What Happened to Cyrix Processors? Why Cyrix Processors Disappeared

The Cyrix 6x86 sold as a P166+ while its clock ran at 133 MHz, and it matched a Pentium on office work for less money. Within four years, the company behind it had been sold twice. Texas-based Cyrix designed x86 processors but never owned a factory. To get wafers made, it licensed its designs to SGS-Thomson, Texas Instruments and IBM, and IBM could sell Cyrix-designed chips of its own. Gross margin fell from 51% in 1994 to 26% in 1996. National Semiconductor paid about $550 million for Cyrix in 1997, then sold the processor line to VIA in 1999 for $75 million plus royalties. In this documentary: • 1992: How Cyrix put 486 software on 386 motherboards • 1994: Why the IBM factory deal cost more than money • 1996: What the P166+ rating actually measured • 1997: How the MediaGX helped Compaq sell a $999 PC • 1999: Why National walked away from Cyrix If you once chose the box marked P166+ because it cost less than the Pentium beside it, tell us what you ran on it. What remains is the MediaGX, reborn as the Geode line AMD bought in 2003. Subscribe for more careful histories of the chips inside the box. Sources: Cyrix Corporation Form 10-K405 for fiscal 1996 - Cyrix Corporation, 1997: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/86... Cyrix Corporation Form S-3 registration statement - Cyrix Corporation, 1996: https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/86... Cyrix Corp. v. Intel Corp., 77 F.3d 1381 - U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, 1996: https://static.case.law/f3d/77/cases/1381-... National Quits PC Processors - Microprocessor Report, Michael Slater, 1999: https://www.cecs.uci.edu/~papers/mpr/MPR/1... #Cyrix #Cyrix6x86 #CyrixMediaGX #NationalSemiconductor #IntelVsCyrix #x86 #RetroPC #PCHistory #ComputingHistory #90sComputers Disclaimer: The voiceover used in this video was generated using AI.