Slashdot Mirror
Linus on Intel's 64 bit Extensions
ceswiedler writes "KernelTrap is running a thread on the Linux-Kernel mailing list about Intel's new IA-32e 64-bit chip. Linus complains 'what I found so irritating is that _hours_ after the Intel announcement,
people were _still_ confused about whether the new intel chip was actually compatible with AMD's chips.' It is, of course, but you have to do a thorough comparison of Intel's reference manuals to discover that-- they don't mention the fact that their new chip is instruction-set compatible with AMD's x86-64 chip." See the previous story for background. So it looks like the reason Intel was vague about their announcement is that they didn't want the WORLD TO KNOW THAT THEY WERE COPYING AND FOLLOWING AMD rather than developing some new thing on their own. Slashdot is proud to help Intel in this quest; wouldn't want the public to know that INTEL WAS SIMPLY FOLLOWING IN AMD'S FOOTSTEPS. Hope this helps.
THIS ARTICLE SUMMARY NEEDS MORE UPPERCASE.
Lameness filter encountered. Post aborted!
Reason: Don't use so many caps. It's like MICHAEL SIMS BLOWING A GASKET.
for clarification :)
Now slashdot will clarify things that businesses cannot ;)
I could change the world, but GOD won't give me the source code
Whoa easy on the caps there cowboy :)
Nobody smart reads Slashdot, otherwise the goose is loose.
What's with the ALL CAPS?
litigious bastards
suck it sco!
Mod me as you will, and I do realize it was meant to be funny, but I expect a bit more from /. than portions of news postings in all caps. Leave it to the reader to decide what's important and what's not. All caps automatically annoy me, and have done since I can remember.
Thanks for your time.
In any business, when you are getting your arse kicked, you look at your competitors to see what they are doing. Why reinvent the wheel and all that....
[ Don't reply to this ]
If there was any doubt that Slashdot is a valid news source, those fears can now be LAYED TO REST.
Everything seemed to be going so nice
'till the end of all beings punched right through the ice
Intel has to be very careful right now, for years they have been seen as the innovator in processors. Now AMD got the jump on them and they don't dare not respond, but they have to respond in a way that seems like it was thier choic.
-- Slashdot, making the Left look conservative since 1997.
Why would Intel be embarassed or whatever to "follow in AMD's footsteps"? I mean, sure Intel's bigger and badder than AMD, but can't you learn something from the little guy sometimes? Don't things like this happen all the time in the car industry with various technologies?
Isn't it interesting how you come to recognize posters based solely on their sigs???
All your instructions are belong to us.
500GB of disk, 5TB of transfer, $5.95/mo
that InTEl Was Simply FOLLOWING In AMD'S FOOTSTEPS
I guess since Intel couldnt convince anyone to buy the Itanium that they bought and rebranded from HP (formerly the PA-RISC) then they must make a clone of something people want.
Phase 1: Make 64 Bit chip
Phase 3: Profit!
Phase 2 was Scrap Other Bought 64bit chip and include AMD compatible 64 Bit extensions to existing tired old Pentium line of processors.
Now Intel is making AMD compatible chips ?!!
You're right. Slashdot often borders on masking editorials as articles, but this is just plain ridiculous.
--Xandu
I'd rather have AMD be the leader than Intel. I've always been happy with AMD, seeing as how they don't bloat the appearance of speed on their cards to the average dolt at the expense of clear technical data.
http://mediagoblin.org/
but micheal beat me to the punch. I'm not sure whether Torvalds was complaining about Intel not coming out with a ready admission "We had to follow AMD because they got there first" or complaining about programmers missing the (in hindsight, at least) obvious conclusion that Intel would make a Howitzer-size hole in their clean-room booties by not going with the AMD flow.
Good for Intel. You may think that the important thing is that they are "following in AMDs footsteps," but I think the important thing is that people won't have to write for two architectures now.
If they were they'd be Apple, not Intel. Duh!
The guitars sound good, now give me about 10db more on the cow bell.
They are still going to be at least 6 months behind AMD. It's rough going from Market-leader to catch-up... guess it takes a lot to break down and admit you went down the wrong path and wasted large sums of cash.
Save a life, sign your organ donor card.
Keep reading down the comments at the linked site and you'll see an even more explicit gem from Linus:
Actually, I'm a bit disgusted at Intel for not even _mentioning_ AMD in their documentation or their releases, so I'd almost be inclined to rename the thing as "AMD64" just to give credit where credit is due. However, it's just not worth the pain and confusion.
Any Intel people on this list: tell your managers to be f*cking ashamed of themselves. Just because Intel didn't care about their customers and has been playing with some other 64-bit architecture that nobody wanted to use is no excuse for not giving credit to AMD for what they did with x86-64.
(I'm really happy Intel finally got with the program, but it's pretty petty to not even mention AMD in the documentation and try to make it look like it was all their idea).
I don't think anyone is surprised by this -- Intel would be nuts to mention AMD in any press release about anything unless it's incredibly negative toward AMD (which this definitely is not), and even then it would be ill-advised from a amrketing perspective.
everything in moderation
biased article summary much?
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
..but are still accurate.
Intel will never, ever, ever put anything out that their name isn't all over it.
Example: Firewire. An industry standard. Does Intel put it in their motherboard chipsets? I remember old Intel comments stating their 'commitment to IEEE-1394' but it was all a load of crap. The PII and PIII chipsets could (and should) have had it on board.
Here, finally, Intel has decided to take someone else's tech. But even now, they won't admit it's someone else's tech.
What a bunch of arrogance..
It's the big dogs that copy the little dogs. Both in this case (Intel, AMD) and in the Microsoft, Apple case. It is so satisfying when this happens.
Now, go troll somewhere else.
-- Fighting mediocrity one bad post at a time.
On Wed, 18 Feb 2004, Mikael Pettersson wrote: ;)
>
> What about naming? IA-64 is taken, AMD64 is too specific, Intel's
> "IA-32e" sounds too vague, and I find x86-64 / x86_64 difficult to type.
> "x64" perhaps?
x86-64 it is. Maybe you can remap one of your function keys to send the
sequence
This whole "ia32" crap has always been ridiculous - nobody has _ever_
called an x86 anything but x86, and Intel is just making it worse by
adding random illogical letters to the end.
In contrast, x86-64 tells you _exactly_ what it's all about, and is what
the kernel has always called the architecture anyway.
Linus
On Sun, 22 Feb 2004, Herbert Poetzl wrote:
>
> hmm, so the current x86_64 will be changed to x86-64 or
> will there be x86_64 and x86-64?
No. The filesystem policy _tends_ to be that dashes and spaces are turned
into underscores when used as filenames. Don't ask me why (well, the space
part is obvious, since real spaces tend to be a pain to use on the command
line, but don't ask me why people tend to conver a dash to an underscore).
So the real name is (and has always been, as far as I can tell) x86-64.
Actually, I'm a bit disgusted at Intel for not even _mentioning_ AMD in
their documentation or their releases, so I'd almost be inclined to rename
the thing as "AMD64" just to give credit where credit is due. However,
it's just not worth the pain and confusion.
Any Intel people on this list: tell your managers to be f*cking ashamed of
themselves. Just because Intel didn't care about their customers and has
been playing with some other 64-bit architecture that nobody wanted to use
is no excuse for not giving credit to AMD for what they did with x86-64.
(I'm really happy Intel finally got with the program, but it's pretty
petty to not even mention AMD in the documentation and try to make it
look like it was all their idea).
Linus
On Mon, 23 Feb 2004, Adrian Bunk wrote:
>
> In the long term, x86_64 creates more confusion:
> - SuSE says AMD64 [1]
> - RedHat says AMD64 [2]
> - Debian says AMD64 [3]
>
> Renaming might be some work today, but it might actually remove
> confusion in the future.
Well, the thing is, I _like_ a vendor-neutral name.
I think it's important to have multiple sources for a chip, and I think
one of the problems with IA-64 was that it was a locked-in chip with
patents and no serious competition internally (ignore the Intel mouthing
about "open").
The x86 is so great partly because there's been real competition. So I
think it's very important to x86-64 to have real competition to make sure
nobody gets too dishonest.
So AMD64 is a bad name, partly for the same reason IA32 is a horrible name
(and who have you ever heard use the IA32 name except for people who are
paid to do so by Intel?)
