The patent wars raged on today with chipmaker VIA Technologies filing suit against Apple for infringing on its patents with its iDevices.

The patent wars raged on today with chipmaker VIA Technologies filing suit against Apple for infringing on its patents with its iDevices.

Taipei-based VIA said Apple's iPhone, iPad, iPod, and Apple TV infringe on three patents that "generally provides efficient loading of data in the microprocessors and efficient conversion and transfer of data in the microprocessors."

"Microprocessors that include this technology can rapidly load data from memory, directly move data between floating point and integer registers, and rapidly convert data from one another, thereby increasing the operational speed of the microprocessors," VIA said in its suit, which was filed Wednesday in a Delaware district court.

Two of the patents were issued in 2001 and the third in 2004. Specifically, they cover a rather technical "instruction set for bi-directional conversion and transfer of integer and floating point data" and "method and apparatus for double operand load."

VIA wants the court to ban Apple from making or importing the infringing products and award damages.

Apple, of course, is no stranger to patent battles. Most recently, it has publicly fought with Samsung, which Apple accused of "slavishly" copying the iPhone and iPad with its Galaxy line of products. Apple has succeeded in getting the Galaxy Tab 10.1 banned temporarily in Germany and delayed in Australia, but the two sides have sued each other over this in almost two dozen courts around the world. For more, see .

Apple, meanwhile, is also battling Samsung rivals like and .