AMD was expected to release the 690 chipset earlier this year. However, it seems that the coming of AM2 65nm CPUs didn't help them much in pushing the manufacturing process further towards the end because they have delayed the chipset again. Rumors coming from several Chinese sites have confirmed that AMD has asked them to remove all references related to the 690 chipset. The RS690 chipset based on an Ati design is currently under development with its A12 stepping. And that means it's about done, motive for which we don't understand why they are delaying it again.

AMD fans that are waiting for this chipset to arrive will have to be patient a little longer with February 2007 being the projected launch date for this long-awaited and delayed integrated chipset. It seems that behind the massive delay of this new product lie some problems regarding the HDCP and HDMI licenses.

First, let's detail the HDCP issue. While HDCP seems to be working on these boards, AMD still lacks a proper licensing for the protocol. The HDMI consortium requires additional fees per product for every newcomer in the motherboard/ video card segment, regardless of AMD's HDCP annual licensing and that seems to be a pretty big problem. Moreover it seems that there are also several problems with the HDMI supports. The TMDS transmitter that AMD uses with this board is HDMI compatible but AMD cannot mention this without a proper license. And that forces all possible manufacturers (MSI, DFI and ASUS) to buy valid licenses for HDMI, HDCP and Macrovision, as well as per-board validation.

As I've said, the situation looks kind of nasty for AMD. The board will come out (probably the first ones to have a working 690 based motherboard will be Asus) but the HDCP and HDMI availability is still under question.