What I found so irritating is that _hours_ after the Intel announcement,
people were _still_ confused about whether the new intel chip was actually
compatible with AMD's chips. Why the f*ck not just come out and say so,
and talk about it? It took people actually reading the manuals (which
didn't mention it either) to convince some people on the architecture
newsgroups that yes, "ia32e" was really the same as "amd64" except in the
small details that have always set Intel and AMD apart.
So I don't really want to change the name. "x86-64" is a good name. I just
wish there was more honesty involved, and less friggin *POSTURING*.
Linus
so, exactly how soon can i expect to see them on my desktop? does it make linux look any better? i doubt it. if you ask me, 64 bit is way too ahead for its times.
you may feel a slight sting. That's pride fucking with you. Fuck pride. Pride only hurts, it never helps
Is there anything new with this? I mean, hasn't Intel been dragging behind AMD as far as getting new products and innovations to market? Personally I think the underdog always has to work harder, and come up new, fresh ideas, faster to gain anything.
This is how technology goes mainstream and becomes inexpensive enough for the everyday consumer: following.
Being a trailblazer may get you bragging rights, but you risk fragmenting the industry and the market you feed. For the longest time in the 90's AMD and Cyrix went on a follow-quest, and breached the low-cost PC market. Not only did they enhance choice and lower prices, they kept the number of standards down to a minimum. Just imagine what would occur if AMD, in the 1990's, came up with something completely different, but can run exactly the same thing Intel chips can at the same price: the market gets fragmented, prices remain high and stagnant, and no one is the winner until one of the two gets clobbered, eliminating competition in the market and raising prices even further.
It's not characteristic for Intel to follow AMD, but IMO, it's the smart thing to do to be competitive.
Oh yes, just because they are following, doesn't mean they can't do it better. AMD did in the 90's and today.
------
Amadaeus
The last bastion of Mathie-ism
So we are ridiculing Intel for supporting common architecture and collaborating with competitor? I guess the implication is that the proper thing Intel should have done is develop its own set of 64-bit extensions, making it absolutely incompatible with AMD's offering. The world would be a much better place then, right?
And Intel doesn't really have to advertise the fact that it's AMD-compatible, it's not like AMD owns more than 80% of the market, and Intel is below 20%. To hyperbolize, you don't expect Microsoft to announce the next version of Office to be compatible with Joe's Software Shop's software.
How does this serve their interests? I don't understand were the pressure was coming from.
If the extensions were not compatible I could easily see Intel pushing AMD out of market.
-ashot
AMD needs to wait until Intel is completely involved in x86 32-64 and then launch a complete advertising compaign to the General Public about this. Show benchmarks. Help manufacturers freindly to their product push their wares. And really nail them hard. No Blue Man Group silliness. No stupid ads. Just plain facts and examples. But they must do so in mainstream media. Telling a bunch of geeks about their products doesn't work, they already get all the information themselves. And they buy based on reasearch anyways, not on advertising.
It's about bloddy time. Isn't that what's next?
"The absurd is clear reasoning recognizing its limits"
-Albert Camus
So it looks like the reason Intel was vague about their announcement is that they didn't want the WORLD TO KNOW THAT THEY WERE COPYING AND FOLLOWING AMD rather than developing some new thing on their own. Slashdot is proud to help Intel in this quest; wouldn't want the public to know that INTEL WAS SIMPLY FOLLOWING IN AMD'S FOOTSTEPS. Hope this helps.
right... let's bring bias into news! yippie!
From the summary, it doesn't seem like that at all.
Intel had no choice but to use AMD's instructions if they wanted their chips to be Windows-compatible.
Paper Launch or not, we need to know a little bit more about what changes are going to be made to the memory controller and bus specifications.
i rer.net
Linus should have also come out with Transmeta's plans for implementing iAMD64....
It is an exciting time when Intel is taking a following to AMD.
Sources for AMD info:
http://www.amdzone.com
http://www.theinqu
Will the Windows 64 Demo work on Intel's 64 bit implementation as it currently sits?
I don't like the fact that the Slashdot headline takes Intel to task for doing the right thing. It would have been bad for everyone (Intel, AMD, and all of their developers and users) for Intel to adopt a "not-invented-here" approach and conjure up yet another 64-bit instruction set out of thin air. The fact that they didn't is a good thing.
Crappy journalism on Slashdot's part.
If you can beat em, copy em, and advertize the hell out of your product/service.
Sigs? We don't need no stinking sigs!
They're damned when they go AMD and would be double-plus dammed if they didn't.
The whole 64-bit thing is hype. Until these processors extend their native word size from 32-bits to 64-bits, they're really not useful for most people.
64-bit memory extensions... whooptie doo.
Up until recently, AMD has had to follow in Intel's footsteps. They have been forced to use Intel's extensions for years- until this (VERY) bold move by them. Now, the tables are turned, and Intel are backed into the corner instead of AMD. I love it.
Listen to my experimental-industrial-techno!
What is the overall instruction set's name?!
Does it remain "x86-64" in the kernel tree, or do we call it "IA-32e"?
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
Next time they decide to take a bullet and promote compatibility, they'll know better!
TEACH EM A LESSON, SLASHDOT!
REM Old programmers don't die. They just GOSUB without RETURN.
I thought Tom's Hardware was a pro-Intel shop? Their reviews and commentaries over the past few years have read as such.
If anyone from Intel is reading this thread, thanks! Conpetibility is important to me, code/end user.
Free speech is getting expensive...
AMD and intel have numerous cross liscencing deals goinging on that ammount to Intel can use AMD's IP and AMD can use Intel's IP for, I believe, compatibility. I am not sure about the exact deals but in theory AMD can make a compatible implementation Intel's HyperThreading tech (via reverse engineering) and Intel can (apparently) in practice use AMD's 64 bit extensions with neither paying royalties or considerations to the other. Other examples from the other direction are AMD implementing MMX and SSE as 3DNow and 3dNow Pro.
There is nothing wrong with being gay. It's getting caught where the trouble lies.
So when e-mail paid AMD for the rights to use the 64bit extensions, did they pay extra for AMD to keep quiet about it?
"INTEL WAS SIMPLY FOLLOWING IN AMD'S FOOTSTEPS."
Hey Sims, did you get this riled up in the late eighties when suddenly the Amiga was being copied left right and center while the Amiga itself was derided?
Uhm, didnt i read somewhere that Intel licensed AMDs 64bit extensions? Just the same as AMD license ia-386 stuff from Intel? This may be covered in the article, which I cant currently get to, and i just cant be bothered to google.
Why does everyone on /. hate Intel? (I am being serious with this question; I honestly don't know)
Intel aren't copying AMD, they've just stated that their 64-bit instructions are compatible with AMDs, how it's implemented is anyone's guess.
It makes sense really. Heck, if they were different, we'd be up in arms about that too... *cough*Itanium*cough*
...Because AMD is currently lagging far behind Intel in terms of performance.
-Fred
Both Linus and Slashdot get the whole thing too personal without using some reasoning.
Do we talk of Gif as "Compuserve Gif" or of PDF as "Adobe PDF"? No. However, re-implementations exist everywhere without attributing everything to the first who used that software/instruction set. It is simply market: the makret wants to be compatible, and so Intel does that. I find it normal. Linus needs to get over himself, because it is obvious from other posts of his that he is an AMD fanboy and that might have an ugly impact on Intel's relationship with Linux (e.g. sharing specs etc). He has to be more responsible of what he says online.
I don't think there was ever really any doubt about that :-)
* And remember, it's spelled N-e-t-s-c-a-p-e, but it's pronounced "Mozilla."
While I found the submission entertaining, I still have to give props to Intel. OK, yes, they are making a chip that's compatible with AMD's instruction set, but this can only be a good thing. Instead of running out and introducing a new 64 bit instruction set to the market to directly compete with AMD, and thus create market confusion and compatibility problems, they've decided to do the best thing for us, the consumers and programmers - embrace an existing standard to avoid market fragmentation.
Yes, it might have pissed Linus off that they weren't very forthcoming about it, but just think how ticked he'd be if they introduced something completely different and he had support two competing 64-bit architectures.
Maybe Intel is taking a lesson from IBM. Just because you are the big boy on the block doesn't mean you can make your own rules. Anyone remember Microchannel Architecture?
