 --> 0:11:56.280 and that connector allows the motherboard to accept data and 0:11:56.400 --> 0:11:59.559 power from the computer and send data back to the computer. 0:12:00.080 --> 0:12:03.480 Then you've got the processor. It's the processor's job to 0:12:03.520 --> 0:12:06.400 interpret information from the computer and send data to the 0:12:06.480 --> 0:12:09.280 display so that the right pixels show up at the 0:12:09.360 --> 0:12:11.280 right time at the right part of the screen. And 0:12:11.320 --> 0:12:15.600 the processor specializes in performing geometric calculations and can include 0:12:15.640 --> 0:12:19.679 features like anti aliasing that's a smoothing technology to take 0:12:19.720 --> 0:12:23.240 some of those pointy edges off the graphics, since ultimately 0:12:23.679 --> 0:12:25.679 all the shapes you're looking at are made up of 0:12:27.160 --> 0:12:31.720 straight lines. Or there's also an isotropic filtering, which creates 0:12:31.920 --> 0:12:36.520 a more crisp image. Then there's another component on these 0:12:36.520 --> 0:12:39.560 cards that's memory. Graphics cards have memory to store information 0:12:39.559 --> 0:12:44.199 about each of the pixels and temporarily store completed images. UH. 0:12:44.280 --> 0:12:47.240 Then there's some sort of connector that allows you to 0:12:47.280 --> 0:12:50.760 plug the display into the graphics card so that way 0:12:50.920 --> 0:12:55.720 you can actually see the wonderful graphics this card is creating. 0:12:55.880 --> 0:12:59.480 If you don't have a connector, then there's the display 0:12:59.480 --> 0:13:03.400 has no way of receiving that information, right. So also 0:13:03.480 --> 0:13:08.319 these days you might end up using a connector on 0:13:08.360 --> 0:13:12.360 the back to plug one graphics card into a second 0:13:12.400 --> 0:13:16.680 graphics card and run them in series so that you 0:13:16.720 --> 0:13:20.240 can boost the performance. That is becoming more and more 0:13:20.280 --> 0:13:24.080 common where you start seeing big gaming rigs that have 0:13:24.200 --> 0:13:29.360 multiple high performing graphics cards inside of them. Now, these 0:13:29.440 --> 0:13:32.080 cards tend to produce a lot of heat because they're 0:13:32.080 --> 0:13:33.880 working very, very hard, and they've got a lot of 0:13:33.880 --> 0:13:36.640 components on them, and so they tend to also have 0:13:36.760 --> 0:13:40.200 multiple cores. That means the processors can work on parallel problems. 0:13:40.840 --> 0:13:44.800 Most graphics rendering falls into that category, but as it 0:13:44.800 --> 0:13:48.040 turns out, so do other computational problems, which is why 0:13:48.120 --> 0:13:51.680 you will hear about large groups using GPUs to tackle 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:55.280 certain types of challenges like mining bitcoins. I'll talk more 0:13:55.280 --> 0:13:58.120 about that in our second episode, but that's a good 0:13:58.120 --> 0:14:00.880 basic grounding of graphics cards. When we come back, I'm 0:14:00.880 --> 0:14:04.400 going to talk about the founding of Nvidia and the 0:14:04.520 --> 0:14:16.200 environment it found itself in those early days. In nine three, 0:14:16.600 --> 0:14:22.160 Jensen Huang, Chris Malachowski, and Curtis priam founded in Vidia. 0:14:22.480 --> 0:14:25.480 But where did they come from? Well, Huang, who is 0:14:25.520 --> 0:14:28.760 president and CEO of Nvidia to this day, was born 0:14:28.800 --> 0:14:32.440 in Taiwan, and then he lived in Thailand as a 0:14:32.480 --> 0:14:34.760 young boy until his family sent him and his brother 0:14:34.800 --> 0:14:38.640 to the United States because Thailand was becoming politically unstable, 0:14:39.000 --> 0:14:41.680 and they moved in with some family members over in 0:14:41.680 --> 0:14:44.640 the States. His aunt and uncle enrolled Huang in a 0:14:44.720 --> 0:14:48.120 boarding school in Kentucky. They thought it was a prep school. 0:14:48.200 --> 0:14:50.040 It turned out that it was actually a school for 0:14:50.080 --> 0:14:53.320 troubled youth. He and his brother were reunited with their 0:14:53.360 --> 0:14:58.040 family and moved to Oregon. Huang would attend Oregon State University. 0:14:58.080 --> 0:15:02.640 He studied electrical engineering there and graduated with an undergraduate degree. 