New Graphics Programming Environment Slashes Development Time and Makes Cinematic-Style Effects Attainable for All Content Developers

For further information, contact:

Derek Perez
NVIDIA Corporation
(408) 486-2512
dperez@nvidia.com

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

SANTA CLARA, CA — JUNE 13, 2002 — NVIDIA® Corporation (Nasdaq: NVDA), the worldwide leader in visual processing solutions, today introduced the NVIDIA Cg Compiler for the new industry standard Cg graphics programming language.  The Cg Language (C for graphics) is a high-level graphics programming language, also announced today, that provides content developers with a complete programming environment to ease and speed the creation of special effects and real-time cinematic quality experiences.  The NVIDIA Cg Compiler is a breakthrough technology that generates optimized graphics assembly programs for dramatic real-time visual effects.

“We are entering a brave new world of graphics software development,” said Peter Glaskowsky, editor-in-chief of the Microprocessor Report, In-Stat MDR.  “The announcement of Cg signals a revolution in computer graphics—and for the first time in years, we can say this without exaggerating.”
 
The NVIDIA Cg Compiler is the heart of the NVIDIA Cg programming environment. Programs written for a standard DirectX® 8- or DirectX 9-compatible Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) can be compiled and run on any conforming hardware.  The resulting program is a highly efficient vertex or pixel shader achieving performance levels equal to or better than hand-coded graphics programs.  NVIDIA’s Cg Compiler was designed to take full advantage of NVIDIA’s GPU features and pipeline, ensuring optimal performance and visual quality.  In addition, NVIDIA’s Cg Compiler uniquely supports OpenGL®. Cg shaders written for OpenGL platforms are compiled and optimized to take full advantage of the extended graphics feature set in NVIDIA GPUs.  NVIDIA’s Cg Compiler is also cross platform, supporting programs written for Windows®, OS X, Linux, Mac and Xbox®.

The most powerful feature of NVIDIA’s Cg Compiler is its forward and backward compatibility.  Borrowing from NVIDIA’s famous Unified Driver Architecture (UDA), the NVIDIA Cg Compiler employs a Unified Compiler Architecture (UCA).  Once written, programs will run on future or past generations of Cg-compatible GPUs and are automatically optimized at run-time for the GPU in the system.  This unique capability relieves developers from the burden of optimizing for multiple generations of GPUs.

“By taking care of the painstaking work required to optimize special effects for today’s GPUs, Cg will make the developer’s life much easier,” said Dan Vivoli, vice president of marketing at NVIDIA.  “Because we do the heavy lifting with our Cg Compiler, developers can spend more time on the creative side of game development.  This begins a new era of dramatically compelling story telling.”

The NVIDIA Cg Toolkit Beta 1.0 will include:

• NVIDIA Cg Compiler Beta 1.0—a C-like language for programming shaders on GPUs
• NVIDIA Cg Browser—a prototyping/visualization environment with a large library of Cg shaders
• Cg Standard Library—a set of built-in functions dedicated to help the programmer with common computations
• Cg shaders—a set of pre-written examples to use and to learn from

NVIDIA’s Cg Toolkit will be available for the first time to European developers attending “The Gathering 2”, a conference in London, June 13-14.  The toolkit will also be available for download at http://developer.nvidia.com starting June 13.

For more information about the NVIDIA Cg solution, please visit the company’s Web site at: www.nvidia.com/view.asp?IO=cg .  Developers interested in learning more about the NVIDIA Cg Compiler, should visit: http://developer.nvidia.com/cg.  For a community perspective on Cg and shaders, please visit the Web site: www.cgshaders.org. To hear what developers and others are saying about Cg, please visit: www.nvidia.com/view.asp?IO=cg_testimonials.

About NVIDIA
NVIDIA Corporation (Nasdaq - NVDA), located in Santa Clara, CA, is the global leader in advanced graphics and multimedia processing technology for the consumer and professional computing markets.  Its 2D, 3D, video and multimedia capabilities make NVIDIA one of the premier semiconductor companies in the world. NVIDIA offers a wide range of products and services, delivering superior performance and crisp visual quality for PC-based applications such as manufacturing, science, e-business, entertainment and education.

Certain statements in this press release, including the statements relating to the Company's performance expectations for NVIDIA's family of products and expectations of continued revenue growth, are forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause results to be materially different than expectations.  Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, manufacturing and other delays relating to new products, difficulties in the fabrication process and dependence of the Company on third-party manufacturers, general industry trends including cyclical trends in the PC and semiconductor industries, the impact of competitive products and pricing alternatives, market acceptance of the Company's new products, and the Company's dependence on third-party developers and publishers.  Investors are advised to read the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, particularly those sections entitled "Certain Business Risks," for a fuller discussion of these and other risks and uncertainties.

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