-R
So now that they've done something good for consumers, being COMPATIBLE, and they did it in such a way that the MARKETING DEPARTMENT and the HIGHER UPS save face...
You have to rub their faces in it.
MORONS.
This is how little-endian big-endian stuff happens.
Intel releases P4. AMD releases Athlon XP. AXP a cheaper, better alternative until Intel drops prices, improves with hyper-threading, larger cache, et al. AMD stagnates for 2 years, releases 64 bit processor, and expects that their short-term momentary superiority over Intel makes them the better company.
In a year when Intel is adding improved instructions, increasing the FSB speed, enlarging their L1/L2/L3 cache, and raising clock speed every 15 minutes on their 62 bit CPUs, we'll see the same goddamn Athlon 64s we see today in a slightly faster clock speed.
Since when has reading articles been a requirement of posting in any given Slashdot article?
I really don't understand why Intel is handling this so poorly. Someone in the higher ups must have thought this to be a horrible end of the world type of thing. In my mind it isn't. They have ended up making Intel look worse if they would have just quitely said, we are supporting x86-64...which is compatible wiht AMD, at the end of the sentence.
AMD is an x86 processor. Something Intel invented. Becuase of the agreement between Intel and AMD over the use x86, Intel can use the new extensions without paying royalties.
A) The only people that might loose faith in Intel are some techies, most of who are already AMDFanBoys ( and girls ) anyways. The average consumer ain't going to care who created the 64 bit extensions.
B) AMD DID THE WORK. No need waste time designing the specs out.
C) MS has an OS ready to go out the door, no time waiting for you apps to be deployed.
D) AMD has spent a lot of time marketing the technology, all you have to say is we do it with more GHZ ( please don't let the GHZ thing spin off into another thread ).
E) You've got something to help ease the pain between your Xeon and Itanium lines.
This is a good thing for Intel. Sure you are copying AMD's instruction set, but lets face it, compared to the man hours needed to actually implement the instruction set in trannies, an instruction set is pretty simple. Intel saves money, says hey look we are not a monopoly anymore don't hate us, and has a good product.
Intel made a bad PR decision, they should just admit it and move on.
yes, not the user comments, the _biased_ article itself.
All your customer are belong to us ;)
"Hey! Unless this is a nude love-in, get the hell off my property!!"
Mod me as flamebait I'm sure but those of you who think Slashdot is a news site need to get some wires uncrossed. It's no different than any other blog out there.
Why is it that we're always seeing people expect quality editing and other journalistic qualities like lack of bias? Even worse who are these idiots who mod such comments up?
It's just a bunch of guys posting links to other news sites! This is a community FOR NERDS not a replacement for your newspaper.
Onto the actual news this is great. You could say it's the final proof that intel can no longer really dictate things completely in the x86 market. The trend was fairly obvious for a while but this has a nice way of finalizing that fact.
Yeah, MS is doing what is best and quickest to market for the consumer by following AMD's lead. Let's just ignore Microsofts horrible track record with things like adding functionality to MSIE in XP SP 2 soon that's been a standard in every other browser for a few years like built-in pop up blocking.
If you seriously think a) MS and Intel aren't in bed together b) that MS is doing what's best for the market by using AMD's 64 bit instructions in their 64 bit OS, you are out of your fucking mind.
Linus said that there compaitible, therefore intel is following in there footsteps.
OR
Intel built there to be compatible with AMD, and still have there own stuff as well.
MICHAEL you are an idiot for trying TO MAKE SOME POINT about a CONCLUSION from somebody WHO HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH THE DESIGN.
Presumably you've been using the internet for more then a week, so you should no better with the caps.
Dolt.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It should be no secret to readers that AMD and Intel share all manner of intellectual property, and probably meatspace property too such as prototypes, engineers, documents, maybe even facilities. Their collaboration/cooperation has been going on for years and years.
Let's not forget that Intel did release a 64-bit processor before AMD. Who can blame them for trying to break away from an instruction set that we've been using since cavemen were carving computers out of stone. It's not their fault that everybody wanted to stick with x86. So now to appease the general public they are forced to beat that dead horse one more time. In fact Intel should be lauded for being compatible and not trying to monopolize the 64-bit market.
Good thing Chevy decided to copy Ford's 4 wheel design, otherwise we would all be riding around in ridiculous 3 wheel Dr. Seuss-looking contraptions. Wouldn't we want Intel to copy AMD's approach to 64-bit computing to minimize the risk of running into compatability issues? Jeez, product copying happens on a day-to-day basis in the product world. I'm surprised at the outcry to Intel's "copying", especially from a crowd that touts interoperability to the degree it does.
End of Line.
Microsoft announced that they would only support the AMD instruction set. So Intel has to follow.
This is the result of divide and conquer strategy. Microsoft like to remain the only monopolist in the pc market, therefore they help out Intels rival.
....reminds me of a certain presidential candidate.
-Valiss
Do you seriously think Intel decided yesterday, last week, or even last year to add 64-bit support to their x86 processors. This has probably been planned for a long time.
... again ... and again?
How much bad PR did AMD get when they had to slip their Athlon64
Better for them to wait until there was at least an OS to support the new CPU's before making a release.
THEY WERE COPYING AND FOLLOWING AMD
"They were following the standard-setter AMD" would probably sting even more.
However, I bet five to one that the genius that decided to break compatibility in the 64-bit platform is still in Intel's payroll and getting a high check every month.
Rome taught me patience and assiduous application to detail. Virtues which temper the boldness of great, general views.
Next thing you know they will be selling processors marked 2600 that only run at 2 GHz.
I thank Microsoft. Sometimes it takes a 4000 pound gorilla to create standards and *while I don't agree with everything they do* they force a sort of standardization that make cheap OTS PC's a reality and brings a little order to what could easily be chaos.
I'd like to see a little more toe-stepping in the Linux market. We could use a bit of a bully.
Quack, quack.
One thing to like about Linus is his anti-FUD, full discosure style, evident here just IMHO.
C|N>K
Whats the story with Linus these days, he is getting fiesty about all sorts of things... this is very unlike him. What happened to the mild mannered Finn of formers years? He must be still peeved about that SCO bollocks. While its all very amusing to see him lifting Intel out of it, I sort of miss the zen like dryness/sarcasm of yesteryear.
"Thats right buddy, the large print giveth, and the small print taketh away."
Linus said that there compaitible, therefore intel is following in there footsteps.
Translation:
Linus said that they're compatible, therefore Intel is following in their footsteps.
Come on people, it's not that hard!
---- It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again. It does this whenever it's told.
They invented an AMD-64 compatible (clone) instruction set.
anyone know where we can order them? or will they be costly.. amd's were free..
Kyle
http://www.unlogikal.net/
Until. . . .
we find that the one instruction set is also known as the Zeist set, Zeist sends new instructions which compete until There can be only One! again.
Next, we find out that the whole Zeist instruction thingy was ignored due to lack of good reviews, customer complaints, and the entire world hating it. People try to pretend it never existed.
Then, we find out that the original Winner of the Prize in the instruction set game, never actually one. There was a hidden instruction set buried under mounds of rubble from an old Chip makers building. The two instruction sets battle for Standards Certification until the original instruction set comes out the victor again!
But wait, we next find out that 64-bit instruction sets know no limits of time or place, where a slightly altered, and more commercialized younger instruction set defeats the instruction set that is a member of his own UT clan. Now, we find out that there may or may not 'can be only one!.
but does anyone else find IA-32e to be a STUPID name for a 64-bit processor?
has never hesitated to vent his personal feelings on anything or even use Slashdot for his complaints with Speakeasy's customer service which was childish on his part and flat out idiotic on /.'s part by letting him run that crap. /. editor.
However, he's right on this one. The caps quotations weren't needed however.
Since Katz left us, Michael is definitely the worst
This guy is way out there
Imagine, Intel conforming to an existing standard!!!!WOOHOO! Way to go Intel!
If we could get more co-operation like this in the industry, software and hardware would work much better, and crash less often!
ttyl
Farrell
CAN-CON 2019 - Ottawa's only book oriented Science Fiction Convention! October 18-20, Sheraton Hotel, Ottawa, Canada h
I'm a bit concerned that people are slagging Intel excessively for this. I mean technically they did the right thing. Yea they definitely should have recognized AMD and made life a bit easier (that's actually Torvalds main criticism). It's a U-turn, but would you rather that after a careful comparrison that they turn out to be incompatible? That would be a huge pain in the ass for everyone. The benefit of using the same instruction set MASSIVELY MASSIVELY MASSIVELY outweighs the inconvenience of a few people figuring that out for themselves.
