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Transmeta set to Introduce Crusoe Processor
senthilp sent us a nice article about Transmeta which basically wraps up all the loose ends hanging out, and sums up the leading speculation on what transmeta will announce. The officail launch date for Crusoe is Jan 19 (next wed) and
Chris DiBona is gonna be there with a richochet on his laptop and hopefully broadcast to IRC what is going down. So anyway, we've only got a few days left to speculate: the leading rumor is a VLIW processor which will be demonstrated in some sort of PDA or Handheld running Linux. But speculation is running rampant: I've heard that they were working on a superior version of The Kernel's Secret Blend of Herbs and Spices, and before that it was a carbon dioxide fueled teleportation device so who knows.
grimsaado sent us details on the Crusoe in another story with slightly more realistic speculation.
I wonder what "surprises" Ditzel is talking about with regard to this.
Pentium killer?
I do like the design
Tell us when the chip actually does come out instead of contributing to the hype around it.
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Funny, though, something tells me it won't replace my 486 cpu anyway...
#include <signal.h> \ #include <stdlib.h> \ int main(void){signal(ABRT,SIGIGN);while(1){abort(-1)
OFTC: By the community, for the community
Actually, I'm happy to finally see what Transmeta has been working on, for a while, I thought they just had Linus on board to improve their IPO standing.
I'm very interested, however, in a good Linux based PDA, and Transmeta's delivery of it will be great.
"You ever have that feeling where you're not sure if you're dreaming or awake?"
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
A PDA or handheld running Linux? Can you think of the numbers of geeks who're going to buy these? That just sounds too cool. If it's got enough power to run Emacs and gcc, I wouldn't have to lug around this Dell Inspiron anymore. :-)
However, what about the other x86 products? I would think they would include those products in the release as well, such as *BSD and Solaris. This would just broaden the market. and of course, these forms of Unix might be able to be ported to the new chipset natively.
Thoughts?
--
Gonzo Granzeau
Gonzo Granzeau
"Nothing the god of biomechanics wouldn't let you into heaven for.." -Roy Batty
The hype and rumors surrounding Transmeta have constantly changed, but everyone seemed sure it would be the greatest thing since sliced bread. Honestly, I think Slashdotters are setting themselves up for a disappointment they haven't seen since the Phantom Menace.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
At the risk of stating the obvious, employing Torvalds was the best move Transmeta could have made. How many millions must he be worth to them in free advertising, before they even have a product?
11.0010010000111111011010101000100010000101101000
I think what we may be talking about here is the FPGA. The Field Programmable Gate Array is just a huge bunch of transistor "black boxes"; adders, multiplexors, etc.. and a single SRAM bit controls the connections that they make with each other. So the entire chip can be reconfigured to handle particular tasks (like a particular encryption session with the key decoder/encoder hardwired onto the chip -- put the sequence of bytes in on one end and they come out the other, encoded or decoded as you like), or mimmick a particular architecture. I don't believe that they're ready for prime time yet, unless transmeta has done something really slick.
os.system("perl -e 'print \"My first Python Script.\"'")
And now there really is a secret message on the web site! Check the HTML source. It was the first thing I did...
And it's not what you think!
If you transpose every 3rd letter, and rot13 it, then transpose every 3rd letter again you get....
'Well done, now apply for a job!'
>:)
For anyone who doesn't get the joke check out he whole spy thing that was on the front page earlier.
Kintanon
Check out JoshJitsu.info for Brazilian Ji
Given a GCC code generator for "native Crusoe," or whatever they'd call the not-involving-emulation instrution set, it ought to be more sensible to run Linux natively on the chip, as that should be faster and more efficient since it takes direct advantage of the CPU's facilities.
That can be made more adamant if we're talking about PDA applications where it's likely that applications are "embedded" and where it's pretty certain that source code to the applications would be available.
If you look at some of the major proprietary applications, it's still the case that they may be recompiled for alternative architectures. Applixware is available for Alpha as well as IA-32. Mozilla is getting deployed on various architectures. StarOffice has been available for PPC. That may not represent an exhaustive list, but a PDA is not likely to have an exhaustive set of software installed on it.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
... is that whatever it does, it uses small amounts of screaming-fast DRAM. Transmeta has been pretty busy in the DDR SDRAM standards process, and their focus has always been on single-bank-to-controller applications at insane speeds (like 400 MHz!)
And of course, it's also a hardware JIT for Java, which fits the oldest rumours about Transmeta... that may have been their original plan before they decided that Java wasn't taking off fast enough to bet the company on.
