Date: Fri, 09 Jul 1999 05:46:10 -0400 From: "Christopher R. Bowman" <crb@ChrisBowman.com> To: Brett Glass <brett@lariat.org> Cc: freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: IA64 Message-ID: <199907090946.EAA07069@quark.ChrisBowman.com> In-Reply-To: <4.2.0.58.19990708092030.0466ca00@localhost> References: <Pine.GSO.3.95-heb-2.07.990708172513.21435A-100000@csd> <4.2.0.56.19990708071909.03f9cda0@localhost>
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At 09:27 AM 7/8/99 -0600, Brett Glass wrote: >At 05:52 PM 7/8/99 +0300, Nadav Eiron wrote: > > >>On Thu, 8 Jul 1999, Brett Glass wrote: >> >> > >> > Not so. Intel sold it as an embedded design, and *actually refused* to sell >> > it to any manufacturer who wished to use it as a general purpose CPU on >> > any significant scale. Intel allowed MicroWay to build boards which used >> > one or more i860s in combination with an x86 in the same machine, but they >> > actively discouraged the development of any i860 products that would >> > cannibalize their precious x86 monopoly. The parts just wouldn't be available. >> > >> > I attended an Intel presentation at the time when the i860 was released >> > which emphasized this. >> >>There's little info on the i860 on the web (it was discontinued too long >>ago), and I don't have its architecture reference around (library closed >>early today for some reason) but, hey, see this quote from >>this URL (remember, it's Intel, from the overview of MMX technology): >> >>http://developer.intel.com/technology/itj/q31997/articles/art_2b.htm >> >><quote>The definition of MMX technology evolved from earlier work in the >>i860? architecture [3]. The i860 architecture was the industry's first >>general purpose processor to provide support for graphics rendering. >></quote> > >Funny how Intel rewrites history to avoid antitrust problems. ;-) Fact is, >they wanted the i860 to be used on graphics coprocessor boards but NOT >as the system's main CPU. I may still have the handouts which said so. >At the presentation, I asked an Intel rep whether the i860 could be used >as a general purpose CPU for a workstation; he replied that Intel WOULD >NOT SELL the CPU to a company that wanted to use it for that purpose. Um, Brett, I can't debate with you what you may have on handouts or heard at presentations. However, in an odd coincidence I was just throwing out some old Intel duplicates and marketing stuff I happen to have here, and what you present above is diametrically opposed to the impression I get from that material. The 1992 Intel Product Overview book (section 4) clearly tags that i960s as targeted for embedded systems, but makes no such mention for the i860s and in fact instead mentions engineering workstations, scientific computing, 3d workstations and multi-user systems. Further the Overview of the i860XP Supercomputing Microprocessor, and the Overview of the i860 64-Bit Microprocessor, Chapter 1 state: the i860 CPU ... is designed to bring supercomputing power to the desktop. And later: This high performance can be applied across a wide variety of compute intensive design implementations, from supercomputers, through technical workstation, to graphics subsystems and application accelerators for personal computer. Also: The Intel i860 CPUs are a family of supercomputing microprocessors designed to provide affordable supercomputing class power to a range of systems from PC's to workstations to massively parallel supercomputers. Further Intel published a document called the i860 Platform Reference Design Guide which was basically a reference workstation design containing "complete hardware theory of operation descriptions, schematics, PAL equations, timing and state diagrams and data sheets for the system's major components. I get the distinct impression that the i860s were targeted at high end engineering workstation type environment. It is not clear if this was to prevent cannibalization of the commodity x86 market or because these machines would presumably have prices that would have kept them out of the lower end. Clearly, however, Intel was marketing the i860s at general computing/workstations and the i960s at embedded design. >This is illegal behavior, since it is discriminatory and an attempt to >manipulate markets. But it was done nonetheless. > >>i860 - a general purpose processor. Let us check further, for instance: >>http://infopad.eecs.berkeley.edu/CIC/ >> >>The same... (anyway, graphics rendering on an embedded controller really >>makes little sense). > >You're forgetting history. At this time, the TMS340 intelligent graphics >controller was threatening to take over this market. (There were many very >good one-card X servers based on that chip.) The i860 was part of Intel's >response. Ah the TMS340, I still have their data books here too. As I remember, general consensus at the time seemed to be that this chip was hot shit, and so I eagerly ordered my data book. I have to say upon reading it that I was not to impressed. >>Also, a search for i860 on Intel's site reveals some references to >>massively parallel machines based on the i860, used for number crunching >>(just like the one they have here in the department, which was not made by >>Intel, or Microway). The reason most of these machines combine the i860 >>with other CPUs is that the i860 is notoriously bad at handling interrupts >>and I/O, which meant that its main use was for number crunching - like a >>sophisticated DSP perhaps, with something else handling I/O. However, it >>was unsuccessful even in that niche. > >The i860 was used in a number of demonstration machines that did >floating point multiprocessing, because its floating point capabilities >exceeded what could be done on any x86 processor available at the time. >But this wasn't considered by Intel to be a "general-purpose" market, since >these machines were produced in small volumes and were ludicrously expensive. > >--Brett > > > >To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org >with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message > -------- Christopher R. Bowman crb@ChrisBowman.com http://www.ChrisBowman.com/ To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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