64 bit instruction set design is not new, there are many 64 bit chips out there and some of these decisions are either inevitable or arbitrary. Copying someone on their instruction set for vanilla 64 bit instructions is not a big deal and is a million times better than designing yet another one.
The problem isn't that Intel is following AMD on the 64 bit route. I think we can all agree that this is a good thing. The problem most likely; for a guy who writes kernels most of the time; it becomes annoying when he has to look through multiple manuals to deduce an answer that could have easily just been said.
"can somebody write up a list of differences? I know there are people who have had access to the Intel docs for a while now, and obviously Intel is too frigging proud to list the differences explicitly."
Of course for a guy who has created a community based upon giving credit where it is due, you can't blame him for getting a little mad about that too.
But let's face it, Intel didn't go out of their way to inform their customers of any technical details - much like many companies still do today. From an engineers perspective it is always nice to get a press release that says "Our product is freakin' awesome, and it runs on gas!" as opposed to "Our product will rule you all and it runs on the distilled remains of million year old plants aged for 7 years on oak barrels in Lynchburg TN".
Just say it runs on gas buttmunch, save us all some freakin time. Of course you have to give it to Intel, Linus may not have read the manual otherwise.
Lameness filter encountered. Story aborted!
Reason: Don't use so many caps. It's like YELLING.
One thing that's been giving me headaches when dealing with Opteron is that the x86_64 chips report the same architecture as x86 chips when it comes to Pre-eXecution Environment booting. Which means it's not possible to tell the difference between the two and provide the correct boot kernel for a network boot. I've had to rely on differing MAC addresses on the systems.
Seeing as Intel owns PXE, I wonder if this means they will add another architecture code for x86_64 (like they did with ia64).
-Todd
"The details of my life are quite inconsequential..."
Just a passing thought, but perhaps the reason Intel wasn't forthcoming about AMD x86-64 compatibility was because they didn't want people running out and buying Athlon64's, knowing that any compatibility issues between Intel/AMD are now moot.
Who doesn't like free music?
To sum it up;
We're buying from Intel now on ?
Well, in this case it was good. I'm sure if it weren't for the 800-lb gorilla Microsoft refusing to support more than one 64-bit X86 architecture, Intel would have annoyingly forked yet another extension incompatible with AMD's.
This would have significantly raised the costs of software packaging for everybody for years to come. In fact, the extra hassle would probably make for a significant decrease in the number of programs that even bothered to release 64-bit versions at all.
Linus himself has switched to PPC64. That happened before his rant about what Intel has done. Here's the Linux Kernel Archive link:
0 77 30986829772&w=2
http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/l=linux-kernel&m=1
Given a general cpu register like eax it looks like this:
31--------------15-------7------0 Bits
|--------------eax--------------|
|------ax------|
|--ah---|--al---|
And now AMD's come up with the brillant idea of extending a register. The 64 bit accumlitive register is now RAX with it's low 32 bits being EAX and the low 16 are ax and so on.
The continuation of adding on register extensions is great for backwards compatiblity but it makes the instruction set a mess. Intel knows this but people don't seem to be will to give up compatibility or performace. The only way this is probably ever going to go away is if every one is forced to write a C compiler.
The sad thing is that a new cpu could have a compatibility layer that had a slight performance hit but with a lack of software supporting new 64 implementations people wouldn't buy it because the pretty little bar graphs that the sales drones produce.
My Hello World is 512 bytes. But it's also a valid Fat12 boot sector, Fat12 file reader, and Pmode routine.
Yeah, Intel is pretty much doing that with the instruction set - except that they aren't suing AMD for using their "new" IA32e instruction set yet...
ROFLMAO!
Good job.
People like to think that AMD is a bunch of guys working out of someone's basement. In reality, AMD is a hulking monster of a corporation. This is a company with tens of thousands of employees and 2.7 billion (US) in revenue in 2002. So, yay, one monstrous corpororation is better than another!
Too bad Intel doesn't have the self confidence and class to cheer for the competition, and *then* turn around and get back to the business of leaving them in the dust.
Seriously people, everything but x86 is Big endian, and we (embedded software people) have endian issues all the time. Wil there finally be 32 and 64 bit big endian instructions?
PLEASE SAY YES!
Slashdot's rate-of-post filter: Preventing you from posting too many great ideas at once.
I beg your pardon? He was reading the processor architecture manuals, not Intel's marketing FAQs. Do you read marketing FAQs as your main source of processor architecture information?
What you say is true now but AMD could do some real damage though by launching a series of commercials with some catch phrase (think "Intel inside") that plays up the fact that Intel chips are based on a standard developed by AMD. Something to effect of "Why pay more for a processor based on AMD's standard when you could be paying a lot less and using the real McCoy?"
Not exactly phrased that way, but you get the idea. It could be a real plus for AMD if they could find the right way to market it. Hence Intel doing the smart thing and trying to burry it for as long as they can.
Downplaying the announcement wasn't just to keep down the shame of following their chief rival, it was also to confuse those in the current market for a new server. From what I understand, Itanium/Itanic has been a serious flop thus far. What will the motivation be for IT departments to buy Itaniums now if they know something more compatible and better for them is coming along Real Soon Now?
Shame that the instruction set is such a horrible hacked-up-extension on top of a hacked-up-extension.
Can anyone think of [a] logical reason[s] why a new 64-bit processor mode couldn't use a brand new clean-n-neat instruction set/encoding while still leaving the 'legacy' stuff intact?
This is just one small symptom of many. Intel is having extremely serious management problems now. Intel hasn't been very humanistic in the past 15 years, and now the company is failing in many hidden and not-so-hidden ways.
I took the plunge last week and got a laptop based on AMD's Mobile Athlon64.
:)
For the next month or so, or until I see someone with a Voodoo machine (not likely), I can rest assured that my laptop is well ahead of the Intel curve
I used to be someone else. Now I'm someone better.
Real life is underrated.
...as a user of Slashdot, I've never seen a story that used so many CAPITALIZED WORDS. Note to editors: Wake up!
Slashdot's first reaction to VMware
>Yes, INtel is so bad for not mentioning there competitor.
No, they're bad for not mentioning in their PR/docs that they are in fact AMD x86-64 compatible. Okay, let's try this again: Being compatible == good, not mentioning that you are == bad. M'kay?
>Now, if only AMD could make a chip that doesn't melt if you don't have the heat sink on perfectly.
They already do, you ignorant git.
What is it like back in the year 2000?
Belief is the currency of delusion.
P.S. UN-altered REPRODUCTION and DISSEMINATION of this IMPORTANT Information is ENCOURAGED.
Your right on in your analysis but the key here is getting the marketing campaign going in time. If Intel brings the chips to market and is selling them for a few months before AMD get's it's act togather it may not matter. AMD needs to be the one to frame this debate or Intel will go ahead and do it for them and who's standard it is won't matter if that happens. AMD needs to advertise on price and the fact that it is now Intel producing a chip compatible with an AMD standard instead of vice versa. Timing is key. AMD has a real oppurtunity here to get a cool marketing campaign going and to gain some market share. It's theirs to lose. Intel made a mistake and AMD has the change to capitalize. If they can't do it now who knows if they ever will.
Whats the big deal with this? I quickly went through some AMD's Athlon PDF's, and while all of them mentioned SIMD/SSE and MMX support, I didn't spot any mentioning that those are actually technologies originally developed by Intel. And why is this? Maybe because Intel and AMD have the cross-whatever license on their technologies so they can leave all that out. Come on, who would voluntarily put their competitors name in their product sheets?
After all, its not either of them copying anything from each other, but just making their own product compatible with a certain set on instructions, while still using their very own under-the-hood implementation.
I think the real issue here is the new blood that makes decisions, to cautious, so they lag.
It appears they waited to see how AMD's 64 would be accepted.
I can't believe AMD would out engineer Intel unless some corporate mucky muck said to wait or hold off.
