Trident Microsystems is a supplier of display-processors for flat panel displays (plasma, LCD, etc.) At one time, Trident was also a supplier of PC graphics chipsets and sound controllers.

= History =

Late in the 1980s, Trident (along with mode.

The rapid introduction of 3D-graphics caught many graphics suppliers off guard, including Trident. It was not until the late 1990s that Trident finally released a competitive chip, the TGUI-9880 (Blade3D.) By this time, Trident s reach had once again retreated to the low-end OEM market, where it was crowded by ATI Technologies, S3 Graphics, and SiS.

Meanwhile, in the laptop market, Trident was an early pioneer of embedded-DRAM, a Fabrication (semiconductor) technique which combines a graphics-controller and framebuffer-RAM on a single chip. The resulting combo-chip saved precious board-space by eliminating several RAM chips normally required for framebuffer storage.

Although Trident enjoyed some success with its 3DImage and Blade3D product-lines, the entry of Intel into PC graphics signalled the end of the bottom-end, graphics-chip market. Trident partnered with motherboard chipset suppliers several times to integrate its graphics technology into a motherboard chipset, but these achieved marginal success. Faced with a contracting market and rising research and development costs (due to the increasing sophistication of 3D-graphics rendering), Trident announced in June, 2003, a substantial restructuring of the company.

In late 2003, XGI completed an acquisition of Trident s former graphics division.

= Graphics Chipsets =

The following lists are not complete.

Desktop

= External Links =