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The Battle in 64-bit Land, 2003 and Beyond
An anonymous reader writes "Paul DeMone has an excellent article up at Real World Technologies on the future of 64bit computing. Find out where MIPS, HP, Intel, AMD, Sun, Fujitsu, and IBM are headed."
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64 bits compute YOU!!!
I only have a 16 bit computer (286) you insensitive clod!
The worst spacial incident in recorded history just occurred and you people are talking about the future of 64-bit computing?!?! My GOD, people, GET SOME BLOODY PRIORITIES!
when we get to 1mbit is when things start to get interesting, until then..............
What happens is....
Paul looked at himself in the mirror. Having just gotten out of the shower, his skin was warm and flushed. He took in the beginnings of the changes his late puberty was presenting. A soft brush of pubic hair around his boyish cock and balls put a smile on his face. There wouldn't be anymore teasing in the locker room now, Paul though. I'm becoming a real man these days.
In two days, Paul would be 18. He would be leaving for basic training in Paris Island. The thought of imminent freedom thrilled Paul. He would be getting away from his stepfather and that bitch of his mother forever. No more long nights of drunken abuse verbal and otherwise from his loving family. Just thank God there weren't any other brothers or sisters to endure the torments he had.
Paul never liked to dwell on those nights. Waiting in his bed at night in terror of when his drunk step father would break through his door reeking of cheap booze and slobbering all over him, telling him lies about how he was his sweat little boy and crap like that, while all the while playing with his nuts and trying to get one of his fat fingers up his ass.
Having his stepfather's cock crammed up his teenage butt had become something of a regular thing for Paul since he was 13.
But not tonight, thought Paul. He was going into the city tonight with his marine recruiter, SSG Thomas. Paul liked his recruiter. He was athletic in a way that Paul had always admired. He was also dark haired, and from what Paul had been able to tell, had quite the hairy chest.
He dressed conservatively, in khakis and a white shirt, careful to not wrinkle his clothing. SSG Thomas had always stressed the necessity of a Marine looking his best at all times. Paul figured that his transformation into a Marine might as well begin before he left for boot camp. He carefully combed his wet hair, smiled into the mirror, then headed for the door.
On the way out, Paul's mother slurred an angry epitath at him, but he gave it no thought. SSG Thomas was waiting for him where he said he would be, right in front of the Baptist church.
"Get in recruit"
"Yes Sir"
Paul got into the Government sedan that the recruiters all shared, and they headed into Houston. It took a little over 20 minutes but soon, the car was plying the crowded night streets of downtown Houston. There was little conversation, but when the car pulled up to the hotel that Paul would be staying at, apprehension got the better of him, and he asked SSG Thomas if he would mind going in with him to help him register into the motel. SSG Thomas laughed.
"First time away from home, aint it boy."
"Yes Sir. I just don't want folks to laugh at me if I make a mistake or something."
"I understand, recruit. One thing you'll learn about the Corp, there's always someone willing to help you out boy."
The area that the motel was located wasn't the best either. Dark streets filled with old crumbling warehouses surrounded the motel. Old neon signs blazed in the night promising everything from liquor and cigarettes to salvation. Paul thought it an odd place for a church. But, he thought, this wasn't Elm Wood. This was Houston, the big city.
SSG Thomas escorted Paul into the motel office, and quickly accomplished getting the room that Paul would stay in until his departure date at the MEPS center the following Monday. Paul picked up the key, and looked at SSG Thomas with a kind of pleading. The Marine got the message, and told Paul he would help him get settled into his room. Paul was very thankful. To be honest, he was somewhat terrified of being alone and on his own. The newness of his freedom was starting to make him uneasy, a feeling he thought would be quashed by SSG Thomas' continued presence.
The room was very plain. Double bed, night stand, dresser and a small TV. The room did have its own bathroom and Paul was surprised to see that it was actually very clean. Paul managed to relax a little bit after looking around.
Seeing that his charge was going to do just fine, SSG Thomas bid good night leaving Paul alone in his room. It was only 830 pm, but Paul was tired and besides, didn't they say that boot camp was going to kick his ass?? Paul got undressed and got under the covers and turned on the TV. While he was flipping through the channels, he came across his favorite Friday night show, and settled in. By 10, Paul found that he really wasn't all the tired anymore. The sounds of the city could be heard through the thin walls. Paul also decided that he was a little hungry. Surely, there was somewhere he could get something to eat that would be close to the motel. Paul got redressed and got some money out of his wallet, put it in his pocket and returned his wallet to the drawer. Better to keep it safe that way. Remembering what the clerk in the office had said, Paul used his key to double lock the door after closing it, and headed out into the night in search of something to eat.
A block from the motel, Paul noticed that there were quite a lot of folks out. Mostly men, and mostly dressed in dark clothes and leather jackets. They seemed to be going into a building down the street with no signs on it. As Paul got to the door, there was just a simple painted sign on the door. "The Loading Dock" What the hell, Paul thought, maybe not a real marine yet, he still felt the bravado and literally willed himself through the door. There was a long hallway, the walls were painted black, and it smelled like smoke. There was also another odor, but Paul couldn't place it. As he came to the end of the hall, the place opened up into a dark room with tables, and a bar against the far wall with a big mirror behind it. There was a pool table in the far corner lit by a single light. The place was also filled with men. Men of all ages, some looked almost as young as Paul, and some, older than his stepfather. The thing the all had in common though, was that when Paul walked into the room, to a man, they all stopped what they were doing, and looked at him. Not really realizing what had just happened, Paul walked purposely to the bar. There were a lot of guys there all vying for the attention of the bartender. Paul found an empty stool to sit on, and waited for the bartender to get to him.
SSG Thomas had been in the john when Paul had walked in, but when he walked back out into the main room of the bar, he was floored. There was his new recruit at the bar, dressed like he was going to church. The Loading Dock had a reputation in Houston as a place you went only if you were serious about the BDSM world. SSG Thomas had the streak in him, that was for sure. And by God, if that little snot nosed little pussy boy hadn't found his way here? SSG Thomas smiled evilly. This was going to be a very interesting night.
Paul found it strange that the guy behind the bar was dressed only in a pair of what looked like leather shorts and some boots. It was warm in the bar, and Paul could see sweat on the bartenders smooth body. He didn't really look much older than Paul. Paul also noticed that there was a locked chain around the guy's neck, like a dog collar or something.
"What can I get for you?" said the bartender
"Can I get a beer?" "PBR if you have it." Said Paul.
"You got an ID on you boy?"
A look of panic crossed Paul's face. This was the first time Paul had been in a bar, and he knew that the drinking age was 18, but he had left his ID in his wallet back at the motel.
"Uh, no, I left it at the Motel place I'm staying at."
