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Is Prescott 64-bit?

Posted by timothy on from the bits-o-plenty dept.

unassimilatible writes "According to The Inquirer, Intel's new Prescott has 64 bit instructions lurking inside. Could really rain on the parade of those who thought the new Athlon 64's would be supreme - especially when you look at Intel's price roadmap. Don't run out and buy an Athlon 64 just yet..."

15 of 487 comments (clear)

  1. FUD by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Intel, those typical insensitve clods, are spreading FUD around to kill AMD.

  2. I would... by TWX · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "I'll stick with Intel, thanks. Any of you guys actually have a *good* AMD processor?"

    My 450MHz AMD K6-2 worked fine, at 4.5x100MHz, my 1.2GHz Athlon Thunderbird worked fine, and my Athlon XP2400+ (2.055 GHz after some interesting bus overclocking) works just fine.

    I've never had a problem with them. Do you know what you're doing? Setting the voltage levels is required on the older boards, and that actually means reading the provided motherboard manual.

    I'm looking forward to a dual-AMD 64 bit configuration for home at some point, it looks pretty sweet.

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  3. The tide is turning for AMD by dankdirk77 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is a disaster for Intel, and if you follow along, HP, which is trying to sell Itanium solutions to counter IBM. I love big blue and AMD, so I can't say I'll shed a tear.

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  4. Wow! Not. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hey! There's a rumour that Intel might have not bothered marketing their new developments properly. You should ignore what is on the market and working just in case you can tweak a future chip to get something a bit like it. You heard it here first!!!

    Idiot.

  5. This is pure speculation by dzym · · Score: 4, Insightful
    From The Inquirer, the The Register wanna-be no less.

    The allegedly informative statement is couched in so many conditionals that they of course can once again squirm their way out of any uncomfortable spot they might get stuck in.

    Plus, I don't see Microsoft supporting not one but TWO Intel-specific 64-bit platforms.

    Hold on to your Athlon64 pre-orders, boys and girls.

  6. Finally caught on? by freidog · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Chip Architect was speculating on this way back when intel's 64 bit extensions were still called Yamhill. They make some interesting observations that lead them to belive the second 32 bit ALU was to allow for 64 bit integer operations in a 2x32 bit format. And not to assist with eliminating resource shortages in HT as some others had suggested.
    And even if that does pan out it's highly unlikley to appear in desktop Prescott core chips anytime soon. Seems much more like something you'd find in Xeon MPs and later DPs to eliminate the need for that hack they call PAE.
    Though i hardly see how 'somebody told us a seinor exec said' makes Slashdot.' (I understand that's what the Inquirier bases most of their news on, i thought we had slightly higher standards of reliability)

  7. FUD! by Tremblay99 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Fear, uncertainty, doubt ... not just the tool of Microsoft! Let's see ... the Athlon 64 is out, officially, in a few days ... Intel's 64 bit part, the Itanium, is having trouble shaking its nickname, Itanic ... lots of developers are excited 'bout having a chip running 64 and 32 bit software. Solution? Don't make a better chip ... just float a rumour that you'll be producing something better with some 64 bit instructions... Real Soon Now! With luck, you'll tank the sales of your competitor's chip, without doing any real work! Blah blah blah.

    1. Re:FUD! by JayBlalock · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Someone with points mod this up. If Intel ACTUALLY had a 64-bitter coming out soon, they'd be trumpeting it like it was the Second Coming. With AMD's new chip about to hit, it would be the only sensible thing to do, even if it's months off. There's no reason they would sit on it (and let just-above-tabloid tech sites "break" the story) *unless* they didn't actually have a competing product envisioned anytime soon.

      --
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  8. Re:Hrmm by squiggleslash · · Score: 4, Insightful
    According to El Reg, Prescott really will keep you warm at night. 100W power dissipation... mmmmms :)

    (To put that into perspective, the twin G5s in Apple's PowerMac together put out 90W total.)

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  9. I've Heard This Before by MBCook · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I've heard this one before, and I've got to say it's an interesting idea. The way I heard the speculation was that Intel would launch Presscot as planned and that while it would contain the 64bit stuff, it would be turned off. Then if AMD hit it off with the Athlon 64, then Intel would tell mobo makers the secret code or whatever that would allow them to turn on the 64 bit part with a simple BIOS upgrade. All of a sudden, Intel would have an instant installed base of 64 bit chips. This means that if Intel doesn't use AMD's instruction set (I doubt this, as the article says it would be eating crow, they'd never do it), they'd have a good chance of instantly having a huge install base on desktop PCs, and since they are Intel, they could get software companies to follow. In one fell swoop they could win the 64 bit war.

    If Athlon 64 doesn't take off, Intel could keep things bottled up untill needed, or even nerver turn it on, letting consumers get 64 bit computing in a future chip that they've had time to improve the instruction set on or something.