Check me if I'm wrong.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Why do you think that MS brought out a 64-bit version in the first place? Probably because if they didn't, the only ones who could claim the power of X86 64-bit compatability would be linux/unix/etc systems. Not good for Microsoft
Now if Intel released their own 64-bit instruction set... again everyone would be harranging how other OS's run it, but windows doesn't, and they'd probably have to add support to save face.
Since AMD followed in Intel's footsteps regarding instruction sets for so long, it's ironic that the first external set that Intel has used gets so much negative publicity.
In fact.. I can't figure out why Intel gets so much negative publicity in general (particularly on Slashdot). What marketing practices does Intel employ that are really so bad? Intel seems much more benevolent than a vast majority of companies. I certainly wouldn't say it's business practices are worse than AMD. Did AMD ever say: "Hey Intel, great job with your new instruction set!" And if you say that AMDs new instructions are superior, you may want to think about what the concept of 64 bit extensions really mean. Any way you look at it, it's a messy patch job, and it's not surprising that Intel wanted to avoid it.
I was once layed off from Intel, and if anyone should resent the company, I think I have that right. However, this type of biased slander is completely unwarranted. I hope you realize that AMD's marketing strategy relies on this type of 'underdog is always superior' mentality to gain market share. Intel relies on the 'the most popular must be the best' mentality. Which is worse? Buying into either one means you are the one that really loses. Seeing it as a front cover story is very disturbing.
http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=linux-kernel&m=107 730986829772&w=2
sorry about the double post
Ability to run all the yet to be released 64 bit software out of the box is a selling point. AMD, they're spunky. All my computers right now are AMD. They've got that fire in their belly. They're like Rudy, but incorporated. But Intel, they're Brett Farve.
You can't exactly interchange the brands of processors without changing motherboards. People don't care about what instructions are where, and who gets credit. They want their software to run. They want it to be fast and simple. That and that alone is what matters. Is that true for the vastly tiny minority that reads slashdot. Nope. But once we move the discussion out into the larger population, they're not significant.
Don't they make meds for Terett's (sp?) syndrome? Maybe this guy needs some...
My ghEtt0 webpage.
Linus sides with AMD rather than Intel because he agrees with their decisions. Every time he's complained about Intel he's had well-grounded-and-explained reasons.
INTEL WAS SIMPLY FOLLOWING IN AMD'S FOOTSTEPS.
Yeah, because EVERYONE knows that AMD had the world's first 64-bit processor.
Phase 3: Profit!
Phase 2 was Scrap Other...
This is an out-of-order execution post. Please re-compile for efficient execution on EPIC archtecture.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
How about not adding any more of your bias regarding submissions, especially in glaring uppercase? We do not care of your opinion of Intel's CPU technology. If you want us to do, submit a comment like everyone else.
We can make up our own minds. We only want the story.
THANK YOU
http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20021226. html
Either way, it only helps the consumer to have a standard like this.
>Intel knows this [...]. The only way this is probably ever going to go away is if every one is forced to write a C compiler.
Yes, because we all know how code-generation for IA64 is such a breeze.
Belief is the currency of delusion.
Jeez ... I don't claim to be half the programmer that Linus is, but I've never once had any confusion over what IA32 meant. It's just a freakin' NAME. It's meant to distinguish itself from other x86 instruction sets that *aren't* IA32. Get over it, Linus.
--Jeremy
Jesus was a liberal
1. go ahead and troll me..
2. stop being hippocrites good ideas are followed
3. This site is becoming such a basher site with buddies group hugging each other that it is anti productive.
Jeoin
Let's see Linus still has financial entanglements with Transmeta? So he's on his high horse say how bad Intel is, but no disclosure that maybe just maybe he might have a financial stake in Intel doing bad (good for Transmeta?)
/Awaits my first -Troll mod
I'll will don my flame retardant undies for questioning King Lord God Linus. (So often I have found that while the OS is open, the minds that work on it are not)
Besides when was the last time you heard any vendor announce using some else's technology? GM: Now using Mercedes safety features! Real world means sometimes you don't tell everything. Like that fact that you are commenting about a competitor to your stock options, but not saying you might be biased.
They simply target different markets, and I guess Intel figured that x86-64 will become a imporant factor in the desktop/multimedia area. And its these consumers that IA32e targets, so making the instructionsets compatible doesn't really seem like such a bad idea to me.
;)
And, they still VERY committed to IA64. Which will remain their platform for professional 64bit computing.
Why you feel that it makes Intel look bad that they are supporting AMDs platform in a platform aimed at gaming/mm/desktop usage(while having a pure 64bit instructionset for their workstation/server processors), I'll never understand
...that goes WAAAAAAY back, and hasn't changed much.
Remember when the 80286 came out? Remember the B-step '286, that Intel didn't want to admit had a bug in its flag storage until the B-steps were sold and the C-steps were coming out of the fabs? Imagine having your customers returning hardware for that -- how many trays of CPUs can you eat before you're Chapter-11? That's just one example.
There was an Intel seminar in SoCal where the Intel rep stood up there at the podium, pointing his pointer at the screen where the next transparency had just been put into the overhead projector and was being shown, and said, "Next, let's talk about Intel service"... and the whole hall full of engineers and programmers cracked up, it was that funny.
Lately, Intel has been doing TheRightThing[tm] more often, but not dependably. This is just another instance of where it's "funny so you don't waste your energy crying". With notable exceptions, Intel cares about Intel, full-stop.
Was that really necessary?
We got the point from Linus the first time.
He was posting his opinion in a mailing list. You're posting juvenile caps on the front page of a very highly-visited, corporate-owned tech news site. It just lowers the image of Slashdot all the more, and no matter how many times Taco professes that Slashdot is just a "hobby," it is viewed as the pinnacle of Linux community opinion and tech news by everyone else.
I know you guys already hit the bottom with the "Microsoft Violates Human Rights in China" article, but at least show a little maturity in the process of editorializing something. Despite typos and endless dupes, at least Taco only writes one- or two-line remarks. He would have said something like, "Most people know AMD was first, so it seems silly for Intel to behave that way."
I remember when compatability with existing platforms was a Good Thing.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Whip out the Troll mods if you must, but is Linus' track record with chips really something that qualifies him as an expert? Didn't Transmeta's uninspiring lack of success indicate he might not really understand the processor landscape as well as he thinks he does?
This topic strikes me more as someone venting a personal peeve, which is fair enough, but not really a newsworthy comdendation from an expert.
I used to wave the mighty intel flag and argue ferociously with anybody supporting AMD....until I actually tried an Athlon, then my song changed to fuck intel. What I'm trying to say is nobody really cares what the brand name is, its the performance that counts. An Athlon 800Mhz out-pacing an Intel 1.5Ghz is what won me over.
Wishing I was a millionaire since 1969.
All that is part of the x86(-32) instruction set that Intel developed and AMD executes natively with their chips.
Come on, I mean. Next you'll want me to break out the LDA instruction and make sure Intel gets credit for it separately from any other assemboy instruction.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
awegaewg
we told the drummer in our band to stop using the blinking cow bell. Or was that f***ing cowbell?
eh? hehe
/. Where the truth
It's not so much that AMD is "still following in Intel's footsteps", it's that AMD chose to remain x86-compatible. If that's following in Intel's footsteps, then Intel is following in Intel's footsteps too, I guess, because Intel sells lots of x86-compatible chips.
The continuation of adding on register extensions is great for backwards compatiblity but it makes the instruction set a mess.
But -- who cares? Modern CPU chips translate instructions into RISC-like micro-ops, and feed the micro-ops into multiple execution units. AMD chips can do a whole bunch of stuff in a single clock cycle, which is why they are much faster per clock cycle than an Intel chip. The pain of a wacky instruction set is isolated in the translation part of the chip, and doesn't significantly hold back the chip in other ways.
RISC fans predicted years ago that CISC would die, because RISC is so much better. But CISC chips contain RISC cores these days, and meanwhile architectures that were originally "RISC" have all kinds of special instructions for working with video data and such (doesn't seem so "reduced" to me). What really happened is that RISC and CISC kind of met in the middle.
And the old idea that RISC instructions would win because they are easier to decode didn't pan out. CISC instructions get decoded to RISC-like micro-ops, as I said, and it turns out not to be a huge deal. Meanwhile, those CISC instructions are denser than RISC instructions, so you fit more of them into your limited cache space, which helps speed.
In short, modern chips do all kinds of clever stuff, and the instruction set architecture is not really holding them back.