"Look boy, if you aint got an ID, you're gonna have to prove you're old enough. Got any ideas boy?"
Paul had no idea. He just sat there on the stool with the kind of deer in the headlights look.
The only thing he could think of to say was, "I'm going into the Marines on Monday."
A couple of heads down the bar turned at that. The bartender smiled at that, and said, "No sweat Jarhead. One PBR coming up."
The wave or relief swept over Paul as the bartender left to get him his beer. Paul quickly pulled out some money from his pocket to pay the man with when he returned with the beer.
"Put your money away boy, its been taken care of."
"What do you mean?" asked Paul, not sure of who had said that, but turning around to see a really big man with muscles like a football player behind him. He was shirtless, and the definition of his chest and abs was like those statues Paul had seen in art class. The man was probably in his late 30s, and for some reason, Paul's dick reacted in a way it never had. Looking up into the man's face, Paul's cock stiffened. Embarrassed, Paul tried to cover his now tenting Dickies with his hand. The big man slapped his hand away though.
"A boy should always show he's ready for a man to use him boy." With that, the man reached between Paul's legs and squeezed his now rock hard dick. Further exploration by the man's hand found his boy nuts. Paul's mind was on fire. A man he had never met, was playing with his stuff, and he was totally turned on by it. The flush in his face wasn't lost on the man.
"You're a hot boy. What the fuck are you doing in here boy?"
"Um, I, ah"
"Shut the fuck up boy. I'm not interested in what you have to say. That was what they call a rhetorical question boy. You don't really have to answer it. Got it boy?"
With that, the man's hand clamped down on his nuts hard, like a vise. The pain was incredible. The amazing thing in Paul's mind was that even though his nuts hurt like hell, his cock remained as hard as it had ever been. And then, something even more amazing happened. He came. His boy cock shuddered with the mix of pain and pleasure, and spurt after spurt of boy cum oozed from his cock. Pleasure turned to humiliation as the widening wet spot on his Dickies got larger and larger, yet the man never released his grip on Paul's nuts. If anything, his grip got firmer.
"You fucking punk. Who said you could shoot your load boy."
Paul's head wrung as the man's open hand cuffed his head. Paul felt the blow but couldn't process what in the world was happening to him.
Suddenly, there were more hands on him. Hands pulling him off of the stool, hands yanking his arms behind his back, hands propelling him to the pool of light surrounding the pool table. Paul felt some kind of cloth being stuffed into his protesting mouth. Paul tried to struggle, but the men that were in control of him were very strong. He was beginning to get very scared. He had no idea what these men had in mind, nor why. A rag with a very noxious smell to it was shoved into Paul's face. A couple breaths later, and reality stopped for Paul, and he drifted off into a drug-induced haze.
Paul became aware of the music first. Throbbing, bass, trance-like music he had never heard before. It was dreamy music the made Paul relax. As he woke up, he took a mental inventory of his situation. Instinctively, he began to stretch, much like a cat when it wakes up. To his surprise his limbs didn't respond much. He felt the restraints at his ankles, thighs, wrists and elbows. He tried to lift his head up, but found that that too was restrained. A breeze in the room felt cool against his skin. Dread began to fill his mind. He was naked and strapped onto something. What the fuck was going on? Panic set in and Paul started to jerk violently against his bonds to no effect though. It occurred to Paul that he couldn't see anything. There was some kind of blindfold on his face partially obscuring his vision, although, he could see a little light and vague shapes. He heard the snap of crackling burning wood. This place smelled different as well. Like stagnate air, leather, burning wood, and maybe a little incense? Paul couldn't be sure.
This sure as hell wasn't anything in his short experience. What kind of people could do this to a person. Feeling terribly alone and supremely out of control, his body relaxed against his bonds.
It was hard for Paul to tell how long he waited there, but it seemed like at least a couple of hours. Finally, after what seemed forever to Paul, he heard heavy footsteps and voices approaching. There seemed to be many voices coming, and soon, Paul lost count of the different voices he heard. Most of the conversation however seemed to be concerning some new property and what kind of things needed to be done to the property in order to get it sold. Paul had no idea what they were talking about. He wondered idly what in the world they were talking about.
"Hey, can someone please let me the fuck up?"
Conversation stopped, and Paul gasped as he felt a stinging pain at the same time he heard the sound of rushing wind.
"The property doesn't speak. If you speak again, you will regret it."
Tears streamed down Paul's face. The pain on the blow was unbearable. But, being the product of years of parental abuse, Paul resolved to not make another sound.
Paul felt the object he was strapped to being lifted at his head from a prone position. Steadily, the platform was raised until he felt almost like he was standing, although, there was still a pronounced angle to the platform.
"Is that what you're selling Hawk?" a familiar voice said.. Paul wondered why that voice sounded familiar...
"Yeah, this little punk should make someone a nice little pet. Why you interested Sarge?"
Sarge? Could it be? Thought Paul.
"He's a little scrawny don't you think Hawk? How much were you thinking of getting for him?"
"How's $500 sound to get the bidding started?" said the man Paul now knew as Hawk.
Suddenly, around the room, shouts of ever increasing prices bawled out. When the bidding got to $10,000, Paul got really scared. This wasn't just some little joke anymore. These men were bidding real money now, and the term "property" and "pet" and "slave" were starting to get thrown around a lot more, although the number of men now actively bidding had declined to just 3 different voices now.
"Hawk, before the slave is delivered, do you intend to modify him, or is he to be sold as is??"
"It's up to the highest bidder, but I have the ringmaster and the vet here tonight. Do I hear $12,000 for that gentlemen?"
What the fuck were the ringmaster and the vet for?? Fear from some primal place crept into Paul's mind. Involuntarily, Paul started to resist his bonds again, squirming and trying anything to get away.
"Please, Please, let me go. I..."
The sound of splitting air and then the crack of a heavy leather belt against the front of his thighs ended his sentence.
"Shut the fuck up boy. You will not speak again." SSSSSSMACK. Another crack of the belt, and more pain. SSSSMACK. Again the belt. The pain was incalculable for Paul. His stepfather had never whipped him before, and his legs were on fire.
A low keening noise was now escaping his mouth, and he felt drool running down his chin.
"$15,000" Again the voice he thought he remembered....
"Sold. Get the boy ready." And with that, Paul felt a number of things happening all at once. It was difficult for him to keep track through the pain, but he was trying very hard to remain conscious. Paul felt his restrained legs being spread apart, and he felt the temperature of the room starting to get a lot warmer. Strong hands also started rubbing something cool around his crotch. The conversation in the crowd was getting quite spirited at this point, with shouts of, "Yeah, shave him down" and "Get him smooth" were common. "Hey, look, the boys getting hard. Damn, can I still bid more money?"
