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Itanium Problems

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the fever-dreams dept.

webdev writes "An article in today's NYTimes (free but...) highlights some industry concerns over Itanium. The author suggests the normal "what's bad for Intel is bad for the computer industry". Anyone know the power consumption for IBM's 64 bit effort GPUL?"

6 of 472 comments (clear)

  1. hrm, somethings amiss, me thinks by Em+Emalb · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "It has taken an entire decade, an estimated $5 billion and teams of hundreds of engineers from the two companies to bring the first Itanium chip to market. As the struggles and costs mount for the companies, skeptical technologists say Itanium now has the hallmarks of a bloated project in deep trouble. It is already four years behind schedule, emerging just as companies are in no mood to spend money on technology"

    Skeptical? More like, forget it Chachi, it ain't happening.
    I guess the larger companies don't get it. Corporations are struggling. Companies are in holding patterns, waiting for the mess, erm, economy, to level off.

    Can I have a job now making millions being a skeptical technologist?

    --
    Sent from your iPad.
    1. Re:hrm, somethings amiss, me thinks by benwaggoner · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Given that Intel plans a 20 year life for the IA64 technology, they're going to go through a number of business cycles. The way to make money during the boom is to have built good products during the preceeding bust, and have them ready to sell once there is a market for them. A poor economy can gut AMD's budget just as much as Intel's, actually improving IA64's long term prospects.

      This current bust is mainly just a post-bubble bust, just like "The New Economy" was mainly just a bubble. Companies will eventually start spending again, and eventually they'll even start overspending again, and then cut projects, rinse repeat.

      --

      My video compression blog
  2. Re:Pricing problem by Grishnakh · · Score: 5, Insightful

    GCC already supports the Itanium and Intel has great code they could give to GCC in terms of optomization (Intel doesn't make money in the compiler business).

    Wrong... Intel IS in the compiler business: they have their own compiler called "icc". They could give code to GCC, but they won't because it'll hurt their icc business. You'd think they'd be smart and release their optimizations to GCC to help their processors perform better, but Intel doesn't think this way. They want you to believe their slick marketing that their processors really are better, AND they want you to shell out for their compiler (which may or may not actually get those processors to perform well--you won't know until you pay up and try it out). Of course, how does this help all of us who use open-source software (which includes Google mentioned in this article), compiled by GCC? It doesn't.

  3. What is bad for Intel isn't necessarily bad... by Shivetya · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Heaven knows they have a copy of MS's book on corporate behaviour when it comes to competitors.

    Bad for Intel probably means good for the industry, as we won't have another half-assed chip shoved down our throats.

    --
    * Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
  4. Re:Google is your... by xenoweeno · · Score: 4, Insightful

    partner=cmdrtaco appears to work just as well. You can use that one instead.

  5. Re:Dynamic optimization in software by CustomDesigned · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Dynamic optimization is not restricted to hardware. Java Hotspot will do well with Itanium (if Sun survives), and I believe Smalltalk and LISP have dynamic optimization as well. The way I see it, Virtual Machines are the future of high performance computing. And yes, .NET is important for Microsoft to prosper in the non-IA32 world. (Although I hate it when the wicked prosper.)