0:15:02.840 --> 0:15:06.160 Then he went on to enroll in Stanford University to 0:15:06.240 --> 0:15:10.080 earn his master's degree in electrical engineering. After that, he 0:15:10.160 --> 0:15:13.200 went to work for Advanced micro Devices or a m D. 0:15:13.680 --> 0:15:16.440 Interesting because we'll hear more about a m D in 0:15:16.480 --> 0:15:19.200 the next episode, and he also then worked for l 0:15:19.360 --> 0:15:22.440 s I Logic before he would leave to co found 0:15:22.480 --> 0:15:26.160 in Video Chris Malachowski, who today is part of in 0:15:26.240 --> 0:15:30.720 Vidio's executive staff and serves as a senior technology executive. 0:15:31.000 --> 0:15:35.119 He attended the University of Florida and received his bachelor's 0:15:35.120 --> 0:15:38.080 degree there and then went to Santa Clara University for 0:15:38.120 --> 0:15:41.120 his masters. He went on to work as a manufacturing 0:15:41.160 --> 0:15:44.080 design engineer at Hewlett Packard in nineteen eighty and in 0:15:44.160 --> 0:15:48.640 nineteen seven he started working for Sun Microsystems and became 0:15:48.680 --> 0:15:51.360 a senior staff engineer, and while he was there, he 0:15:51.520 --> 0:15:55.480 co invented the g X graphics architecture and led design 0:15:55.520 --> 0:16:01.040 work on graphics interfaces. Curtis Priam attended rin Alert Polytechnic 0:16:01.520 --> 0:16:04.240 Institute and he earned a degree in electrical engineering in 0:16:04.280 --> 0:16:07.880 nineteen eighty two. He worked on the IBM Professional Graphics 0:16:07.880 --> 0:16:11.720 Adapter and like Malachowski, Prium would end up working at 0:16:11.760 --> 0:16:14.480 Sun Microsystems and was also one of the inventors of 0:16:14.480 --> 0:16:18.040 the g X graphics architecture and now the three founders 0:16:18.080 --> 0:16:20.120 for in Nvidia. He is the one who is no 0:16:20.160 --> 0:16:23.080 longer working with the company. He retired from in Vidia 0:16:23.160 --> 0:16:27.280 in two thousand three. So back in pri Um and 0:16:27.320 --> 0:16:33.680 Malachowski are steaming. They're incredibly frustrated because they had been 0:16:33.760 --> 0:16:37.480 encountering roadblocks at Sun micro Systems. They both felt the 0:16:37.520 --> 0:16:40.240 company was pushing R and D in the wrong direction 0:16:40.400 --> 0:16:44.160 for graphics, and Wong, who was working at l S 0:16:44.160 --> 0:16:48.000 I he wasn't really disenchanted by his work, but he 0:16:48.120 --> 0:16:50.520 was thinking about what the future of processing was going 0:16:50.560 --> 0:16:52.960 to be all about. And the three sat down to 0:16:53.000 --> 0:16:57.640 talk things over at dinner at a Denny's restaurant, which 0:16:57.680 --> 0:17:01.240 I think is great. The idea that a hugely successful 0:17:01.280 --> 0:17:05.720 company was born over a conversation at a Denny's is 0:17:05.760 --> 0:17:09.320 fantastic to me. I've had a lot of conversations at Denny's. 0:17:10.080 --> 0:17:14.240 None of them have led to a monumentally successful company, 0:17:14.280 --> 0:17:16.640 so I'm not doing it right. But anyway, the three 0:17:16.640 --> 0:17:20.160 of them, I started talking about the future of computing, 0:17:20.160 --> 0:17:24.760 and they agreed that graphics based accelerated computing was the future. 0:17:25.400 --> 0:17:30.440 And gosh, they were incredibly prescient about that. We'll we'll 0:17:30.440 --> 0:17:32.720 talk more about that, I mean, but I kind of 0:17:32.760 --> 0:17:35.880 alluded to it earlier, about how graphics processing units are 0:17:35.920 --> 0:17:38.680 now used in lots of different applications that have nothing 0:17:38.720 --> 0:17:43.160 to do with making pretty pictures on a display. Uh. 0:17:43.320 --> 0:17:47.200 They kind of saw that coming down the pipe. Maybe 0:17:47.280 --> 0:17:49.760 not quite in those terms, but they did think that 0:17:49.920 --> 0:17:55.280 was the future of computing. However, to pursue this belief. 0:17:55.520 --> 0:17:58.719 It would mean forming a new company and and leaving 0:17:58.760 --> 0:18:02.280 their current jobs, and then designing the technology from the 0:18:02.320 --> 0:18:06.680 ground up, designing graphics chips from the from the beginning, 0:18:07.000 --> 0:18:10.120 and so it would mean entering into a crowded marketplace 0:18:10.200 --> 0:18:13.040 because the early nineties already had a lot of different 0:18:13.080 --> 0:18:17.240 companies that were creating graphics cards, and there were probably 0:18:17.280 --> 0:18:20.760 around two dozen competitors already on the market. So it's 0:18:20.800 --> 0:18:24.320 becoming a huge headache already