There was general laughter followed by "You had your chance Bart" and then, more laughter. Paul couldn't help his reaction though, try as he might, his cock seemed to have a mind and life of its own.
Shaving the little hair off of Paul's body took less than 10 minutes. All the while, the pulse of Paul's heart was counted out by the bobbing of his hard cock for all to see. The shame of it burned on Paul's cheeks. How the hell could his cock be hard? It was like it was some traitorous thing.
"AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHGGGG." The shock of the cold against his tender nipples was sudden and took Paul completely by surprise. The shock quickly turned to a dull ache as the cold conspired to numb the area quickly.
"Hey Jack? You got all your tools tonight?"
"Yeah Hawk, how you want this one done?"
"Hell, ask his owner. Hey Sarge, how you want him done??"
"Nips and PA Jack. Nice heavy gauge to start with. No sense in going through all that stepping up in sizes forever. Know what I mean?"
"Yeah, Sarge, I got ya."
For Paul, the world had closed down to just the sensation of the freezing of his nips. There was a steady burning ache now, and he wondered to himself, if he would be able to take much more. A rubber gag of some kind had been shoved into his mouth and then somehow strapped around his head. His protests and cries of pain were now muffled animalistic noises, lost in the noise of the crowd and the music.
The ice was removed from Paul's nipples whereupon Jack tested them by pulling and pinching them. When there was little obvious objection from Paul, he judged them to be sufficiently numbed to begin. Taking a large 8ga needle, Jack worked it quickly through the left nipple. The boy didn't squirm, so Jack proceeded quickly. There was a little blood, but overall, not much. Jack backed the needle with the 6ga ring that the boy would wear. There would be a little more tearing that way, but he hadn't brought a larger gauge needle. The ring went in with a little difficulty, more blood began to run from the new piercing, but it would soon stop. Taking the ends of the flexible ring together, he ignited the small torch with which he would weld the ends together. When this accomplished, he went to work on the right nipple. Duplicating the process over, the ring went in quickly, with little recognition from the boy that anything had happened.
The next piercing would be a little different, as there was a higher potential for bleeding from the boy's penis. Jack very carefully swabbed the area under the boy's glans with bedadine followed by swabbing the inside of the boy's urethra with lydacane. Allowing about a minute for the drug to deaden the nerves in the area, Jack took out the hooked 6ga needle which he would use to pierce the boy's penis. Jack had to stifle a laugh as the boy's cock kept bobbing up and down with every beat of the boy's heart. Oh well, no time like the present, Jack thought, and worked the needle into the boy's urethra. When it was about 3/8ths of an inch in, he forced the needle through the boy's cock. The gauge of the needle caused some significant tissue damage, and there was a copious amount of blood initially. Taking the 6ga PA ring Jack quickly fished the open end of the ring through the new hole in the boys penis. The ring slid through without much difficulty, and again, Jack used the same technique to close the ring, permanently closing it.
The bleeding in the boys nipples had already stopped, and the bleeding in the boys penis would stop momentarily. Jack stepped back to admire his handy work. This one was going to be something special. He could wait to see him after the Vet got done with him.
During the piercing process, Paul was only aware of some tugging on his nipples, and when his cock was pierced, his only feeling was of a feeling of a little pressure on the inside of it.
"Nice job Jack"
"Thanks Sarge. You want anything else done while I've got my tools out?"
"Nah, that will do for now. Maybe in a few months, we'll get some more done. You never know." Sarge looked down at his new property and smiled. When the boy had come into his recruiting station, he had caused his heart to jump. This boy was something special. Naturally smooth body, long lean muscles, and the face of an angel with bright blue eyes. It had been a shame thought the sergeant that this boy was going out to Paris Island. Oh well, it wasn't going to happen now. This one was going to the ranch, and the Colonel would be very pleased. Very pleased indeed. The only thing left was for the Vet to do his work, and this boy would be ready to take on his new life.
"Hey Hawk, Where the fuck is the Vet?" yelled SSG Thomas.
"He's on the way. You want to get the last load out of the boy before he gets down here?"
"Hell yeah. You got the machine?"
From above the table where the boy was strapped down on, came a hose with a long stainless cylinder attached to it. The boy's cock was already hard, so all that Sarge had to do was lube it up a little and slide the cylinder over it. The rubber grommet at the base of the milker would create the suction necessary with the lubricant.
"Enjoy this boy. This is the last time you're ever going to cum.'
With that, a switch was flipped, and a very very pleasurable sensation flooded Paul's body. The milker started its subtle vibrating and the interior sleeve of the cylinder began its methodical pulsating up and down the boy's penis.
Paul couldn't understand what was happening any more. All he could process was that this the last part of his current torture. A feeling of relief swept over him, and he allowed himself to believe that after this, these men would allow him to leave, and that he would be able to continue on with his life, become a Marine, and finally get to be his own person in the world. Images of other Marines in uniform formed in his mind. These images had been the grist of his mastrubation fantasies for the previous months since he had first entered the recruiter's office. The force of the milker was having its effect on Paul and he could feel a powerful orgasm working its way up. Paul's mind tried to prevent this from happening too quickly, but was unable to stop it. For the second time in the evening, Paul's cum erupted from his cock.
There was a cheer from the assembled men in the dungeon as the boy's body rocked from the first of many orgasms to come. There was a particularly satisfied grin on SSG Thomas' face. This boy had the right attitude. Some boys in the situation were never able to get an erection and suffered their loss without one last release.
Paul's body rocked from the orgasm. It had been extremely intense, and his cock was particularly sensitive after cumming, but the milker didn't care. It just continued its mechanical function.
Sarge inspected the collection receptacle and was pleased to see a thick white ejaculate. He contemplated taking a taste for himself, but knew that the consequences of that would be terrible. The Colonel liked his pleasures, and there were too many men here that were friendly with the Colonel to risk a little pleasure for himself.
Within two minutes, the signs of another impending orgasm were written all over the boy. His toes were curling up again, and the second orgasm was completed. The machine efficiently deposited the boy's cum in the collection receptacle with his previous load. Sarge was pleased to see that the consistency of this load was almost identical to the first one. This boy had a lot of cum to deposit tonight. Already, within the crowd, there were several bets going as to how many times the boy was going to be able to cum before he started shooting blanks. The "good" money was being bet on five times. Sarge grinned to himself. This boy was a cummer, and seven or eight times was not out of the question.
Paul was floating on the high of his sexual releases. Not even missing a beat, the milker continued to provide Paul with a kind of pleasure he had never experienced before. The images of Marines in uniform were being replaced with the visions of the men he had seen in the bar earlier in the evening. Men with muscular frames, hairy chests, leather pants, boots. The fantasy was quite vivid for Paul. It was almost as if one of his fantasy men was trying to fuck him.....
