Silicon Integrated Systems
Encyclopedia
Silicon Integrated Systems (SiS, Traditional Chinese: 矽統科技) is a company that manufactures, among other things, motherboard chipsets. The company was founded in 1987 in Hsinchu Science Park
, Taiwan
.
facilities. At the end of 1999, SiS acquired Rise Technology
and that company's failed mP6
x86 core technology.
bus among older ISA
- and VLB
-buses. Mainboards using this chipset and equipped with CPUs such as the Intel 80486DX4
, AMD 5x86
or Cyrix Cx5x86
processors had performance and compatibility comparable with early Intel Pentium systems in addition to a lower price.
After this late success, SiS continued positioning itself as a budget chipset producer. The company emphasized high integration to minimize the cost to implement their solutions. As such, SiS one-chip mainboard chipsets that included integrated video, such as the Socket 7
-based SiS 5596, SiS 5598, and SiS 530 along with the Slot 1
-based SiS 620. These were some of the first PC chipsets with such high integration. They allowed entire system solutions to be built with just a mainboard, system RAM, and a CPU.
, SDRAM
1.5GB max., a bus frequency from 66 MHz to 124 MHz, and can have from 2 to 8 MiB
shared memory for an integrated AGP
SiS 6306 2D/3D graphics controller. Includes integrated UDMA66
IDE controller. mainboards using the SiS 530 were positioned as cheap office platforms and paired often with low-cost chips from Intel
competitors, such as the AMD K6
series or Cyrix 6x86
. The graphics controller had Direct3D
6.0 and OpenGL
support, although it was a very low-performance product for 3D acceleration.
SiS 540 (Spartan) integrates SiS 300 graphics controller.
were the only two companies initially awarded licenses to produce third party chipsets for the Pentium 4
. SiS developed the 648 chipset with this license.
Some cards contain a 3D graphics accelerator but it is only functional with the SiS's Proprietary Windows-only driver http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-hardware-18/onboard-sis-661-fx-566428/ (the company does not provide http://www.winischhofer.net/linuxsispart2.shtml documentation for others to write drivers). However, the Linux kernel includes a working third party driver that, while not supporting 3D gaming, makes the cards usable under Linux.
Hsinchu Science Park
Hsinchu Science and Industrial Park is an industrial park established by the government of the Republic of China on December 15, 1980 with investment from the Kuomintang. It straddles Hsinchu City and Hsinchu County on the island of Taiwan....
, Taiwan
Taiwan
Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...
.
Business
In the late 1990s, SiS made the decision to invest in their own chip fabricationFoundry (electronics)
In the microelectronics industry a semiconductor fabrication plant is a factory where devices such as integrated circuits are manufactured....
facilities. At the end of 1999, SiS acquired Rise Technology
Rise Technology
Rise Technology, was a short lived microprocessor manufacturer that produced the Intel x86 MMX compatible mP6 processor.The Santa Clara, California based company was started by David Lin in 1993 with funding from 15 Taiwanese investors, including UMC, ACER and VIA Technologies...
and that company's failed mP6
MP6
This article is about the mP6 microprocessor. The Rise mP6 was a superpipelined and superscalar microprocessor designed by Rise Technology to compete with the Intel Pentium line.-History:...
x86 core technology.
Mainboard chipsets
One of the most famous chipsets produced by SiS was the late 486-age chipset 496/497 which supported PCIPeripheral Component Interconnect
Conventional PCI is a computer bus for attaching hardware devices in a computer...
bus among older ISA
Industry Standard Architecture
Industry Standard Architecture is a computer bus standard for IBM PC compatible computers introduced with the IBM Personal Computer to support its Intel 8088 microprocessor's 8-bit external data bus and extended to 16 bits for the IBM Personal Computer/AT's Intel 80286 processor...
- and VLB
VESA Local Bus
The VESA Local Bus was mostly used in personal computers. VESA Local Bus worked alongside the ISA bus; it acted as a high-speed conduit for memory-mapped I/O and DMA, while the ISA bus handled interrupts and port-mapped I/O.-Historical overview:In the early 1990s, the I/O bandwidth of...
