Motherboards in 2000 Preview - Part 1: Chipsets

On August 9, 1999, AMD released their long awaited Athlon processor and, on October 25, 1999, Intel released their rebuttal, the Pentium III E. With two new processors in the market, and a few more to come (i.e. VIA/Cyrix's Joshua) the chipset manufacturers have been hard at work making sure that these latest processors receive the proper support from their end. And thus marks the beginning of yet another cycle in the motherboard industry: the introduction of a handful of new chipsets has lit a fuse that will once again breathe new life into the motherboard industry.

At this year's Fall Comdex, we were given the liberty of taking a look at some of this "new life" and have managed to compact it all into a Motherboards in 2000 Preview. The preview is split into two parts, the first part concentrates on the chipsets behind the next wave of motherboards and the following part will provide a brief preview of the motherboards themselves.