Sarge chuckled as he fitted the electrically charged anal plug into the boy. The boy's hole was very tight, but this little probe would really get the boy's cock going, thought SSG Thomas. After embedding the plug in the boy's ass, Sarge took the lead wires and attached them to the modulation board. He started with a slow and steady stream of pulses. He was pleased to see the obvious pleasure on the boy's face as this new device made its presence known to the boy.
For Paul, the rest of that part of the night was a complete blur. His very being was contained in the sensations resident in his ass and cock now. Getting fucked by his father was never like this. The fantasy of the big strong leather man was fading and now the image of his marine recruiter was there. SSG Thomas. So strong. Paul get he had a huge cock and yearned for the time when he would be able to feel his hard cock in his ass. He came again with a shudder.
Sarge noted that this time, the ejaculate wasn't as thick as the previous loads in the evening.
Ultimately, though, the boy came a total of 6 times before the machine only extracted air from the boy's nuts. Too bad for the boy, thought Sarge, since this truly would be the last time the boy was ever going to be able to shoot like that. He looked over to Hawk who had also been monitoring the boy's progress and then to the Vet. It was time.
The Milker was disconnected from the boy. Sarge was careful to seal up the boy's cum receptacle for the Colonel. The Man would be very pleased with his new boy's production.
The Vet walked over to Sarge. "Do you want the boy awake for this part?" Paul wondered in a very dreamy state what the new voice meant by that, but for his part, the haze of his sexual bliss clouded the truth of his situation to him.
"Yes. He is to remain awake, and it will be explained to him as it is happening. Are you ready doc?"
"Just take me a minute to get him ready. You want a complete reduction done as well?"
"Yeah. I want it to look like there was never a sack there at all doc. Do a good job. The Colonel will make it very worth your while."
With that, the Vet set about prepping Paul for the procedure of removing his boy nuts and bag. After several injections into his scrotum, penis, and surrounding groin, the Vet waited a couple minutes for the drugs to take affect.
"Lower the table, and raise the boy's head" ordered the Vet.
The table was returned to its horizontal position, and Paul felt something being place under his head. He still had no idea what was going on, but the drugs the Vet had injected into him were having their effect and it was like he was somehow detached from what was really happening. When the blindfold was removed from Paul's eyes. All he could see was a very bright light above him. He could hear the conversations of the men around him, so he assumed he was in a large room, although he really couldn't see anything beyond the light. Paul looked down at himself, and was surprised to see the shiny steel rings in both of his nipples. He had never seen body piercing before, and found that it looked quite cool to him. When his eyes looked down to his boy cock, he saw the huge ring that was now permanently a part of his cock. His cock was flaccid now but the big ring pulled on the head of his penis creating a tension there that he had never felt before. A man with a white doctor's coat came into view as well as SSG Thomas. SSG Thomas? What the fuck is he doing here? The question never got out of his mouth since the gag was still firmly in place.
"Ok boy, this is what's going to happen." SSG Thomas started to explain. "You see, my commander the Colonel saw you come into the bar tonight, and said that the best way you could be a Marine was to be the property of one. From this night forward, you are going to be the property of my commander. I will your trainer. But, boy, you have to understand that the Colonel only takes on boys who have been cut. To this end, your boy nuts are going to be removed now by the Vet. He will make sure that you are comfortable while the procedure is taking place. Do you have any questions boy?" A somewhat evil grin crossed his face. Paul tried desperately to voice his objections, and began trying to squirm, but his body just refused to move, and well, there was that thing in his mouth, so just a lot of muffled sound came out of him. "I didn't think so. Doc, if you will do the honors."
Conversation in the room stopped. The only sound was that of the music which had been turned down so the Vet could concentrate on his work. The room temp had been raised to almost 90 degrees, so the boy's nuts were well relaxed, and easy to get at. He took a number 2 scalpel and made an incision down the centerline of the front of the boy's scrotum. There was little blood, thanks to the drugs which restricted the flow of blood in the immediate area. The boy's scrotum opened revealing his testes. The Vet took the left one and rolled it out with his hand until it popped out of the incision. It was a smooth grey color, glistening in the bright overhead light. The cord holding the organ was quickly tied off robbing it of its life. A quick flick of his scalpel and it came away clean in his hand. The vet looked up at the shocked face of the angelic boy he was nutting. Oh well, this one was going to have it better than most boys he worked on. He placed the severed organ into the waiting tray and quickly got back to work rolling the boys right testicle out of the incision. The process was repeated and voila, the boy was a eunuch. The tricky part of the procedure was to take the now unused skin of the scrotum and make it seamless and smooth. The Colonel would pay a lot extra for care in this part. The Vet carefully trimmed the now excess skin and got out his suture kit. 15 stitches later, and the tight incision became almost invisible. There was just a little blood seeping from the wound, but it would soon stop. The vet looked at the two testicles in the tray, knowing the fate they had in store in the Colonel's kitchen.
The assembled crowd started to file by to see the Vet's handy work. All of them agreed that it would be very difficult to tell that the boy had ever had a set of balls under his now denuded cock.
The shock of seeing his nut cut out of his body had caused Paul to retreat deep into shock, passing out from the sight of it. The drugs eased him into a deep almost comatose state. A place he wished fervently to stay.
But, this is only the beginning of the story. There would be much more Paul would endure, and learn over the coming weeks, months and years. His dream of becoming a Marine was over, the reality of his slavery not yet realized in his mind.
SSG Thomas chuckled to himself. It had been a very interesting night. But the rest of the year looked like it was getting better, all the time. Yes, getting much better.
I hate article which are spread over multiple pages and where no print-all-pages version is available. go fuck yourself! i'll never ever read this fuckin article!
...was that this was a story about Nintendo 64! Mario Party Rules!!!
Intel will release a 64 bit processor first, but 2 months later AMD will come out with a 61 bit processor that runs twice as fast. Don't ask me how, or even why speed is relevant to the computing power, but they will do it.
Then, 6 years later, China will come out with their own.
Work sucked, until it became unemployment, when it became slightly more tolerable. -Tet
Fucktards like you are ALLOWED TO POST!!!
For those who want the article all on one page.
Sorry, but my karma just ran over your dogma.
The article is very detailed on many points, but doesn't seem to have much mention of environmental aspects like heat dissipation. I can remember when this was a big issue with every new CPU, but lately it seems to have been swept under the rug. What's changed?
I'm certainly interested in the speed of CPUs, but heat production in the embedded space happens to be a bigger issue for me.
Could I interest anyone in some toast?
This site will now be known as "www.appleshill.com"
my wild guess, without reading the article, of course, is
someone somewhere is working on a 128 bits micro
errera hunamum ets
Hah! My Commodore 64 has 64 BYTES! Hah!
how fast the x86 64-bit processors are? They are stuck on platforms with lousy I/O. Why bother to have a 64-bit processor for anything other than a server, and if you want a server, you better get one with good I/O.
