Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2001 09:21:17 -0700 From: "Jeremiah Gowdy" <jgowdy@home.com> To: <remy@boostworks.com>, <ajh3@chmod.ath.cx> Cc: <freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: x86-64 Hammer and IA64 Itainium Message-ID: <000701c0c8e1$e3016490$015778d8@sherline.net> References: <200104181422.f3IELwC11439@luxren2.boostworks.com>
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> > Isn't time we kill the x86? It's been around too long. I'm not sure how > > the Itanium looks, and I'm no Intel freak, but a change would be nice. > > We should begin moving in the direction of RISC (or at least VLIW). > > > > There's a reason every other processor has a radically different > > architecture. Motorola, Sun and Digital all broke new ground with their > > processors, because the x86 doesn't amount to all that much any more. > > Remember, this technology was designed for 20-year old computers. > X86 (and -64) is going to be just die hard PC and workstations where > deadly wrong past must be taken into account at the price of wasted > power. Futur is more than probably Itanium and alike for servers CPUs > and a bunch of ARMs for low-level I/O tasks. Back to imagination. (Take > a look at 0.15um copper process FPGAs with embeded ARM at Altera, for > example, and you will see why no one, in the futur, will never ever need > a proprietary and undocumented 'server class' SCSI or network card). Excuse me for saying so, but I've heard all this talk before. "x86 will die. Some other architecture like Alpha will take over." Why hasn't it happened yet ? Tell me there haven't been far superior cpus than the x86 line almost since it's creation. Why weren't those other cpus adopted ? If technical merit ruled the processor market, Intel would be out of business having screwed themselves so royally in the past 2 years. When the Athlon is faster AND cheaper, why do people continue to buy Pentium IIIs ? The answer is simple. The industry is conservative. They will stick with what they know works. If you don't believe there are hoards of IT Managers out there who will frown at the idea of a new architecture, you're wrong. And besides, because of the design of the Itainium, the only software that will run at the super speeds that it provides is that which is compiled with an ILP aware/capable compiler. The Itainium is ALL about having the right compiler. The current GCC port to Itainium has NO ILP support. It may have something in the future, but something is not everything. Now think about this. Microsoft Visual C++ will be *the* industry compiler for Itainium. Their compiler is already working and has ILP support. Plus Intel makes its own compiler which plugs into Visual Studio. Both the Microsoft and Intel compilers for ILP are going to kick the crap out of gcc and I think we all know it. So then what, you're going to have FreeBSD and Linux compiled with an inferior compiler compared to Windows with their compilers ? The first thing that will happen is Microsoft will pay for a benchmark showing Windows beating the living crap out of Linux and BSD. And this time they won't have to fake it. Not having proper ILP support is like intentionally stalling pipes constantly. The whole design of this new cpu is the ILP. Without it, the GNU compiled programs aren't going to have much to show for. The Hammer is another standard x86 processor with a new 64bit mode, 64bit registers, and a few other advantages. FreeBSD will already run under the Hammer in 32bit mode, and it will be faster than current Athlon/P4 cpus by quite a margin. There's no reason not to extend FreeBSD support to this next generation of x86. FreeBSD is based in the x86 (and Alpha) world. If you have issues with that, or want to push for a Sparc, PPC, or Itainium port, I don't see what that has to do with FreeBSD's continued x86 support. The two are not mutually exclusive in my opinion. > > RN. > IeM > > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message
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