-buses. Mainboards using this chipset and equipped with CPUs such as the Intel 80486DX4
Intel 80486DX4
The IntelDX4 is a clock-tripled i486 microprocessor with 16 kB L1 cache. Intel named it DX4 as a consequence of litigation with AMD over trademarks...
, AMD 5x86
AMD 5x86
The Am5x86 processor is an x86-compatible CPU introduced in 1995 by AMD for use in 486-class computer systems. It was one of the fastest, and most universally-compatible upgrade paths for users of 486 systems....
or Cyrix Cx5x86
Cyrix Cx5x86
Released in August 1995, four months before the more famous Cyrix 6x86, the Cyrix 5x86 was one of the fastest CPUs ever produced for Socket 3 computer systems...
processors had performance and compatibility comparable with early Intel Pentium systems in addition to a lower price.
After this late success, SiS continued positioning itself as a budget chipset producer. The company emphasized high integration to minimize the cost to implement their solutions. As such, SiS one-chip mainboard chipsets that included integrated video, such as the Socket 7
Socket 7
Socket 7 is a physical and electrical specification for an x86-style CPU socket on a personal computer motherboard. The socket supersedes the earlier Socket 5, and accepts P5 Pentium microprocessors manufactured by Intel, as well as compatibles made by Cyrix/IBM, AMD, IDT and others.Socket 7 was...
-based SiS 5596, SiS 5598, and SiS 530 along with the Slot 1
Slot 1
Slot 1 refers to the physical and electrical specification for the connector used by some of Intel's microprocessors, including the Pentium Pro, Celeron, Pentium II and the Pentium III...
-based SiS 620. These were some of the first PC chipsets with such high integration. They allowed entire system solutions to be built with just a mainboard, system RAM, and a CPU.
Socket7
The SiS 530 (Sindbad) with SiS 5595 southbridge supported Socket 7Socket 7
Socket 7 is a physical and electrical specification for an x86-style CPU socket on a personal computer motherboard. The socket supersedes the earlier Socket 5, and accepts P5 Pentium microprocessors manufactured by Intel, as well as compatibles made by Cyrix/IBM, AMD, IDT and others.Socket 7 was...
, SDRAM
SDRAM
Synchronous dynamic random access memory is dynamic random access memory that is synchronized with the system bus. Classic DRAM has an asynchronous interface, which means that it responds as quickly as possible to changes in control inputs...
1.5GB max., a bus frequency from 66 MHz to 124 MHz, and can have from 2 to 8 MiB
Mebibyte
The mebibyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information. The binary prefix mebi means 220, therefore 1 mebibyte is . The unit symbol for the mebibyte is MiB. The unit was established by the International Electrotechnical Commission in 2000 and has been accepted for use by all major...
shared memory for an integrated AGP
Accelerated Graphics Port
The Accelerated Graphics Port is a high-speed point-to-point channel for attaching a video card to a computer's motherboard, primarily to assist in the acceleration of 3D computer graphics. Since 2004 AGP has been progressively phased out in favor of PCI Express...
SiS 6306 2D/3D graphics controller. Includes integrated UDMA66
AT Attachment
Parallel ATA , originally ATA, is an interface standard for the connection of storage devices such as hard disks, solid-state drives, floppy drives, and optical disc drives in computers. The standard is maintained by X3/INCITS committee...
IDE controller. mainboards using the SiS 530 were positioned as cheap office platforms and paired often with low-cost chips from Intel
Intel Corporation
Intel Corporation is an American multinational semiconductor chip maker corporation headquartered in Santa Clara, California, United States and the world's largest semiconductor chip maker, based on revenue. It is the inventor of the x86 series of microprocessors, the processors found in most...
competitors, such as the AMD K6
AMD K6
The K6 microprocessor was launched by AMD in 1997. The main advantage of this particular microprocessor is that it was designed to fit into existing desktop designs for Pentium branded CPUs. It was marketed as a product which could perform as well as its Intel Pentium II equivalent but at a...
series or Cyrix 6x86
Cyrix 6x86
The Cyrix 6x86 is a sixth-generation, 32-bit 80x86-compatible microprocessor designed by Cyrix and manufactured by IBM and SGS-Thomson. It was originally released in 1996.-Architecture:...