"And this is my boy, Sherman. Speak, Sherman." "Hello." "Good boy."
here.
Lack of eloquence does not denote lack of intelligence, though they often coincide.
There needs to be a true revamping of CPU architecture, not simple adding of bits. 64 bits is fine and dandy, but the convoluted instruction set, seemingly random usage of registers, and an inability to do fast floating point operations really hampers the x86 system. Seeing as how IA64 is based on x86, this will be a problem into the future.
And with IBM announcing further support of the Intel architecture, there doesn't seem anywhere for the computer industry to expand.
It isn't even an argument of "what are we going to do with all this power?" It's more like "where's the fucking power?"
I have been pwned because my
Do you think that if they were using 64-bit chips on the Space Shuttle it would have landed safely?
The preliminary reports say that environment regulating systems were the first to fail. Could this have been prevented if they had been based on IA64 instead of the 8-bit chip arrays that they currently (formerly) used?
What a load of bits.
It amazes me that this discussion is even taking place.
I would have thought that by now, we'd be discussing 128bit or 512bit computers. I mean, I've been working on Dec Alpha chips for 8 years now. A nice, fast, 64 bit processor. (Tru64 kinda sux though).
8 years in computer time is like 800 years in human time. What's up? 64bit processors should be old new now...
The Battle in 64-bit Land, 2003 and Beyond!!! more like celda
Otherwise, well done! Keep up the good work and Semper Fi !!!
Microsoft is eagerly awaiting 64 bit processors, as they will "greatly decrease the incidence of Integer overflow exceptions, and memory overwrites"
Intel had one called i860. Currently we're held up by Microsoft waiting to implement windows64. Microsoft wants to preserve their monopoly on the desktop and leverage their power into server space. Whoever Microsoft backs will probably benefit and that's likely to be their buddies Intel.
TOKYO, March 2, 1999 -- Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. is pleased to announce the co-development with Toshiba Corp. of the 128 bit CPU ("EE", or "Emotion Engine ") for use in the next generation of PlayStation . In order to process massive multi-media information at the fastest possible speeds, data bus, cache memory as well as all registers are 128 bits; this is integrated on a single chip LSI together with the state of the art 0.18 micron process technology. The development of a full 128-bit CPU is the first of its kind in the world.
Holy cow... I didn't know microprocessor features were still so freaking huge! Methinks the author needs to remember that there is an HTML entity readily available as µ. :) Unfortunately it seems slashdot is stripping out most of my entities so we can't see it here . 0.13 mm is 130 microns, which is roughly where IC technology was in the mid- to late-1980's if I'm not mistaken. That can't possibly be right. If use of the entity is out of the question (just as it seems to be on ./), maybe they could have said 0.000013 mm or even spelled out the word "micron" right out.
Qu'on me donne six lignes écrites de la main du plus honnête homme, j'y trouverai de quoi le faire pendre.
Hah! My Commodore has 64 kiB! Hah!
I'm no longer getting email when my comments are moderated.
And instead of listing the moderations given to a comment, percentages are given. This wouldn't be so bad, if those percentages were calculated by any accurate algorithm. No such luck.
But what's this:
(It's this comment)
If Insightful is 30% and Flamebait is 20%, it appears that each moderation (if weighted equally) must have contributed 10%, so there must have been 10 comments.
So 5 Funnies, 3 Insightfuls, 2 (*-1) Flamebaits = +6. But the "sum" is +2, and I doubt this particular comment got 10 moderations (I'm good, but I'm not that good).
I'm not super concerned with my Karma (or else I'd be posting this anonymously), biut I do like knowing what impression my comments make.
And I must admit a predjudice for math that makes sense.
Slashdot is a great resource, but it loses a lot when the moderation system makes no sense.
Opinions on the Twiddler2 hand-held keyboard?
Hopefully, 64bit will bring some performance to the Apache project :)
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http://www.funpic.de
http://www.funpic.de/categories.php?cat_id=225
http://www.funpic.de/details.php?image_id=1889
I presume Digital...Compaq...whoever.. killed it for purely political reasons? Or are there some technical reasons I don't get?
In and of itself, a 64 bit processor with a 64 bit operation system really doesn't mean better performance. You've really got to have application which leverage that kind of platform. And there aren't many. On my SPARC servers (which all have 64 bit CPUs), going from a 32 bit OS to a 64 bit OS so no real improvement or degradation regarding performance in a wide variety of applications. Going 64 bits for most people mean nothing.
The main selling point for SPARC, which most people who aren't dealing with Sun don't understand, is not the CPU itself or the speed of a uniprocessor box.
It is the total package. (Admittedly, the lower part of that is the uniprocessor performance.) On the upside, Sun has some very compelling benefits. Almost all major UNIX programs (commercial) are developed for SPARC, often as the primary development platform. The binary compatibility is awesome. The binary tat I compiled on my workstation (with 5 years old technology that is several CPU generation behind) will containue to run the most modern hardware. There's no recompiling for different/newer architectures (unless you're looking to gain a specific advantage of a new processor and your compiler can do it). And probably one of the best features is an awesome scalability story. If your code does threads, or uses more than a processor at a time, you can scale from a 1 CPU to 100+ CPU configuration. No special programming to worry about clusters or to take advantage of new hardware. Additionally, because the hardware is (majority) single vendor, you gain a great deal of relaibility over platforms which has an incredible amount of diversity (wintel). Okay. That's a double edge sword, admittedly.
That said, it is too bad that Sun just can't keep up in the uniprocessor world. But it has quite a number of real-world advantages beyond performance which keep it afloat, which may surprise people.
Hopefully, 64bit will bring some performance to the Apache project :)
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FunPic
Happy Tree Friends
Ownage
Wow. You could get FOUR P970 from the transistor count of ONE Itanium 2. But the Itanium 2 isn't four times faster than one P970s, its not even as fast as two P970s.
Seems that IA64 is dead. People will go x86-64 for compatibilties sake, and IBM P970 if efficiency is important..
What's with this graph? http://www.realworldtech.com/includes/images/artic les/battle64-2003-fig1.gif
Am I the only one who likes seeing UNITS on things?
Itanium 2/1000 scores a little over 1400 somethings at just above 800 something elses. Is this better or worse than the Athlon XP/2250, which scores less than 800 whatever-they-ares at 900 who-knows-whats?
Most users won't need more than 32bits for years. By 2010 normal people will probably want 64bit desktops so they can have more than 4 gigs of ram (although Intel may be able to trick them with their 36bit extension).
128bits is a LOT.