The sad thing is that a new cpu could have a compatibility layer that had a slight performance hit but with a lack of software supporting new 64 implementations people wouldn't buy it because the pretty little bar graphs that the sales drones produce.
If you want me to feel sad, you need to back this up with some facts. Show me why you feel the Athlon64 would be faster if it were not backward-compatible with x86.
As it is, the Athlon64 is already a sweet chip in 32-bit x86 mode (you know, "following in Intel's footsteps"). Then it gets better when you run 64-bit software (mainly due to the extra registers). Good in 32-bit, better in 64-bit... why am I supposed to be sad again?
steveha
lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely
Also, Itanium made a clean break with all the mode switching nonsense. There was no more real-mode to protected-mode switching, and no DOS compatibility. Also, no BIOS, or at least not like the ones we have today.
I assume that x86-64 will still have a familiar BIOS, and still come up in real mode (and run DOS). Maybe you even have to switch to a special 64-bit mode to take advantage of the 64-bit registers?
Anyway, I don't know enough about the new architectures to complain about Intel's switch. So I'll just hope that everyone switching to x86-64 was really the best outcome for consumers.
MM
--
By including this sig, the copyright holders of this work or collection unreservedly place it in the public domain.
I know its not the official name (sad that I feel I must say that)
I don't have to write a C compiler, because many excellent enough ones are already available. (Thanks, compiler writers.)
I don't have to write in assembly language -- see line above.
Because of this -- see both lines above -- I don't care about a messy instruction set because it really doesn't affect me.
And you shouldn't have to either. If you still do code assembly, this new twist has just make you an even more valuable commodity than before, and you should be asking for a raise.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Does anyone out there think that Intel has been planning this for a long time? Or at least this sort of thing? Why else would Intel try to secure IP rights to AMD patents royalty free, years ago?
Not that I really feel bad for AMD; lets not forget people, AMD started business doing exactly this sort of thing to Intel. Personally, I can't wait for nanotech to take off to the point where at least home fab facilities are affordable. Then we can design our own cores and forget this whole debate altogether. For those curious, there are already people doing that in FPGAs; its too bad that affordable FPGAs are an order of magnitude or two slower than best-of-breed processors these days.
On the flip side if you find that you suddenly need a 256-bit bus or 8 pixel pipelines, an FPGA can reconfigure itself on the fly for that. It'd be great if every program carried with it a set of core designs for the various subsystems, and could reconfigure them on the fly.
I would love to have a computer with 4-8 FPGAs on a PCIX card, a GPU consisting of 2-4 high speed FPGAs, and a nice big high speed FPGA for the main processor. Need hardware SSL? No problem. Hardware MPEG2 to DivX transcoding? No problem. Highly optimized pixel pipelines? Just send me the bits baby...
Its a nice dream anyways...
For those interested in trying something like that out on their own, I highly recommend http://www.opencores.org/
I am disrespectful to dirt! Can you see that I am serious?!
OK, Prove it: What was your previous stage name?
...can't resist...
this would be the first time Intel isn't owning the buzzword "compatible"...
but since the Caps Lock key on an AT-style PC keyboard is a non-momentary on-off switch, pressing both at the "same time" would yeild either a single "D" followed by a single change in state for the Caps Lock, or single change in state for the Caps Lock followed by a line of "D"s. Since the PS-2 protocol does not allow for multiple non-modifier non-momentary keys to be pressed simultaneously, your first assumption is incorrect. However, you are correct in that the shift key would produce the above string, irregardles of the status of the Caps Lock.
don't like what Intel did? don't buy their chips. end of story, no need for some overly-winded diatribe on a ml.
vodka, straight up, thank you!
This is quite possibly the dumbest thing to make the front page of Slashdot in a while. So because Intel didn't lick AMD's balls in a PRESS RELEASE, it's newsworthy? Hey, here's some news...
AMD IS SIMPLY COPYING AND FOLLOWING INTEL by releasing x86 compatible chips. Get that? AMD IS JUST COPYING INTEL!
Too bad you can't moderate the stories. This would would get a "-1 Completely Pointless" from me.
'Standards' in computing only impress those who are impressed by things like 'standards'.
The two are totally different. In IA-32e, the new 8-bit registers are called r8l through r15l. In AMD64, they were called r8b through r15b. Clearly, Intel is ushering in a new and exciting wave of computing technology.
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
Here, #9
Q9: Is it possible to write software that will run on Intel's processors with 64-bit extension technology, and AMD's 64-bit capable processors?
A9: With both companies designing entirely different architectures, the question is whether the operating system and software ported to each processor will run on the other processor, and the answer is yes in most cases. However, Intel processors support additional features, like the SSE3 instructions and Hyper-Threading Technology, which are not supported on non-Intel platforms. As such, we believe developers will achieve maximum performance and stability by designing specifically for Intel architectures and by taking advantage of Intel's breadth of software tools and enabling services.
What a crock of shit!
Not quite... you missed the fact that Itanium boots in the good old 8086-compatible real mode, executing 16-bit code through a hardware emulation. All the x86 wackiness is there on a corner of the chip.
Period.
Hey Michael, if you've got something to say, either make a comment about it in the comments section OR write a fucking article.
HI, MY NAME IS ISAAC.
ZIPPY the PINHEAD
Infuriate left and right
How the hell do you mark an article -1 Toll?
saying "AMD inside" ?
Or have silly adverts extolling the virtues of their latest chip.
It's nice to see an editor with a backbone for a change.
Trolls dont like to be Flamebait, because they burn so well. Protect our Troll heritage!
If you still do code assembly, this new twist has just make you an even more valuable commodity than before, and you should be asking for a raise.
I wish, but my managers dont even know what assembly language is.
I dont understand why so many nerds like AMD. I've never had any good experiences with them.
What pieces of shit! All kinds of compatability issues with my Lucent win-modems, Creative soundcards, and 3dfx or nvidia cards. Their processors also run *way* hotter than Intels'.
2 of uncles have had the same experiences more recently with Althlon processors. They both swear that they'll never use AMD again and neither will I!
My roomate in college had an AMD system that blew out its motherboard once a year. My trusty Intel P3 lasted all 4 yrs.
I'd much rahter pay more money and get reliable Intel quality. To hell with AMD!
The moon is huge, but it's small compared to the earth...
On most accounts, AMD is only about 1/8th the size of Intel.
AMD is somewhere around 10K people to Intels 80K people.
AMD revenue 3 Billion, Intel Revenue 30 Billion.
profitability: AMD cumulative profit since it's inception in 1969, somwhere around $150 million! Intel profit just last quarter alone, $1.6 billion!
it is so good to see that innovation is still alive in the marketplace. who would have thought intel would be so innovative as to license the AMD Hammer for their future chip lines? way to go, intel, raise the flag higher!
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
At least from a legal standpoint, both companies share the patent on the technology. I'm pretty sure that AMD and Intel both had input. Why else would Intel be able to release a 64-bit CPU at roughly the same time (not the Itamium of course). Did AMD have more to do with the design? Yes, but if they were smarter at Intel they would have taken some credit or at least tried to outmarket AMD a little better.
;)
That's okay though, I'm glad AMD is still in it. Competition is good and once Intel really starts cranking out X86-64 chips prices will go down. We all win. I'll be buying AMD though.
It seems the author of the article wished to place emphasis on certain words in the article. I contend that he went about achieving his end with the incorrect means.
HTML has provided authors with a means of deliniating emphasized content since version 2.0 and this means has not been depricated since.
The following is taken from RFC 1866:
5.7.1.3. Emphasis: EM
The <EM> element indicates an emphasized phrase, typically
rendered as italics. For example:
A singular subject <em>always</em> takes a singular verb.
This is the best way for authors to indicate emphasized content because user agents may then style the content according to a stylesheet. For example, a user agent may perform a text transform to all capitals (which would achieve the effect he created), boldface the content, or raise the volume of the content (for an aural browser).
It should be noted that Slashdot is written in accordance with the HTML 3.2 Reccomendation from the W3. Comments, since they are displayed under this doctype, should follow spec.
It is fairly well-known to insiders that Dave Cutler, chief software architect for Windows NT at Microsoft, approached AMD with the concept of extending the x86 instruction set for 64-bit instructions and data.