because software developers had to 0:18:24.320 --> 0:18:27.160 figure out which formats they were going to support, which 0:18:27.200 --> 0:18:30.919 a p I s should they use to develop their 0:18:30.960 --> 0:18:35.119 software that because the APIs would be compatible with specific 0:18:35.200 --> 0:18:40.240 types of graphics cards. Graphics cards would support programs that 0:18:40.280 --> 0:18:43.920 were developed using certain APIs, and you could get things 0:18:43.920 --> 0:18:48.280 like drivers to help support uh all other API s. 0:18:48.359 --> 0:18:52.800 But if a company is making a graphics card with 0:18:52.960 --> 0:18:57.719 the intent to support a specific API, that kind of 0:18:57.720 --> 0:19:00.240 software is going to perform better on that hardware air 0:19:00.440 --> 0:19:04.080 than other software. So this was becoming a confusing marketplace 0:19:04.160 --> 0:19:06.760 for developers as well as for customers. Let's say that 0:19:06.800 --> 0:19:08.720 you're out there on the market. You you want to 0:19:09.040 --> 0:19:13.520 buy a machine that is really graphically intensive so that 0:19:13.600 --> 0:19:16.480 you can do stuff like maybe maybe you're doing architecture 0:19:16.480 --> 0:19:21.560 design or or computer assistant design CAD programming. You want 0:19:21.600 --> 0:19:23.720 to make sure that the systems you buy are going 0:19:23.800 --> 0:19:26.880 to be compatible with the software that you depend upon. 0:19:27.320 --> 0:19:29.720 And that was starting to get kind of a little 0:19:29.720 --> 0:19:31.880 complicated in the early nineties, and it would only get 0:19:31.920 --> 0:19:35.080 worse before it would get better. But this environment did 0:19:35.160 --> 0:19:39.480 lead to opportunities like the founding of companies like alien Ware. 0:19:40.080 --> 0:19:43.960 You know, alien Ware being the boutique gaming rig company 0:19:44.520 --> 0:19:47.000 that that all started because the founder of alien Ware 0:19:47.920 --> 0:19:52.680 would end up building gaming rigs for friends because he 0:19:52.800 --> 0:19:57.400 was not confused by all the different types of cards 0:19:57.440 --> 0:19:59.240 and motherboards and things like that out there, and so 0:19:59.280 --> 0:20:03.240 he would build gaming rigs for them. That was possible 0:20:03.280 --> 0:20:06.360 because of this massive confusion in the marketplace. Now, one 0:20:06.440 --> 0:20:12.159 year before in Video launched, so back in there was 0:20:12.200 --> 0:20:16.199 another company called Silicon Graphics Incorporated, later known as s 0:20:16.240 --> 0:20:20.240 g I. They will release a multi platform application programming 0:20:20.240 --> 0:20:23.080 interface for two D and three D graphics called open 0:20:23.160 --> 0:20:27.560 g L one. Oh. Now, it was not initially intended 0:20:27.920 --> 0:20:31.240 to be an a p I for developers to develop 0:20:31.400 --> 0:20:34.600 three D games or games that would use three D graphics, 0:20:34.760 --> 0:20:37.800 but it was quickly adapted for that purpose. And meanwhile 0:20:38.080 --> 0:20:42.560 Microsoft was preparing a rival API release called Direct three D. 0:20:43.119 --> 0:20:47.960 And Microsoft didn't concern itself too much to make sure 0:20:48.000 --> 0:20:51.320 that open g L would run smoothly on Windows machines, 0:20:51.920 --> 0:20:53.960 which is the kind of thing that would get Microsoft 0:20:53.960 --> 0:20:56.760 in trouble down the line. They would get accused of 0:20:56.800 --> 0:21:00.520 engaging in anti competitive practices, in other words, making sure 0:21:00.560 --> 0:21:05.160 that their operating systems would support their own software and 0:21:05.240 --> 0:21:10.199 maybe not do so much to support other people's software. 0:21:11.640 --> 0:21:14.080 But it also helps illustrate how confusing this world would 0:21:14.080 --> 0:21:18.119 have become already before the video had even hit the market. 0:21:18.520 --> 0:21:21.440 But while in Video was forming, other graphics card companies 0:21:21.480 --> 0:21:25.320 were already folding or getting absorbed into larger companies. Uh So, 0:21:25.520 --> 0:21:27.879 in Vidia is coming into a market where companies with 0:21:28.080 --> 0:21:34.440 names like Gemini Technology, Headland Technology, Tamarack, Acumos, those were 0:21:34.440 --> 0:21:38.000 starting to go away. Some companies were still around, but 0:21:38.040 --> 0:21:41.560 they shut down divisions that had been working in graphics processing. 