Don't be fooled by the emotion engine in the PS2. It is 128bit in the sense it can handle 4 32bit floating point numbers at once. Guess what? So does Altivec, SSE, etc!
Calling systems 128bits is like calling the Atari Jaguar 64bit when it was powered by the good old 68000 that powered the 16bit Gensesis, 16bit Amiga, etc.
Typically the number of bits something is referrs to how much memory it can address (2^32bit=4gigs for example). Marketting likes to calling things 128bit (PS2 can handle multiple 32bit numbers at once), 64bit (Jaguar had a memory bus capable of moving 64bits at once), or 24bit (The Neo Geo had a 16bit 68000 and a 8bit z80) to get your attention.
The worst spacial incident in recorded history just occurred and you people are bashing Microsoft?!?! My GOD, people, GET SOME BLOODY PRIORITIES!
Atari was on the right track with their Jaguar, and I still think these new-fandangled 64-bits don't hold an ounce of water against my Nintendo (Ultra) 64!
-Christopher Wu
http://www.christopherwu.net/
I mean we all know by now those spec benchmarks really don't translate well into real world performance. He's got nothing else to go on but to say machine A is faster than machine B based on spec2000 alone is kinda nutty. Bus speed, memory bandwidth and a host of other factors effect machine speed.
Also I know POWER4 chips are made very conservativly so they don't fail as often, I'm assuming its the same for many of these other workstation chips.
Also the power consumption issue is glossed over quickly, but I'm hearing it getting to be a big deal. Power/ cooling costs are making some of these a difficult sell in the server room.
Ya. Techincally years ahead.. marketing.. 'duh.. whats that'. Same for all of the atari line after their dad bought the place.
damned moron tramiel brothers.. phfft
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Are HP and SGI porting HP-UX and Irix and all the associated apps to IA64 or are they focusing on Linux for this platform?
What about IBM and Power4? What OS (AIX?) and applications run on that platform?
I think an equally important and even more interesting aspect in this luming 64 bit war is going to be the software.
It seems Intel's got a great floating point beast in the Itanium. But is this really that hard to do from a technical stand point?
For example the Power4 can issue 4+1 branch instruction per cycle. If IBM was targetting rendering simulations (BTW with OpenGL2.0 your VPU/GPU will do this instead of you CPU! There is already a plugin for Maya that lets your ATI 9700 do the final rendering instead of yourCPU!) or science work couldn't they simply add additional floating point pipelines to handle 4 instructions per cycle?
It doesn't seem that hard to create a CPU to score well on SpecFP. Just give it lots of bandwidth and FP execution resources. Things like branching and OOOE don't really matter like they do for SpecINT. I know its not that simple, but it seems that a company would find it easier to win SpecFP than SpecINT.
One thing the article hasn't been updated to mention is that Intel have changed the Itanium roadmap. They will be introducing a dual core processor in 2005 (Montecito), this is no longer a rumour. Intel are playing catchup here, IBM and Sun are already much further along this path. Intel do however have the resources to throw into development to do this successfully, the gains they have made from Itanium-1 to Itanium-2 suggests that catching up is not beyond them.
I wonder how much of the battle for domination in the server market will be decided by economics rather than technology. I suspect that if Intel can kill off AMD (how long can AMD sustain their current losses?) then they could use their dominance in the desktop market to subsidise the development of Itanium and really drive it into the server market, killing off the strugglers like Sun by seriously undercutting them with price/performance. In the long term I think only IBM stands in Intel's way.
PCs do not even today have lousy I/O. In fact, because the PC architecture has less registers, code needs to store stuff in memory more often, which lead to PCs outperforming RISC machines in memory bandwidth over the years. Sun and IBM in particular have been outperformed in RAM bandwidth for over a decade. They mad up for it in good floating point performance, but now the PCs are catching up there as well.
;-)
By the way, AMD's HyperTransport and Hammer memory infrastructure is quite similar to the "perfect scalability" Alpha memory hardware that has been making headlines recently. I expect Hammer to rule the planet here. Madison also has huge memory bandwidth, but it wastes most of it reading NOPs and instructions that are predicated away or otherwise discarded.
Also, if you actually read the article, you will notice that even the PowerPC translates their ugly and complex instruction set to an internal instruction set, which is more RISCy. This is the very thing that RISC afficionados have been using as argument against x86 for years!
The world isn't that black and white.
If they're supposed to be reporting anything, whi are the charts unlabeled?
Is the whole thing bullshit?
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
1. x86 has been revamped many times. That's why it is still competitive, although its doom has been predicted numerous times.
2. x86 actually has faster floating point than most RISC CPUs. Why don't you actually read the article and look at the stats they give there? In particular thanks to SSE, x86 not only has directly addressable floating point registers but it has huge performance gains to offer for vectorizable calculations. Did you ever ask yourself why all the movie special effects farms have moved their render farms to x86?
3. "Seeing as how IA64 is based on x86"... Care to pass that crack pipe around or are you going to smoke it all alone?
4. "And with IBM announcing further support of the Intel architecture"... ?! What the fsck are you talking about? The only Intel architecture IBM recently announced support for is IA64. You seem mighty confused, man.
Sun zealots gloss over the fact that Digital did it first, faster, and had support for it on their operating systems. Oh, and didn't need OS hacks to work around terminally buggy hardware.
Integer / Buffer overflows in Microsoft operating systems are horribly overplayed. Many will simply use this excuse to say that Linux is better than Windows, but the arguement has really been misunderstood for a long time.
The reason these errors became popular is because of Win95. Advertised as the "most stable home computing experience yet," it had several issues with overflows, the two most glaring were buffer overflows (which is still present in Windows, but being fixed with new security updates daily from MS), and ye olde integer overflows. The more problematic of the two was the latter, as it would cause blue screens and, later, the "A fatal exception in OE has occurred [...] Now closing the program" error message.
Almost all of the integer errors were fixed from Win98SE on, and are hardly a problem anymore Since 2k/XP (no, I never bothered to waste my time testing WinME). Nowadays it takes a really horribly coded program to get one of those errors, and yet the arguement lives on.
Wow, I guess that could be considered pro-Microsoft, but I've recently aquired some spare karma. Yay! Time to have a karmacue!
Work sucked, until it became unemployment, when it became slightly more tolerable. -Tet
Boy, Intel can't win. ;-) )
First people hammer (excuse the expression) it for making a 64-bit processor with massive parallelism (the Explicitly Parallel Instruction Computing, or EPIC architecture) which introduces a whole different way of using the compiler/silicon relationship (which generates best perf times our there on practically all SPEC tests) - AND THEY GET YELLED AT FOR NOT BEING A DIRECT EXTENSION OF x86 ARCHITECTURE AND CHANGING THINGS TOO MUCH.
Now this fellow thinks because there's some compatibilty with old 32-bit, that it's NOT RADICALLY DIFFERENT ENOUGH.