The motivation for this move was probably complicated, but Intel's slow-motion malaise regarding its IA64 strategy was no help. Microsoft needed a 64-bit platform that would gain wide acceptance before it devoted a significant amount of resources to drive Windows support on the platform to consumer-level quality.
Some even make the further claim that Cutler may have actually designed the instruction set for AMD and handed it to them intact. In other words, he approached them and said, "If you build a chip that runs this instruction set, we can guarantee NT support for it, and backwards compatibility with x86-32 will come for free."
AMD even acknowledges Dave Cutler and has a page with his information on their web site. If you do a search for articles, you'll find supposedly leaked memos mentioning builds of NT running on the new chip before it was even announced publicly (and hence before SuSe knew about it either).
You be the judge.
IA-32e? What a last gasp of despiration that the one true 64-bit Intel box will be the Itantic.
"They are basically taking all credit for what AMD has done so they don't look like they lost a battle (which they DID). If they had any honor, they would have done things MUCH differently."
Look for the new 'Intel (with help from AMD) Inside' label, your assurance of the quality and reliability you've come to expect from Intel (and AMD).
Actually, this came as a surprise to me.
I thought Intel would make a (slightly) incompatible instruction set and try to use their market dominance to force AMD into playing catch-up.
Guess Intel is not so sure of itself anymore.
For the record: I which AMD lots of success.
I hope the AMD386 days will re-live. Remember that?
On a differen tack: What _will_ Intel execs do to the testicals of that Itanium guy...?
Intel starts copying AMD. Lets see now AMD has provided more bang for the buck at least since Athlon came out. That means equal to better performance for less money. Intel's sales drop a small amount and the start copying AMD. Now if their prices start reflecting reality, this might be good. But I'll probably get another AMD anyway.
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.
It's not as if AMD would ever copy anything...
(Hey, wait a second, I used to own an AMD486....)
carrying compatibility baggage going all the way back to early DOS.(P> All these years I thought x86 was backwards compatible with the Intel 4004, and now you tell me it's actually backwards compatible with an old operating system! Well, I guess you learn new something every day...
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
this shit was just too funny.... i almost LOL'd in class. so funny in fact, that i registered to post on /.
god.
I think this is a pretty nice aknowledgement to the AMD developed technology from Intel. I have yet to understand why AMD is so sparse on servers when the reliability is as good/bad as intels. Now that Intel is jumping in AMD's track perhaps we will se more AMD cpu's in servers.
I think this is a big thing since i cant recall one single thing that Intel has used their cross license for up until now. Maybe a turn in events who knows. Any torch in intels butt is good anyhow.
HTTP/1.1 400
... he should go work for AMD.
Oh, my bad. I guess I (mis)remembered from an IDF presentation a few years ago.
What I remember is this: they were going to drop all 8086 compatibility, and totally revamp the BIOS by publishing a new standard for the pre-boot environement.
I wonder if they changed their minds, or I just got the story completely wrong? Anyway, thanks for the correction.
MM
--
By including this sig, the copyright holders of this work or collection unreservedly place it in the public domain.
It's meant to distinguish itself from other x86 instruction sets that *aren't* IA32. Get over it, Linus.
Like AMDs or what? Are you astroturfing by any chance?
There has never been any confusion over the x86 name. It came after 486 and pentium kept the same instructions-set at 386, where each previous generation had been "unique". So the line goes: 8088, 8086, 80286, x86, x86-64.
If that should look any other way it would be IA8, IA16, IA16+crap, IA32 and AMD64
Holy crap a pentium 64? What century did I wake up in to miss 5-63 ?!?!
I'm not sure if anyone will see this, but... AMD was not the first to 1 GHz. That should go to Seymour Cray, who had a 1 GHz chip back in 1994, believe it or not. I can only imagine what things would be like if he were still alive and happened to work for AMD.
bruce who???
I think it was really nice of Intel to actually use AMD's pre-existing instruction set standard, making life easier for EVERYBODY, and bad form and a bad example to set to criticize them for it.
-k. ^-^ ^D
Given crap like this passing the filter, does it actually perform ANY useful blocking?
Or are there just a lot of easy tricks to get past it?
I get false positives from just trying to post relevant snippits of Perl, whereas stuff like this, or the goatse fellow get through... *shudder*
That was precisely the point of the grandparent. Because you do not see the pain involved with using the x86 architecture, you have no incentive to change to a different one.
Intel would like you to change, however, because it makes their job of designing better chips (and compilers that support them) easier.
I don't know what good that would bring, but it's a nice thought anyway
And precisely my point is that at the high level there is no pain. That's what high-level languages hide from you.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
This could have gone way bad if Intel came up with another instruction set, totally incompatible. Thank God for that.. or actually M$ for announcing only ONE 64-bit Windows version. But if it wasn't for AMD, Intel would be milking the 32-bit cow DRY for 2 or 3 more years. This is why I always buy AMD - competition. And you should buy too! :)
A lot of consumers want 64 bit computing and 32 bit compatibility. I want it... I have several Athlon64 boxes already. Gamers very definitely want it. Intel has been able to maintain an edge primarily through fab (chip feature reduction) tricks. AMD actually has the better design and they have had it for over a year.
If you don't believe me then perhaps you are unaware of the advances that have made to the insides of cpus in recent years. AMD more then holds its own. Here is a URL ref describing the Opteron's internal logic.
AMD Opteron Architecture
Funniest article I can recall. I really liked the caps, too. Italics would not have been nearly as fun for me.
a,e,i,o,u and sometimes w and y (at be if of up cwm by)
If Intel made something completely different than AMD and completely broke compatibility you would all be screaming about that. Now they are acknowledging that AMD beat them to the market and defined the standard, and when they decide to follow it, they are accused of not innovating and following in their footsteps. *braces for moderation*
Pascal and Delphi are case insensitive, and while C, C++, and Java are case sensitive, they sensibly use lower case keywords. So why does WIRTH put his KEYWORDS in UPPERCASE and making OBERON and COMPONENT PASCAL so UNREADABLE?
Why does parent even have a positive score? The poster demonstrates a complete lack of having read what he's replying to.
Good point, and normally this would be the case but Intel are stuck between a rock and a hard place right now. firstly their x86-64bit is vaporware so the delay in developing new instructions would hand AMD an enormous lead in the market, secondly once AMD had this lead intel bringing our an incompatable chip would be itanic style sucide. I mean athlon64 is THE standard, CIO's aren't going to switch to a non standard chip which costs 2x as much.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
Intel has a 64 bit cpu out called itanium duh..
How is it they are following in AMD's steps.
So yes they are following AMD's lead by making a 64 bit cpu cheaply? available to the masses like AMD's except the one cpu from AMD is 700$
I don't see how they are copying.
Another AMDfanboi...
I have read about Michael's behavior before and didn't think it was a big deal. Today really pissed me off though. His antics are completely uncalled for.
I think that if the Slashdot readership can come up with some reasonable successors. We can flood Taco's mailbox and maybe OSDN to see if we can get some change around here.
With all the bitching on this site about enacting grass roots movements and the quality of postings/news. We should start a grassroots movement in our own stomping grounds to initiate changes we want.
Click Here Then copy and paste from below:
Dear Taco,
Please ban Michael from posting stories on Slashdot. If you create a poll with some new candidates to take his place, I'm sure the Slashdot readers would be more than willing to choose a successor. At a minimum, someone should put the proverbial muzzle on that bitch and stop her barking. Michael's editorial comments are not needed nor wanted in the front page.
As far as I can tell, Slashdot was intended as a forum for people to express their opinions about news stories. Michael can express his opinion in the forums like everyone else. I'm sure he could even create a second account, so nobody knows who is actually posting his blathering idiocy.
Thanks,
Slashdot User ID#
not Dell.
The submitter is both a troll and uninformed.
Aside from the inflamatory formatting of the text, AMD and Intel almost certainly cross-license their patents, as is par for most big technology companies. It's just the only way to operate today. AMD swipes Intel improvements, and Intel swipes AMD improvements. Why do you think the two are so similar in performance?
Finally, "stealing" an instruction set is ridiculous. For Chrissake, an instruction set gives you very little. If AMD couldn't have "stolen" the IA32 instruction set in the first place, they would never have gotten off the ground in the consumer CPU market, since they would have had an incompatible CPU. That's akin to getting a program that can read another program's file format and claiming that the second program "merely follows in the first's footsteps".
