Evergreen Technologies Inc. is preparing a new version of its processor upgrade based on Intel Corp.'s newest Pentium III chips.
The upgrade, scheduled for delivery next quarter, will offer a way to breathe new life into old Pentium PCs.
Evergreen, based here, is using its PCI card-based AcceleraPCI upgrade platform to develop the high-performance upgrade. The AcceleraPCI upgrade currently supports Intel's lower-priced Celeron chip from 333MHz to 500MHz, as well as 64 Mbytes to 256 Mbytes of memory.
Evergreen said its AcceleraPCI is "a complete performance core retrofit" on an easily installed PCI card. The product offers Pentium users the ability to upgrade the CPU, memory and bus without replacing the motherboard. Instead, customers plug the AcceleraPCI into a PCI slot and reboot the system.
The new upgrade will support Intel's latest Pentium III chips manufactured on 0.18-micron process technology, formerly code-named Coppermine. The AcceleraPCI will support the new socketed version of Pentium III, as well as the 133MHz front-side bus speed featured in many of the new chips.
Evergreen's new upgrade offers new life for existing ISA systems, said Tim Bajarin, president and industry analyst at Creative Strategies Inc., Campbell, Calif. "There are a lot of PCs out there based on ISA. People don't necessarily throw them away. This is a solid option."
Compared with the price of getting a new system, the upgrade makes sense in a lot of corporate environments, he said.
For San Francisco-based Bay Area Transit Consultants, the AcceleraPCI was the solution for upgrading several clone PCs that were not Y2K compliant, said John Scarcella, information services team leader at the firm. The upgrade boosted the 133MHz Pentium computers to 433MHz, Y2K-compliant machines with 64 Mbytes of memory.
But Todd Barrett, network sales manager, CPU Sales and Service Inc., Waltham, Mass., said his company has had difficulty getting technical support from Evergreen in the past. There is probably a market for the AcceleraPCI upgrades, but Evergreen "would have to increase the quality of the service of their company and possibly drop their pricing a little more," he said.
The current Celeron-based AcceleraPCI upgrades range from $435 to $379.
Prices for Evergreen's upcoming Pentium III upgrade, as well as processor speed grades, will not be available until the product is released. The price will depend on prices of Pentium III chips by the time the product is introduced, as well as how much memory is included on the card, a company spokeswoman said.
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