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jcadam · May 14, 2003, 12:36 PM

AMD's Opteron is out, has been for a little while. The Opteron is the server version. A little later on, the Athlon-64 (I think that's the name for it, meh, whatever, it's a K8) will show up for desktops. The nForce3 is already on the way to support the thing, looks to be another excellent mobo chipset from nVidia. I'm not sure what the initial clockspeed on the thing will be, but I believe its somewhere in the 1.8-2 GHz range. Looks like the Athlon-64 and the PPC 970 will at least be in the same class. The PPC 970 should be superior, but not dramatically so.

The real test will be which platform updates to 64 bit native software first to take the new chips to their full potential. We can definitely expect all of the Apple-branded apps to go 64 bit-native within months of the new 970 machines being announced. I can't imagine why third party developers would drag their feet either (Micro$oft could do a re-compile of Office X and sell it again for $300 a pop), since Apple does define the macintosh platform. For AMD, the job is much tougher. Micro$oft has already pledged an x86-64 version of windows, but what about apps? Would software developers want to support seperate Intel and AMD x86-64 versions of all their software? If x86-64 really succeeds, it would mean the end of Intel's dominance of the PC.

And I don't know what the hell Intel's plan is, unless they intend to ride the Pentium 4 for a while longer and then try to push an x86-incompatible Itanium-derivative onto to the desktop market and move the wintel world to IA-64. Heh, that would be after an x86-64 version of Windows and many other key apps are on the market.... Intel is in trouble I think.

Looks like lower-clocked 64-bit processors are the future

Catfish_Man · May 14, 2003, 01:07 PM

And I don't know what the hell Intel's plan is, unless they intend to ride the Pentium 4 for a while longer and then try to push an x86-incompatible Itanium-derivative onto to the desktop market and move the wintel world to IA-64. Heh, that would be after an x86-64 version of Windows and many other key apps are on the market.... Intel is in trouble I think.

Looks like lower-clocked 64-bit processors are the future

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Intel is working on a (relatively) high speed x86 emulator for IA-64, so that they can get rid of the x86 processor core that's tacked onto the Itanium's die (horribly slow, and increases die size). I imagine they'll refine their emulator a bunch, then get the Itanium sped up until it's enough faster than the P4/P5 that it can emulate them at reasonable speed. The P4 is roadmapped to hit 5GHz in 2005, then be replaced by a new 65nm core. Little is known about "NetBurst"'s replacement.

Overall, I would agree with you. Intel's strategy seems severely flawed. However, since it's obviously flawed to a non-expert like me, I'm assuming Intel knows about it. I'm sure they have a number of backup plans (although I still think the K8/970 combo is going to cut them badly).

Leonard · May 14, 2003, 01:29 PM

I don't know why you'd want a 64-bit version of Office. A word processor, excel spreadsheet and presentation package wouldn't see any benefits from going 64-bit. Application more like Maya, Photoshop, Shake, Final Cut Pro, iDVD, and maybe iTunes and DVD Player would probably benefit more from 64-bit.

jcadam · 01:43 PM

Originally posted by Leonard:
I don't know why you'd want a 64-bit version of Office. A word processor, excel spreadsheet and presentation package wouldn't see any benefits from going 64-bit. Application more like Maya, Photoshop, Shake, Final Cut Pro, iDVD, and maybe iTunes and DVD Player would probably benefit more from 64-bit.

hey man, maybe I need really high precision floating point numbers in my excel spreadsheets

Nah, but people will buy a new version of Office, even if it doesn't add anything useful. When I said Micro$oft could do a recompile of Office and re-release it I was trying to be sarcastic and halfway-serious at the same time

Maya would love a 64-bit CPU though (In fact it does, if you run it on an SGI Octane2 or something similiar), as would Photoshop.

Superchicken · May 14, 2003, 02:57 PM

Isn't the biggest advantage of the 970 more RAM and faster bus? I mean I havn't heard any other advantages of 64 bits... infact the faster bus is an advantage of the chip not 64 bits... anyway.
Intel can't be screwed they'll probably either just emulate AMD's thing or get M$'s support for another architecture.all M$ would have to do is make a fat file system that would let you store multiple compliations in one file... it'd be bulky but work until one arch was decided on.

And Excel might be able to benifit.... dout word would.

Photoshop would benifit for some users.. the biggest benitis that I can see would be science apps and 3D

Evangellydonut · May 14, 2003, 05:38 PM

yeah, 64-bit for the most part just allows more RAM addressing... but hey, Gates himself was pondering 'bout who ever needs more than 256K (? not sure on the number) of RAM...But yeah, Intel will be in much worse shape if they jump in to the 64-bit desktop along with Apple and AMD even though they would be doing a good thing for the computer industry. x86 instruction set is way too outdated and needs a complete overhaul...I'm thinking they might be able to pull off something similar to the PPC transistion...(and no, it'll take A LOT of effort for intel to emulate AMD since that requires them to design a new chip from the ground up)
64-bit will be handy in a few years, when M$ manages to figure out how to use 4GB of ram for their WindowsXYZP...with ever-increasing CPU power and HD and RAM, why the hell not make the OS as bloated as you can 'n utilize the new resources, right? Else the computer industry will be in a wose slump than the one we are in right now. Otherwise, CAD programs 'n photoshop 'n such will utilize 64-bit first, but then again, most workstations have been 64-bit forever now...

cowerd · May 14, 2003, 05:58 PM

The G4 already has 36-bit memory addressing (64 GB RAM). Apple only gives you 4 slots anyway.

D'Espice · May 17, 2003, 04:25 PM

That's a question one can not easily answer. First of all, nobody knows whether we really need 64-bit CPUs. Second nobody knows what Intel's gonna do and as we all know these guys can change the future of microprocessors.

My guess would be that Intel's Yamhill program is going to continue and Intel will present a x86-64 compatible microprocessor by the end of 2004 or somewhen in 2005.