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HP Introduces Final Processor in PA-RISC Family
The HP Way writes "According to an article on InformationWeek, HP announced the immediate availability of the 800 MHz, 1.0 GHz, and 1.1 GHz dual-core PA-8900 with 64MB on die L2 cache, the last member of the PA-RISC family of microprocessors. Customers with Superdome chassis can install Itanium 2 CPUs alongside PA-8900 processors."
My hope is that IBM does not make the same mistake as HP, but instead continues with their AiX/PPC combination on workstations and servers. We need variety in the UNIX market to result in innovation and improvements. With IRIX and SGI gone, Compaq and Tru64 gone, and soon possibly HP and HP-UX (there are doubts that the Itanium can fully replace the PA-RISC), the major UNIX vendors left are Sun and IBM. Frankly, that may not be enough to provide a sufficient level of innovation.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Ack, the flames, THEY BURN!
But seriously, there are far too many architectures around to keep running. Fine, perhaps the elegant ones with technical superiority didn't triumph over the cruder general purpose, but I can't imagine being a developer still trying to support a dozen processors. There is market room for at least 3, and possibly 4 architectures out there, and the fewer there are, the more software choice there is for each as developers are forced to move to successful platforms.
People who think they know everything really piss off those of us that actually do.
The point here is that the worst of all the CPU designs out there is the Intel one. Alpha, MIPS, SPARC, PA-RISC, POWER, PPC are all better designs. The reason they never really made the desktop is because they aren't Intel. This is the same rationale that lead to Windows, Word DOCs, etc being "the way".
It comes down to managers that don't know a damned thing about the tech, but making all the decisions on it. These other architectures had more growth potential, higher performance, and better overall design than any Intel chip released in the x86 line. The downside was mostly in channel cost. Since they weren't already abundant, they were expensive. If they were mass produced, they wouldn't be any different in cost than the x86 market is.
Look at how well the PPC is doing in the console industry right now. It was obviously a better choice than the x86 based chips or it wouldn't have been done. It obviously could be manufactured for the same price or less.
Two interesting tidbits. First, look into the iAPX-432 processor. Intel intended to kill off their 8-bit CPU line because in favor of that chip. It was 32bit, could do SMP, supported hot-swappable chips, and a host of other features. The 8086 was thrown in as a quick product to hold the company until the 432 was ready. Needless to say that the 432 never became popular as a result of the x86 line.
The second tidbit is that the Itanium actually needed an instruction set translator to run existing x86 apps. This layer was developed in partnership with HP. Intel *doesn't* maintain compatibility in their chips. They were trying to kill off x86 again, because it was a dead end.
Are people buying Pentium 4s to run DOS in Real Mode?
The frightening answer to that question is yes. There are still a plethora of programs in a variety of niche applications (machine control, point of sale, etc) that still run in real mode DOS. Many of these applications rely on hardware compatibility with the original IBM PC. That is why they still sell Pentium 4 motherboards with ISA slots.
Itanium's often laughed at for sucking; but in some ways Itanium was the most successful bluff every played in the tech industry. In much the same way that Reagan's Star Wars bankrupted the Soviet Union got almost every single competitor to fold.
Back at the begining of the project, Intel was nowhere in high-end & 64-bit computing. There was HP (PA-RISC), Sun (Sparc), Dec (Alpha), IBM (Power), MIPS (SGI). Intel wisely picked the partner with the stupidest management (Carly) to give up their competitive edge and announce to analysts that Intel's vision/roadmap is so AwSuM that RISC is dead and that they're going to follow the bidding of their master Intel for their 64-bit plan. Wall Street bought in to the story so much that almost everyone else with competitive chips folded their strong hands to Itanium's bluff - SGI spun off MIPS and MIPS decided to leave the hgh-end space. Compaq undervalued Alpha and let it die. Sun tried to become a software company and if it weren't for Fujitsu making modern sparcs, sparc would be dead.
Basically, with nothing but PR and Carly's stupidity, Intel wiped out over half of the high-end computing processor market.
Thankfully AMD had the vision to see through the bluff, and saw the opportunity for 64-bit computing that worked; and thankfully IBM didn't have someone like Carly around so they saw the value in retaining competitive advantaces; or the computing world would be pretty bleak place right now..