WHAT DO YOU WANT? QUANTUM COMPUTING? (Intel's saving that for 2010...
http://www.realworldtech.com/includes/templates/ar ticles.cfm?AID=RWT012603224711&mode=print
Link provided in several other posts, AND you need only look near the upper right of the article and LO AND BEHOLD - a 'print' button!
Only the bus interface was 64-bit.
i860 was very innovative for the time, I'm not disputing that, but a 64-bit CPU it was not.
I won't switch until my favorite BSD operating system is supported. It's BSD that's important to me, not the underlying architecture.
He said, "You'll be able to tell your grandchildren that you helped assemble the first NT supercomputer," and I cringed.
It is such a shame to see good CPU architechtures die, and crap live on.
The Motorola 68K family were a joy to work with - lots of registers, and a very orthoginal instruction set - you could use any A register for pointers, any D register for data - none of this "ECX is for loops, EDI for destination pointer, ESI for source pointer" crap of the x86.
It's dead now, save for use as a microcontroller.
The Alpha was a ass-kicking, name-taking monster. While I never seriously programmed on it, it was 64 bits long before anybody else knew how to spell it - it had well established software and compiler technology. It is STILL one of the leaders.
But for all intents and purposes, it's dead, Jim. Yet Itanic, with an unproven design concept, is flourishing (sorry, having worked with DSPs that implemented the VLIW idea, I have doubts about the real-world performance of VLIW in a multitasking environment).
As Billy Joel said, "Only the good die young...."
www.eFax.com are spammers
... When will Big Blue buy Sun?
(or is it just too much fun turning the hose on them...?)
HP-UX 11i 1.0 runs on PA-RISC (uname -r returns 11.11).
HP-UX 1.5 and 1.6 run on ia64 (uname -r returns 11.20 and 11.21, IIRC).
So, its there already. And you can buy boxes running it today.
How do I set my moderation to "unwilling" - I've read the FAQ which has advised me it's within preferences, but for the life of me, I can't find the option to actually change it to unwilling?
Also can I turn it back on at a later date if I want to?
Apologies once more.
Geeks hate decimal, right?
...64 bits battle you!!!
Bet you're running Slowaris on that $35k ultra.
At our shop we make these little 1u dedicated boxes - mostly they do Postgres database work with a PHP front end. We initially used Sun Netras, until we found price-competitive intel kit. Anwyay.
Interesting this is that we benchmarked our application on the Netras using both Linux and Solaris, and found that Linux would run at double or triple the capacity of Solaris.
Finally someone tells it like it is! Computer architects have known for a LONG time (eg., 10 years) that MIPS and SPARC were horrible architectures (designed by people who clearly misunderstood the whole RISC concept) and that Alpha was a fantastic architecture that got the 801-idea spot on. As IBM Fellow and Turing Award winner John Cocke pointed out, the whole idea was FAST instructions that were simple enough for compilers to generate and optimize. It had nothing at all to do with the number of instruction types or their complexity. Not only was Alpha the first 64-bit architecture, but it's the only one that has legitimately scaled over a 10+ period. While it is a tragedy to see the Alpha die due to incompetent marketing, it is gratifying to finally see an informed article that gives credit where credit is due. Long live the Alpha!
The only thing that the author fails to note is HP's responsibility for the wretched Itanium 1. The first IA64 architecture was designed by HP and Intel in collaboration, and HP was the one who pushed the idiotic EPIC idea.
Unfortunately, none of the current crop of 64 bit processors deliver: the cost of true 64 bit systems (those capable of actually using more than 4 Gbytes of memory) generally starts somewhere upwards of $10000, and for that you do not get anywhere near 10 times the performance of a $1000 PC.
The main reason right now to get a 64 bit system at current prices is because the applications just cannot be shoehorned into a mere 2-4 Gbytes. If AMD can change that equation and deliver comparable bang-for-the-buck to current PCs, with 64 bit addressing being icing on the cake, they have a winner. None of the other players seem to be capable of doing that--they have tried and failed miserably so far.
If you'd ever written code, you'd know that Tru64 is hands down the BEST unix ever created. It is 100% standards compliant and extremely robust. The man pages are the best out there, and best of all, the APIs are exactly as documented in the man pages. No other Unix comes close. I've written a lot of code for Tru64, Solaris, IRIX, HPUX, Linux, and AIX. Tru64 is by far the best. Linux is next best because of all the user support. Solaris is usable if you don't mind all the careless POSIX-violating namespace pollution that occurs with every new release. IRIX and HPUX are practically unusable.
http://www.sun.com/servers/workgroup/880/
Let's all make sure we're talking about the same thing.
The IO on a server is rarely going to run through an AGP port. That's because you're not going to use a V880 to pump textures to a GPU card for playing games. A V880 is designed to kick any PC's ass up and down the street as an entry-level fast fileserver and database server.
The V880 has several PCI busses for all of its PCI slots (count em).
Some of the PCI slots are 66MHz 64 bit wide PCI slots. How many of those do you have in your PC? (clue: AGP doesn't count).
What kinds of PCs can you get that can have 64GB RAM? And 8 way concurrency on access to that RAM? (Clue: do your homework on Intel SMP limitations).
How can you possibly saturate that 533MHz FSB on the PC? You do it swapping textures across the AGP port! Try loading up your PC with FCAL adapters, hooking them to smart disk arrays with gigs of write-through cache and see how much IO you can get.
--- Nothing clever here: move along now...
I found that most difficult to find :(
Those little boxes made me feel responsible to do the right job and made me concerntrate more on posts I should moderate and less on relaxing and reading the comments for their content.
I hope I can enable it again one day if I ever need it (shrug)
(hey, I was in Houston-what else do they have to be proud of?) ::indignant expression::
Well, I was born there for starters, in the NERV-5 installation just to the southwest off 59.
But then, you probably weren't supposed to know about that back then, so I guess the space program is a start.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
...just buy an Atari Jaguar.
I mean seriously, can't you do the math?
The man pages make fun of their own earlier/current bad design decisions.
Meep!
That's annoying, but I can see it. Not enough new equipment is being sold to support the introduction of a new architecture right now. If you want a server farm, you can buy one real cheap from someone going out of business. Might not even need to move it from the co-location site.
You guys, I don't hear any noise. Are you sure you're doing it right? -- My Life With the Thrill Kill Kult
Thrill Kill Kult rocks..... though I like the early tracks more than the later "Disco Porn Soundtrack" era. Confessions of a Knife, now thats the good stuff...
...Intel have changed...
"Intel", being a single entity, is a singular noun.
"have" is a verb that agrees only with a plural subject in a 3rd-person context.
Is the quality of ESL education really becoming this bad ?
