S3 SuperSavage MX/IX Mobile 3D Accelerator

Memory bus & MX/IX

Just like the old mobile Savage had a MX and an IX version, the SuperSavage receives the same two distinctions. 

The SuperSavage MX is the regular SuperSavage core we have been talking about thus far, with a 64-bit/128-bit SDR or 64-bit DDR path to its frame buffer.  The frame buffer can be as large as 64MB, however realistically speaking you can expect to see 8MB, 16MB and 32MB versions appear in various notebook configurations.

The 64-bit/128-bit Single Data Rate SDRAM memory bus options will feature a SuperSavage core clocked at 143MHz and the synchronous the memory bus clocked at 143MHz as well.  In the case of the 64-bit DDR solutions however, the core/memory clocks will drop to 125MHz.

In terms of performance, the SuperSavage MX with a 128-bit SDR bus should be the highest performance solution here; followed by the 64-bit DDR memory bus and the lowest performing solution will be the 64-bit SDR solution.  S3 claims that the 64-bit SDR solution will be approximately 20% slower than the 128-bit SDR solution.  The 64-bit DDR setup should offer performance similar to that of the 128-bit SDR version with a few percentage points performance deficit. 

The SuperSavage IX is S3's Multichip Module (MCM) version of the SuperSavage core.  This part features both the SuperSavage core and a certain amount of memory on two separate dies but in the same package much like the way the Pentium Pro featured on-package but not on-die L2 cache.  The benefit of this is that it saves precious real estate on the motherboard which, in a notebook, is much more valuable than it is on a desktop motherboard. 

The SuperSavage IX can currently feature either 8MB or 16MB of on-package SDRAM either with a 128-bit SDR or 64-bit DDR path to the memory contained within the package.  An additional 64-bit or 128-bit path to an external frame buffer is also possible for even larger memory capacities.  As time goes on, the amount of on-package memory may be increased to 32MB depending on the memory markets.  Again, this chip supports up to 64MB of total frame buffer and the clock speeds mentioned above apply here as well. 

Above you can see the 5 package options that S3 offers the SuperSavage MX/IX in.  The most interesting options are those that are pin-compatible with the Savage/MX and Savage/IX chips meaning that they can be dropped into current designs that use the Savage/MX and Savage/IX chips; as well as the T64C which is a small package version of the SuperSavage IX since it only supports 64-bit DDR SDRAM (64-bit vs 128-bit = fewer pins to include, resulting in a smaller package). 

Another interesting point to mention is that in order to keep cost and power consumption low, S3 is apparently using a more elegant DDR setup that does not require any extra termination because it is a DDR solution.  If you'll remember to DDR in the motherboard arena, an extra row of terminators is required on the PCB layout, which is apparently also the case in GeForce3 cards.  While S3 wouldn't divulge any more information about how they are managing to accomplish this, they did claim that their DDR solution would use fewer pins and thus require fewer/no termination when compared to an equivalent solution from NVIDIA.  Without the data to back this however we can only take their word for it.