0:21:41.880 --> 0:21:45.320 Motorola did that with their division, Acer did that. So 0:21:45.440 --> 0:21:48.000 in Video was getting into a very uncertain market and 0:21:48.040 --> 0:21:50.800 the three co founders didn't have any idea how to 0:21:50.840 --> 0:21:53.199 create a business plan, and they didn't even have a 0:21:53.240 --> 0:21:57.840 product yet, but they did hold rounds of venture capital financing. 0:21:57.920 --> 0:22:00.919 To get the startup capital. They needed to design a 0:22:01.000 --> 0:22:04.000 graphics card and partner with a manufacturer to make it. 0:22:04.359 --> 0:22:06.639 Because they did not have the manufacturing facility, they were 0:22:06.680 --> 0:22:08.440 not actually gonna build the cards. They were going to 0:22:08.560 --> 0:22:11.320 design them and send those designs to a manufacturer that 0:22:11.359 --> 0:22:13.320 would be in charge of actually putting the stuff together. 0:22:13.840 --> 0:22:17.200 Wong has said in interviews that he tried to make 0:22:17.320 --> 0:22:20.760 a business plan to present to potential investors. He really tried, 0:22:21.680 --> 0:22:25.040 but he just wasn't able to do it. And essentially 0:22:25.040 --> 0:22:27.320 he told investors, I tried to make one, but I 0:22:27.400 --> 0:22:29.080 ran out of time before I could finish it. And 0:22:29.119 --> 0:22:32.320 the response was essentially, that's okay. We wouldn't have believed 0:22:32.359 --> 0:22:35.840 your business plan anyway. But the three engineers knew their 0:22:35.880 --> 0:22:39.360 technology backward and forward, and they were able to get 0:22:39.520 --> 0:22:42.320 enough confidence and investors to secure funding to the tune 0:22:42.359 --> 0:22:45.800 of around twenty million dollars. And I would like to 0:22:45.800 --> 0:22:48.199 take this opportunity to say that I also do not 0:22:48.320 --> 0:22:53.520 have a business plan. Money please, I guess it doesn't 0:22:53.960 --> 0:22:58.639 work for me. Well, anyway, this whole process took about 0:22:58.640 --> 0:23:02.119 a year, So from ninety three to ninety four, the 0:23:02.160 --> 0:23:04.439 company is just kind of getting started. They're starting to 0:23:04.480 --> 0:23:09.240 design their work, they're raising finances. They form a strategic 0:23:09.280 --> 0:23:13.560 partnership with a company called s G S Thompson micro Electrics. 0:23:14.640 --> 0:23:17.639 This company would actually be the one to manufacture the 0:23:17.680 --> 0:23:22.560 first graphical user interface accelerator chip that in Vidio designed. 0:23:22.920 --> 0:23:27.240 They also partnered with another company called Diamond Multimedia Systems 0:23:27.600 --> 0:23:33.119 to take these chips and install them in multimedia accelerator boards. 0:23:33.160 --> 0:23:35.840 So if you think of a graphics card like an 0:23:35.880 --> 0:23:38.840 actual expansion card that you would put in a computer, 0:23:39.480 --> 0:23:43.879 Diamond Multimedia Systems built the card and the chip that 0:23:44.000 --> 0:23:48.840 powers the card was made by Nvidia. So producing graphics 0:23:48.840 --> 0:23:51.640 cards required a lot more work than just one company, 0:23:51.720 --> 0:23:54.840 is my my point here. The first product out of 0:23:55.040 --> 0:23:59.159 Nvidia would come to market in n and it was 0:23:59.240 --> 0:24:03.919 the in V one nd PC. Consumers would know it 0:24:04.000 --> 0:24:07.600 as the Diamond Edge three D graphics card, and the 0:24:07.760 --> 0:24:10.600 chip was chosen by Sega to go into the Sega 0:24:10.640 --> 0:24:15.119 Saturn game console. The Diamond Edge three D was a 0:24:15.160 --> 0:24:18.960 conventional pc I card. Pc I stands for Peripheral Component 0:24:19.040 --> 0:24:25.000 interconnect They would later end up being replaced by other formats, 0:24:25.040 --> 0:24:29.399 but this was the standard that we used to plug 0:24:29.440 --> 0:24:31.959 in expansion cards. It was a type of computer bus. 0:24:32.359 --> 0:24:35.880 A computer bus is essentially a channel or a pathway 0:24:35.920 --> 0:24:39.520 that exists between different components and a computer. So PC 0:24:39.680 --> 0:24:42.240 I card slots would allow PC owners to swap out 0:24:42.280 --> 0:24:46.080 expansion cards that would allow you to augment your PCs capabilities. 0:24:46.080 --> 0:24:48.240 It might be a sound card, or a graphics card 0:24:48.320 --> 0:24:52.040 or something along those lines. So how did Nvidio's first 0:24:52.080 --> 0:24:55.480