Wow. Reading further into your posting, it becomes even more painful to one's eyes.
Intel are playing...
Intel do...
Then you proceed to use the proper subject-verb agreement in the following independent clause:
only IBM stands in Intel's way.
Not only are you stupid, but you're inconsistent in your stupidity as well.
I'd put those GED plans on hold for the moment, if I were you.
There are almost 2^32 possible IPv4 addresses. We are told that these will be exhausted soon. Suppose that 1/8th of them actually correspond to a host on the internet: that's 2^29 hosts. Now how much data might be on each host? We only have 35 bits of virtual address left, which allows an average of 32Gb of addressable data per host. This seems very limited.
So 64 bit addresses may not be sufficient to address all of the information in the internet. Most P2P systems internally use a 128-bit address space of file hashes. So is it useful for CPU instructions to be able to address this much data using virtual addresses?It seems that alot of the x86 biggots are way misinformed, that or they selectively remember the articles they read. That said, x86 for years has been widely based on a RISC chip. (since the original pentium, iirc) Intel hasn't made anything worth a steaming pile of dog poo in years(a la, itanium1/2, pentium 4, p4-xeon). Sparc has made many advances, and has been 64-bit since the ultra series. Alpha (R.I.P) was a beast of a cpu. Very versitile, very fast, but as someone else said, catered to only but a few people in the market.
:) )
Sun's been up the alley and back down a few times with the 64-bit arguement. I think they JUST broke the gHz barrier with the sparcs, and i'll take a 1gHz sparc over a 3gHz PeeCee any day. Hell, i had an Ultrasparc AXi 300Mhz, 1mb cache, run circles around a p3-700 xeon w/ 1mb cache. Why? Mainly cause solaris is pretty much designed for sparc, and sparc ONLY. A port is pretty much pointless... Again, specific tool for the specific job. The bigger the job, the higher the pricetag. (would you honestly trust your 2-3 terrabyte database for medical records to a few PC's running linux? Didn't think so...
I'll keep my athlon desktop for my q3 games, but i'll use my sparc for my day-to-day stuff just because i personally think it feels faster.
or even 10^1000000 (in binary)?
I heard the Opteron is due end April, but the desktop Athlon 64 is for September.
AMD says that's because they're waiting for a 64 bit desktop O/S first. Dunno how true that is.
Or are we talking about the housekeeping processor that keeps track of scores and stuff?
AFAIK, the Athlon 64 (the consumer chip) has been delayed to concentrate on getting the Opteron (server chip) to market.
The almost-same in Java, "thank Object" just doesn't sound the same. Score: C++ 1, Java 0?
Yes, I like Java over C++ ;p
Flamebait or "unmutual"?
Scores of people dying in Mideast incidents are discussed elsewhere on the Internet.
So are thousands of people dying annually on US highways, for those who feel only US events matter.
Saying the Atari Jaguar was "powered" by the 68K is like saying my computer is only 8 bits, because the 8042 controller that talks to the keyboard is 8 bits.
The 68K was an I/O processor - the main processors in the system WERE 64 bits.
And the 68K family were 32 bits from the get-go: address registers, program counter, and data registers were all 32 bits. True, the external bus interface to the world was a 16 bit wide datapath and 24 bit wide address path on the 68000, but the 68020 was a full 32/32 path. And even the 68K itself still used that 16 bit bus to fetch 32 bits of data (2 operations per word).
Do you classify the 386SX a 16 bit part? - because it had the exact same sort of interface to the world - 16 bit data bus, 24 bit address bus.
True, many of the modern video cards incorrectly call themselves 128 or 256 bit devices when the largest single numerical value they can work with is 32 bits or less, but do try to be accurate in what you complain about.
www.eFax.com are spammers
And yes, I do realise that 2048 bits is generally 32 bits float * 4 channels * 16 pixels/texels per cycle. But I was having a dig at Intel, whose adverts seem to show that the Pentium brand lets you read CD-rom drives, access the internet and get high texture fill-rates, when with some games, it almost is a housekeeping chip.
You have your right to free speech. You also have a right to be an utter asshole if you wish. But I don't think anyone cares if this tragedy "technically" qualifies as a textbook "worst incident" scenario for the US Space Program.
I don't know who said it first but I'll say it again, "While you may have the right to do something, that does not mean you are always right in doing it."
So next time just STFU.
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
A SUV is useful, if you're a park ranger or someone else who actually needs the high clearance and 4WD. But the general populace has been convinced that they need one, even at the expense of high maintenance costs and poor gas mileage.
Similiarly, these kind of 64-bit processors are useful, if you're building high-end servers, designing aircraft, or doing many types numerical simulation. They certainly aren't designed for anyone else, with insane power consumption levels and heat issues. There's no way an Itanium 2 is ever going to work in a laptap or game console, for example. I hope the faux high end PC crowd realizes this, and we don't end up with the bottom end machine from Dell in a few years shipping with a 200 watt 64-bit processor. What a tremendous waste that would be.
As an aside, it's interesting how these CPU manufacturers aren't concentrating on what would be most useful: low price, low power consumption, and small form factor. It's like the early 1980s minicomputer market (VAX, etc.) compared with home computers from the same era (Apple, Atari, etc).
From a system administration and architecture point of view, if the CPUs in question are generally in the same ballpark from a performance standpoint it's decidely more important what operating system you can run on it.
For example, if I had an Oracle database to run, would I run it on Solaris, AIX, or Windows?
CPU-wise, AIX and Windows are better off, however, if given the choice I would always choose Solaris as it's better than AIX (a truly IBM'ed up version of UNIX...yuck), and worlds apart from Windows from a reliability and administration standpoint.
Anyone who read the article asks the same thing.
You're right that computer architecture is in for some big changes in the coming decades, but probably not in the ways that you expect. As some other posters pointed out, the RISC/CISC debate is over. The big problem is that all popular architectures are still structured around the idea of a single sequential instruction stream.
Computer architects have more transistors than they can shake a stick at now, but at some point it becomes impossible to accelerate a single RISC/CISC instruction stream by throwing more transistors at it. What we need are new architectures that are designed from the ground up for serious parallelism. I'm not talking about 4 or 8 parallel execution units, I'm talking about tens, hundreds, even thousands of instructions executing independently.
If you're interested in this sort of thing, I recommend checking out the ADAM architecture from MIT or the PipeRench architecture from CMU. Obviously, these ideas are not yet commercially available, but I expect that within 10 years we are going to see a major leap in the mainstream processor world to more highly parallel architectures.
Cheers,
Benjamin
'Nuf said.
Sorry for the problem. There was a 'communication problem' at the hosting site between the data base server and the web server (though both were running fine).
:-(.
I think someone unplugged something, and it took them 14 hours to figure it out.
Regards,
Dean