. The graphics controller had Direct3D
Direct3D
Direct3D is part of Microsoft's DirectX application programming interface . Direct3D is available for Microsoft Windows operating systems , and for other platforms through the open source software Wine. It is the base for the graphics API on the Xbox and Xbox 360 console systems...
6.0 and OpenGL
OpenGL
OpenGL is a standard specification defining a cross-language, cross-platform API for writing applications that produce 2D and 3D computer graphics. The interface consists of over 250 different function calls which can be used to draw complex three-dimensional scenes from simple primitives. OpenGL...
support, although it was a very low-performance product for 3D acceleration.
SiS 540 (Spartan) integrates SiS 300 graphics controller.
Socket 370, Slot 1
- SiS 600/SiS 5595
- SiS 620/SiS 5595
- SiS 630SiS 630/730The SiS 630 and SiS 730 are a family of highly integrated chipsets for Intel and AMD respectively. At the time of release they were unique in that they not only provided VGA, Audio, LAN, IDE and USB functionality on board, but were also in a single-chip solution...
- includes North- and South bridges (SiS 960) and 2D/3D graphics controller (SiS 305) - SiS 633
- SiS 635
Socket 478
SiS and ALiAcer Laboratories Incorporated
Acer Laboratories Incorporated is a major designer and manufacturer of integrated circuits for the personal computer and embedded systems markets. It is a subsidiary of the Acer group....
were the only two companies initially awarded licenses to produce third party chipsets for the Pentium 4
Pentium 4
Pentium 4 was a line of single-core desktop and laptop central processing units , introduced by Intel on November 20, 2000 and shipped through August 8, 2008. They had a 7th-generation x86 microarchitecture, called NetBurst, which was the company's first all-new design since the introduction of the...
. SiS developed the 648 chipset with this license.
- SiS 640 (IGP)
- SiS 645
- SiS 645DX
- SiS 648
- SiS 648FX
- SiS 650 (IGP)
- SiS 651 (IGP)
- SiS 652 (IGP)
- SiS 655
- SiS 655FX
- SiS 655TX
- SiS 661FX
- SiS 661GX
- SiS R658 (Rambus)
Socket A (Socket 462), Slot A
- SiS 730SiS 630/730The SiS 630 and SiS 730 are a family of highly integrated chipsets for Intel and AMD respectively. At the time of release they were unique in that they not only provided VGA, Audio, LAN, IDE and USB functionality on board, but were also in a single-chip solution...
- SiS 733
- SiS 735
- SiS 740/SiS 961
- SiS 741/SiS 964
- SiS 745
- SiS 746
- SiS 746FX
- SiS 748
Socket 775
- SiS 649
- SiS 655 (AGP chipset)
- SiS 656
- SiS 661
- SiS 662 (IGP)
- SiS 671
- SiS 672
Graphics chipsets
- SiS 6202
- SiS 6215
- SiS 6326SiS 6326The SiS 6326 was a graphics processing unit manufactured by Silicon Integrated Systems. It was introduced in June 1997 and became available to the consumer market in the end of that year...
- SiS 300SiS 300The SiS 300/SiS 301 is a graphics processing unit that was manufactured by Silicon Integrated Systems. This GPU, targeted mainstream commercial and consumer markets.-Overview:...
- SiS 301SiS 300The SiS 300/SiS 301 is a graphics processing unit that was manufactured by Silicon Integrated Systems. This GPU, targeted mainstream commercial and consumer markets.-Overview:...
- SiS 305
- SiS 315
- SiS 320
- SiS 326
- SiS 330
- SiS 340
- SiS 360
- SiSM672, dual output (primary output max. 1280x800, Secondary output max. 800x600)
- SiSM672FX
- SiS671
- SiS671FX
- SiS671DX
- SiSM671MX
- SiS968
Some cards contain a 3D graphics accelerator but it is only functional with the SiS's Proprietary Windows-only driver http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-hardware-18/onboard-sis-661-fx-566428/ (the company does not provide http://www.winischhofer.net/linuxsispart2.shtml documentation for others to write drivers). However, the Linux kernel includes a working third party driver that, while not supporting 3D gaming, makes the cards usable under Linux.