Based on what I've heard from inside sources: the FT article is dead on the mark.
Listen to the logic: there are processors designed from the ground up for high-powered workstations (Intel Itanium, Sun SPARC, DEC Alpha).
There are processors designed from the ground up for personal computers: AMD Athlon, Intel PIII/Celeron, etc.
There are processors designed from the ground up for embedded computing: StrongARM, MAJC, etc.
Now, please, name me one processor designed from the ground up intended for laptops.
You can't, can you? Intel and AMD retrofit their desktop processors for laptops. Every other component is now specially designed for laptops - think IBM harddrives, LCD displays, etc, etc. The end result is that the CPU is the (physically) biggest item on a laptop MB and it consumes the most power.
Transmeta Crusoe, the first processor x86-compatible processor designed specifically for the laptop, will allow laptops to be smaller, lighter and run for longer all with less battery power.
The logic is infalliable. The market is untapped. If their processors are fast enough, in 2 years Transmeta may be the Intel of laptops CPUs.
I submitted this too, but someone beat me to it
A couple of days ago, a friend of mine that works for IBM told me that he is working on a project with Transmeta. He said even Linus Torvalds is working on this project. When I asked him what he was doing, he told me "cool stuff" with a smile. He is also under NDA, so he couldn't give me any more information but it will all be release to the public soon. With the article stating "unspecified partner", putting 2 and 2 together, is this partner IBM?
Steven Rostedt
Steven Rostedt
-- Nevermind
They aren't looking to just go after Intel but rather will have a surprise announcement of Multi processor Crusoes being launched by Apple running OS X server and emulating PPC faster than Motorola can make the chips run. 800 Mhz dual processor boxes running a *BSD variant that is easier to administer and cheaper than equivalent NT boxen (no CALs guarantee a price advantage).
The tip offs? IBM, a Motorola rival producer of PPC chips is producing the Crusoe but IBM's own PPC chips would compete with Crusoe if it were truly an embedded only chip. There's no advantage for IBM to do that.
Apple also plays into this with its stealth update of Mac OS X server to 1.2. With delays on other fronts (Pismo, the P7, Mystic) it would have been a natural to hype the upgrade to their server software at MacWorld SF but they didn't go for it. The stock price was hammered because of the lack of news.
A Transmeta tie in would give Transmeta an instant market for chips in a controlled hardware platform that has a good reputation for quality. This would ease Apple's supply problems for chips since they would suddenly be able to go to Crusoe whenever Motorola fell down on the job. It would also reinvigorate Apple's stock price by showing a business strategy that's been assembled piece by piece for the past year+, hidden in plain sight. It's just the sort of 180 degree coming from nowhere gotcha that Steve Jobs would love.
DB
Ask yourself: what is different about the assumptions of hardware computer architecture in an era of open source?
Answer: you can presume that the user has not just the binary code but the source code
Premise: programmable logic can optimally execute algorithms for which source code is available
Impliciations: Rather than using pre-defined, general-purpose execution units, the proper OS could compile open source directly into linked transistors on a programmable chip (e.g. Crusoe) in a JIT-like process when programs are loaded for execution. By more efficiently using transitors, applications would take less power (like Crusoe rumors,) and the one-time-each-runtime compilation burden would make this design most useful in single-task environments (like the embedded tasks in Crusoe rumors.)
Is this interesting enough that I should elaborate further?
--LP
Perl
If their processors are fast enough, in 2 years Transmeta may be the Intel of laptops CPUs.
Not just laptops though. If the chips are as small, fast, and energy-saving as described in the ft article then you will see them in just about everything that will be performing computing and IP functions in 2 years.
Expect this to include not only cell phones and PDAs (of course), but also watches, cars, TVs, cable-boxes, home phones, MP3 players, gameboys, etc.
Work for Change & GET PAID!
Having a faster/cheaper CPU does not establish anything about superiority of OS platforms.
There are any number of pieces of Win32-only software that people have, unwittingly, married themselves to, where it would take a messy divorce to extricate themselves. This list might include:
There may exist vaguely analagous software on Linux, and more and better in progress. That doesn't mitigate the messiness of the "divorce."
If Transmeta were producing a chip that provided support for things like:
- Segmentation in the style of Multics
- Hardware-supported garbage collection, useful for either JVMs or for Lisp variants
- Something otherwise better than merely expanding chips from 32 bit addressing to 64 bit addressing
I'd agree that there could be something fundamental here to, in the long run, change computing.When all that it seems to bring is power consumption reduction, space reduction, hopefully faster performance, and perhaps less damage to the wallet, that's not really news. Every generation of CPUs since the 8008 has provided some mixture of those improvements.