Heck, I'm sure Intel has done some things that they shouldn't be proud about, but it damn well is not being compatible with AMD's instruction set or "jacking clock rates to fool potential AMD customers".
May we never see th
Except Toms Hardware and one other (it may have been Anandtech). They actually did verifiable testing and found they could not finish compiling the linux kernel without it crashing. Shortly afterwards, due to the noise made by these two sites, intel recalled the chip.
Just because they change sides doesn't mean they're following the advertising dollars. The early athlons did outperform intel chips. Then intel caught up and recently the P4s have been outperforming the Athlons. Now it looks like Athlon 64s will outperform the P4s. This happens.
As for using a comment directed at the AMD-fanboys as evidence, the AMD-fanboys are freaks and are far more biased than any news site could possible get away with.
Nerd: Derogatory term typically directed at anybody with a lower Slashdot ID than you.
bacome.
pethetic.
lmao.
hell? Why do I have to scroll bloody 1/2 down the page before I get past all the "funny" replies? Slash needs a filter for funny vs. 'pertinent' dammit, or perhaps something where a funny post isn't worth as much as one that goes into the details of the topic at hand...
mix_master_mike
vafrous
That's someone else's tech too...
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Well well well... looks like Intel has a case of NIH complex.
I am disapointed, have Intel learned nothing from Bill Gates?
Listen to how they weasel their way into admitting that they implemented the AMD64 instruction set:
So, "in most cases, yes" you can write software that will run on both processors (implying that they're implementing AMD64), but be sure to use Intel-specific features such as SSE3 so as to maximize "performance and stability" (i.e., Intel's market dominance).
First HP makes PA-RISC. This turns out to be a kick-ass architecture with a lot of room to grow. Years go by and Intel enters into a partnership with HP to develop PA-RISC into Merced... nee Itanium. This is good. Intel of course bojos everything up and many millions of dollars later, we have really kick-ass PA-RISC chips and Itanium 1 which nobody gives a rats ass about. Some improvement later and we still have some even more kick-ass HPPA chips and Itanium 2 and its ilk.
Then $SUIT_IN_THE_EXTREME Carly decides after buying CornPACK and Tandem to say F*** all common sense... we have this next-gen PA-RISC design called MAKO and our current Superdomes that outperform Itanium 2 (but shhh don't publish those results)... lets throw it all out... HPPA, MIPS (Himalaya), Alpha, yes all the good processor technology we own... to be dependent on Intel who has no prior experience with 64 bits other than our partnership that makes crappy chips and bet the farm on Intel as being the bomb diggity of 64-bitness.
Now Intel realizes... WE GOOFED big time. WE HUFFED the SCO crack-pipe... lets make x86-64 (one big head smack for the obvious not occurring to them earlier, and another one for extending the life of x86 even farther). WHERE does this leave both Intel (with IBM and POWER4/5/6+ spanking their asses back to the stone age) and poor (NOT) HP who bet the farm on Itanic 2... ?
Oh this is too good.
I hope they both sink in the same boat.
and for AMD's sake I hope they add a fs*ckin thermistor to their procs so if the heat sink is loose they don't smoke themselves... (fsckin unacceptable).
All your customers are belong to us?
On Cnet it says that Intel has a 82.8% market share, while AMD has mearly 15.5%.
http://news.com.com/2100-1006_3-5152255.html
So score one for AMD they are really getting to Intel... err wait... nevermind.
And for the fanboys, please remember that AMD did not invent 64bit computing. Most people that buy the desktop 64bit chips don't even understand what a 64bit processer implies, they just think, "w0w d00dz m4 AMD 1s t3h l33t!!11 rAwX0rz!111!!one1.
bcefghijklnopqrstuvwxyz
PCI itself is little-endian.
Put all your other devices in little-endian
mode and be happy.
Alpha -- normally little-endian
ARM -- many versions are little-endian
MIPS -- set by the motherboard
PowerPC -- set by software (2 styles)
SPARC64 -- set via the page tables
I've done this for PowerPC. For an IBM 4xx CPU,
you set a bit in the page table entry. For the
Motorolla 7xx and 74xx chips, you set two bits
in the MSR, plus for easy driver writing you
do a 64-bit byte swap on the CPUs bus.
If they don't test it they can't guarantee it.
They wouldn't test compatibility, they'd just test that software runs on it.
And once Intel sells 10 times as many as AMD could hope to sell, who's compatible will be a question AMD will have to answer.
basically a Cyrix 686 with intigrated chipset, video & audio.
When he said most modern chips don't covert CISC to RISC, which is right.
Just look at the huge variety of server & embedded CPUs they use RISC, compared to the number of X86 chip makers, basically Intel, AMD, VIA & NS (that make a enbedded version of the Cyrix 686 with intigrated chipset, video & audio). Of course going by PC unit sales things would be different.
Incidently the VIA C3 is basically a ramped up version of the IDT Winchip II. VIA purchased Cyrix, which had a newly designed chip called Joshua. It had the fastest X86 integer unit (the 686 integer unit), combined with double the floating point units of the 686 (& each was a faster FP unit too), with 2 3DNow units too, so it was very fast in regards instructions per clock, but was hopeless in regards being ramped up to good speeds, which meant poor marketibility. But VIA bough IDT which had the Winchip, which was the opposite, it was a design that could easily be ramped to a Ghz or more, but was poor in regards instructions per clock, marketibility wise much better, It did also have the benafit of being power efficient 'n cool.
So VIA cut the Joshua & renamed the Winchip IIB as the Cyrix 3(b), eventually becoming the C3.
Well things went something like that.
Headlines are subjective. The article should be objective. Comments (opinion) can be subjective, and generally are.
Never has that been anyone's illusion.
The point is that there are two. Two is better than one since it promotes competition which leads to fair pricing and innovation.
I don't want Intel to lose... and I never wanted AMD to win. I want them to tie.
Now if only a viable 3rd competitor may enter the fray... dare I hope for IBM (Apple PowerPC/G5?)
what luck! it's compatible, puh ... :P
...
been having doubts lately using PCs instead
of apples, since they look so pretty
would have been quit a dead blow, if we'd get
a incompatiblity split on the PC, considering
IBM (PPC) being a mammut, and apple gaining
rediculous momentum
smart move overall on intels and amds side.
it's a huge herd but with fresh customers
("dad i want a computer for birthday") keeping
the sheeps compatible is better for the PC market.
The need for *binary* compatibility is artificial and sustained by companies that don't get with the opensource plan. Its from this that you generate a legacy tied to one architecture.
Any software written to a set of ABIs and available as source code (ie opensource licensed products) can be recompiled to different architectures without creating a legacy, architecture dependency. It is the future, and as people use Linux and opensource software more and more the advantage of binary comaptibility that Intel and AMD have will lessen, just as the weight of that legacy (in terms of architectural complexity) will increase.
Other factors, like java's virtual machine, provide even more architecture independence which will only increase with time.
AMD was successfully sued by Intel over their use of Intel microcode in their 386/40 processor, back in the day. AMD was forced to reverse-engineer it before they could resume sales. I remember, because my first IBM-compatible machine was built around one of the pre-lawsuit 386/40 chips.
I don't mention this to imply that Intel is some saintly company, only that both chipmakers have, um, "pushed the boundaries" when it comes to each other's intellectual property.
Thank you for observing all safety precautions.
Lots of people chortle over Intel supporting x86-64, like it's an embarrassment for the big guy to copy the little guy.
But since when it this new in the computer industry? Very little of what Microsoft sells WASN'T copied/stolen/extorted from some much smaller company. That's their life-blood.
Soooo, intel is trying to make subtle and silent the fact about 64bit computing.
:-)
I think it is good.
What will think John the Customer seeing "IA32e" ? He's taught that "number does matter", so he think that nop 64 bit is there. And just want someone to proove he is genios, making this conclusion himself.
So AMD PR is to help him feel himself supermind - and then he will start showting about lack of 64 in intel at every street.
And intel will have shout 'we have 64 too' - and no more silence.
PS: i wish there be Opteron DoubleThreading.
Maybe slots, like 1st athlons and P2 were.
Socket gives 2 memory feeds and 2 HT feeds.
Let ceramic case has 2 chips within, connected by inner HT wire. And then let each of them has one outer memory wire and one outer peripherals wire