    It really is an interesting idea, and quite a consipracy theory. Is it true? Who knows! But with all the hub-bub around the Opteron and the upcomming Athlon 64, I wouldn't be suprised if Intel were to drop a bomb like this soon. Just think. Intel first steals AMD's thunder by anouncing the P4EE. Not only is it announced first, but it trounces the competition in benchmarks (this is speculation, I haven't seen any numbers). If the P4EE is fast enough in benchmarks and the price is competitive with the Athlon 64, AMD could be in some trouble. Now if in a few months, Intel announces something like this, AMD's savior that they seem to be betting the farm on could be in BIG TROUBLE. If this happens, AMD's best hope is that Intel DOES use their instruction set, because if they don't things could get very ugly.

    So will any of this happen? Who knows! But that can't stop me from speculating! There is one last thing I'll comment on. If Intel does release a 64 bit processor soon, and doesn't use AMD's instruction set, there is a small possiblity that THEY (Intel) could be in trouble if the Athlon 64 (and friends) make a big enough splash. They might come too late to the party to make big decisions (like which instruction set rules).

    These things seem a bit more likely, given that Intel seems to be in trouble right now (IMHO). While they are ratcheting up the P4 fast, the fact is that they weren't planning on 64 bits any time soon, AMD has forced the issue on them. If AMD is right, that will put them in trouble. And anyone who follows this kind of stuff knows that Intel has some major heat issues. Current opterons put out what, 70 watts? And some of Intel's upcomming chips are looking at 120 watts during usage (maybe as high as 150 under full load). Between heat, stagnation, and pathetic sales of the Itanic, Intel seems to be in Trouble.

    The last thing that I'll say is a message to Intel: when you move to 64 bits (or even if you are just going to stick with 32 for a long time more)... DROP THE NAME PENTIUM. I'm tired of it. There have been FOUR of them (not counting all the different core revisions of each one). I know you have marketed that name for years, but it's time to move on. When will it stop? The Pentium 5, which you might call the Pentium Pentium, or Pentium Squared? Will I have to wait untill the Pentium 17 before you get a new name? Come one guys. Time for a name change.

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    1. Re:I've Heard This Before by Dominic_Mazzoni · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Then if AMD hit it off with the Athlon 64, then Intel would tell mobo makers the secret code or whatever that would allow them to turn on the 64 bit part with a simple BIOS upgrade. All of a sudden, Intel would have an instant installed base of 64 bit chips. This means that if Intel doesn't use AMD's instruction set (I doubt this, as the article says it would be eating crow, they'd never do it), they'd have a good chance of instantly having a huge install base on desktop PCs, and since they are Intel, they could get software companies to follow. In one fell swoop they could win the 64 bit war.

      You've got to be kidding. It takes years to develop a compiler for a new instruction set. If Intel suddenly announced that a lot of their chips were 64-bit capable, it would be completely useless, because there would be no software at all that could take advantage of it.

      Keep in mind that running 64-bit programs requires that the Operating System supports the instruction set completely (otherwise the registers wouldn't be saved properly, at a minimum), so they'd basically have to have Microsoft on board, in addition to probably a Linux port in order for it to be useful.

      And in the meantime, all of those extra instruction decoders and extra registers would be there on the chip, wasting valuable silicon that could be used for a larger cache. No way - Intel wouldn't sacrifice potential speed now for the chance to surprise everyone with a 64-bit processor later.

      Face it: Intel gambled with the Itanium, and so far their gamble hasn't been paying off. It's far too early to see who will win in the long term, but it's clear that the Itanium hasn't been an overwhelming success, while the Opteron is definitely equally popular already, if not already more popular.

  10. Isn't this what Intel wants? by Kevinv · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Float a rumor that their next chip wil have some 64 bit instructions, so don't upgrade to that competitor that is true 64-bit?

  11. Has anyone Considered? by Bruha · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What would happen if they succeded in causing AMD to go out of business? Then the only other option for consumers are VIA C3's and Transmeta which will never match Intel's. So then once again at the top of their game and after buying auctioned assets off AMD's corpse they ratchet prices back up and we lose out on innovation.

  12. Re:Let me see if i can understand this by xswl0931 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Assuming it's true that Prescott has 64-bit capabilities built in but not enabled, the reason to keep it secret is to not have a cheap Intel 64-bit capable processor cannibalize their expensive Itanium sales. If a dual or quad proc Prescott 64-bit system costs the same as a single proc Itanium system, which would you buy?

  13. "Don't run out and buy an Athlon 64 just yet..." by colins · · Score: 4, Insightful


    I'm afraid this line of reasoning just doesn't cut it.

    Intel does not want a 64bit x86 on the market. They want to lead everyone to Itanium where they don't have those pesky AMD guys competing with them.

    It's for this precise reason that everyone SHOULD run out and buy an Athlon64. If nobody buys them, Intel will have no reason to jump into the 64bit x86 market at all.

    I for one can't wait for Athlon 64 to hit the market... I need a viable 64bit Linux workstation solution and I need it yesterday.

    -cjs