Unless "Crusoe" offers more than that, I can't get overly excited.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Transmeta needs a fab; IBM is a logical partner. But--a thought: IBM would have been in this partnership for a year or more; would knowledge of the coming Transmeta products have been a reason that IBM has gone all out for Linux?
1000 SlashDot sigs
In the February Popular Science, they said that the new Amiga machine had a TransMeta chip in it. Popular Science named no specifics, however, I think that this must be the chip they're talking about.
Phyrkrakr
"God doesn't play dice"-Einstein
Psychic spies from China try to steal your mind's elation.
Making worshipful cow eyes to the effect that it would be just TOOO SWEET! doesn't establish anything about one's ability to do that. The matters patented, such as Memory controller for a microprocessor for detecting a failure of speculation on the physical nature of a component being addressed (US5832205), might be helpful in making an emulation a bit faster, but does nothing to support the software side of the matter.
The only way your theory is "prime possibility" is if Transmeta has actually been working with developers of something like VMWare. If they have, then there could be some synergies.
If not, then all we have is a somewhat faster chip. Plus, of course, a bunch of members of the Cult of Linus, all worshipful, but with no actual merit to their worship...
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Crusoe may be pretty slick and fast stuff, but is merely hardware. It doesn't, simply by sitting on a PC board emitting heat, solve software problems.
IBM picked Linux because they figured they could sell software services out of the deal. I don't see Crusoe in that picture.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
The first patent doesn't seem like a big deal, at first. Translating x86 instructions into other instructions is what every Intel processor has been doing since the PPro. In fact, the PPro includes microcode that handles this conversion, allowing dynamic bug fixes by re-decoding x86 insts to not use the buggy native RISC inst (but only like 3 people on earth know how to do it, due to fear of microcode viruses).
;)
However what would be cool is if the translation layer was general enough to allow it to run many different instruction sets, perhaps even simultaneously. You could run apps compiled for any platform on the same machine at the same time. Finally, every geek's dream come true: The ability to run WinNT and AIX on the same machine at the same time!
I suppose VLIW in itself is interesting, more as an anomaly than as a technological marvel.
I guess we'll see on the 19th, but for the meantime it's more fun to guess.
The enemies of Democracy are
I have yet to see a single piece of evidence to suggest that Crusoe will necessarily be able to "rewrite its internal wiring"; the Transmeta patents suggest that the machine has a fixed native instruction set, and that other instruction sets are handled by binary-to-binary translation, by software, of code for other instruction sets.
My speculation for 1/18/2000 -- Transmeta showcases a PalmPad-like device that will run PalmOS, WindowsCE, Linux *and* MacOS, all in their own maximizable window. Just a guess. :)
;-)
And wouldn't that piss VMware off
Chris
San Francisco values: compassion, tolerance, respect, intelligence
what's the use of a multiuser handheld, a handheld or other small device looking like it running linux? :)
;-) to the Internet... remote administration? Who needs it, I've got my server with me.
Imagine a future where, when 'the server' goes down, the technician pulls a spare server out of his briefcase plugs it in, and you're rolling...
Imagine having a permanently running file/mail/web/etc. server in your pocket with a permanent wireless connection (is that an oxymoron
And yes, I know this is an extreme example, and I know that it wouldn't be like I represented it, but you just have to look at the last 30 years of development in computer/electronics technology, and it doesn't look all that far-fetched.
The fact of the matter is, we can't really imagine exactly what it will be like in another decade or so, but there are no actual disadvantages to having the same computing power:
-in a smaller package,
-consuming less power, thus
-generating less heat, thus
-making less noise
regardless of whether you carry it with you or not. I'd be overjoyed if my personal server (a Pentium 166, sitting on top the cupboards in my kitchen, whirring/humming away) could sit next to my paperbacks on my bookshelf.
Chris
San Francisco values: compassion, tolerance, respect, intelligence
It seems obvious to me that the whole reason they hired Linus is to port the Linux kernel onto their architecture. They could hardly run Windows on it since Win98 doesn't even run reliably on half of the x86 motherboards out there. However the Linux kernel is small enough and "knowable" enough to make a reliable port feasible (especially in Linus' case since he's supposed to have reviewed every single line of code in there). And ask yourself: How much are they paying Linus? And how mnay people would it have taken (and how much would it cost) to port any other capable OS onto Crusoe?
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction