I don't think it has been claimed that ARM is performance competitive with top-end expensive processors.
Obviously, Intel is going to introduce their best technology in the premium parts first, but Intel waterfalls architecture generations quickly. There are already 'value brand' versions of the Ivy Bridge predecessor, Sandy Bridge available and I'm guessing you'll see inexpensive IB gen procs by end of year. So there' nothing inherently expensive about Ivy Bridge, just the models available at this moment.
There's two things a shrink lets you do. Either add more transistor real estate (more cores, cache, cpu engines, specialized functions - basically more performance and functionality) OR it let's you reduce die size. (Or mixture of both) Reducing die size means more dies per wafer and since wafer cost is somewhat fixed. your cost per die comes down and you can more aggressively compete on price. When you imply the better process technology means lower profits, you're not necessarily right - you can increase your % margin even on processors you're selling for less money. Of course, to make the same or better profit, you need greater revenue (more of those lower price but lower cost parts sold).
MSFT isn't interested in Intel Atom phones. There is no Windows Phone build for anything but ARM. All of the 5 or so Intel Medfield Atom phones out there run Android. Where did you get the idea Windows had anything to do with Windows in phones?
US Federal Trade Commission is not likely to let either Intel (component market share ) or Apple (finished product market share, effect on direct competitors) buy ARM. Qualcomm, NVIdia, TI, Samsung and others would all be lining up to testify what havoc and destruction either aquisition would cause. ARM may be based in the UK, but I'm sure this would have to pass US regulatory scrutiny.
Canada, the most similar economy to that of the US, does so well economically in part because it's had a huge tradition of immigrant entrepreneurship for decades. Whereas the immigrant xenophobia in the US leads to incidents like a senior manager at a foreign car plant getting arrested for not having the right paperwork. If you treat foreign investors (who could put plants elsewhere) like that, what does it say to someone thinking of moving to the US to start a business?
under-performing the older "Sandy Bridge" is pretty damning to Intel.
In what category does Ivy Bridge 'under-perform' Sandy Bridge? It exceeds it in every category - esp performance per watt important in Ultrabooks - and is behind NO WHERE. Not living up to someone's expectations about how much better it is than SB is not the same as under-performing.
No, Tocks (Penryn, Nehalem, SandyB, Haswell) are new architecture, Ticks (Merom, Westmere, IvyBridge, Haswell-sucessor-on-next-gen-XXnm-process) are updated architecture on new process.
Terrible analogy given that there's no analog in the software for the alteration between manufacturing process and microarchitecture design steps that Tick / Tock represents.
How can you sign up for 4G with Canadian telcos Rogers or Telus? According to the announcement: "Apple's Tim Cook said. It will support U.S., U.K., and Australian English, French, German and Japanese voice dictation." So there's no support for Canadian French or Canadian English. I don't think Rogers or Telus are equipped to deal with foreign languages.
I think creative people use tablets and phones as convenient, lightweight, supplementary devices. But any musician using ProTools or designer using Adobe CS on a powerful desktop or laptop doesn't think an iPad is going to replace that.
Anyone who's been paying attention realizes that MSFT was engaging it's traditional Apple-envy by trying to create a MSFT iOS tablet experience (we create, you consume and buy) with WOA. Despite (at least on boot) laying Metro on both, REAL Windows (x86) is very different and can be used to do creative tasks.
MSFT wants what Apple has: APPLE: OS/X on x86 (general purpose computers) to create apps for ARM iOS (device OS) phones and tabs MSFT: Win on x86 to (general purpose computers) create apps for ARM Win8 (device OS) tabs (phones later) The money is in the consumption devices, so you focus on making sure the general purpose devices (computers running a real OS) have the tools to rapidly build app product for the devices.
Imagining the ARM ver of Windows be a thriving creative equal of x86 is typical Slashdot wishful thinking. A new, CHEAP fast, open platform that doesn't drive additional revenue isn't in any major player's interest and isn't going to happen.
You've got amazingly cheap and powerful x86 architecture that acquired a gigantic open ecosystem in spite of what the big players have wanted. Appreciate and protect this anomaly while you can.
Intel's new Medfield Atom will run Android phones and tablets, Tizen devices, Win 8 tablets and (if MSFT get's their head screwed on correctly) Win Phone. Since the underlying firmeware environment in the medfield platforms is driven by Intel's reference design, MSFT will not be able to dictate whether other OSes can boot any more than they can in the rest of the x86 world. (Assuming OEMs will be smart enough to let customers control UEFI authentication)
Apple's unwillingness to yield to 3rd party apps for core functions such as enterprise mail is very infuriating. I frequently need to send out updates to attendees on a calendar item and Blackberry (and every other email/call system on PC or phone I've ever seen) makes the process of sending an email to fellow meeting attendees very straightforward -but the iPhone ( iOS 5) mail client doesn't let you do this and even makes it very hard to gather all the email addresses in a meeting to copy them and create a fresh mail send. Now, I could understand if Apple followed the model of "we make dumbed down the default apps shipped with the phone and if you want real functionality, get a more powerful 3rd party app". But Noooooooo...... Apple has designated email as something others are not allowed to provide, so you have to live with Apple's belief that if they don't give you that feature, you don't need it and you need to reexamine your life to see where you've gone wrong. I miss my Blackberry. There's so much it doesn't do, but the core business functions and enterprise mail/calendar integration is still the best.
KDE and Gnome obviously yes, but Unity is one of the top 3? Just because most recent Ubuntus foist this on users (and most feedback I've seen has been negative) - is there any data to show that Unity has even 10% of Linux desktops? While Ubuntu is popular, that just means it's bigger than any other. My totally unsubstantiated guess would be that Ubuntu is less than 30% of all desktop Linuxes installed and of that, not all are 11.x gen and many of those users have installed another desktop. So... I would be SHOCKED if Unity is running on 5% of Linux desktops - does anyone have any hard evidence to counter this? I wouldn't be surprised if Enlightenment or Fluxbox had bigger install base. (I can't believe no one else has pointed this out)
One of the silliest ideas to come around in the last few years is broadcast HD. The intersection set between people who are dependent on broadcast TV (vs cable/telco or other wired provider) AND those who care about HD is practically NIL. Smartest thing to do is to leave those few users who are dependent on plain old fashioned low-def broadcast TV alone and not make them buy or use converter boxes they don't want and leave that old VHF and UHF spectrum alone. AND free up the HD broadcast spectrum (take it back from the networks) which hardly anyone is consuming and make it available for some real useful purpose. What SHOULD happen is wireless spectrum should only be used for mobile applications. Fixed sites should use cabled connections.
... that the customer for a SQL (or other) db is not the end user. Except for freakish entities like Facebook that write their own application layer that uses the db, most users have a commercial application which is really what the db is serving. For instance, an application tier software vendor will support MS-SQL or Oracle or MySQL or DB2 (or some combination of these) depending on end user preference. But if an end user decided to be clever and wants a next gen database architecture, they can't decide that for themselves, they need to ask their app vendor to please use and support the db we want. The app tier vendor doesn't particularly want to incur the costs of re-architecting the app to support a different db ESPECIALLY (horrors!) if you want a non-SQL db which will REALLY make the re-engineering painful and create two codes steams - one for you funky odd customers and one for the sensible ones that want to stay on an SQL db. So, you need a value proposition for app vendors to make this huge change occur. Don't try saying that the overall solution will perform better - from the app vendor's point-of-view, customers can fix that by throwing lots of hardware at it and (golly!) that also means more app tier system (cpu, core, socket or whatever) licenses for the app vendor. So existing app vendors are not likely to do this. This is only going to happen when the performance of app solutions (probably wholly new ones) that will use non-SQL dbs is so massively superior that insurgent app vendors threaten to displace the incumbents. Don't hold your breath for this though. There are lots of fine application solutions out there with many many person-years of code which are solving real problems and for a large enterprise application, simply having a much faster db backend won't overcome lack of features so the insurgent app vendors will have to be superior there too. Tough job. So. I'd bet on inertia (never a risky proposition) and assume that for large databases, non SQL dbs (or even new SQL entrants in the dbs market) are not going to make much headway over the next 5 years of so.
My DIY setup: booksized chassis Mini ITX formfactor H67 board with Core i7 2600K and 5750 graphics board, 8GB RAM, SSD boot and multi Terabyte spindle disk. On any metric (FPS etc) or subjective criteria, any games available as console and PC totally suck compared to the PC system. DIY game machines rule.
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I don't think it has been claimed that ARM is performance competitive with top-end expensive processors.
Obviously, Intel is going to introduce their best technology in the premium parts first, but Intel waterfalls architecture generations quickly. There are already 'value brand' versions of the Ivy Bridge predecessor, Sandy Bridge available and I'm guessing you'll see inexpensive IB gen procs by end of year.
So there' nothing inherently expensive about Ivy Bridge, just the models available at this moment.
There's two things a shrink lets you do. Either add more transistor real estate (more cores, cache, cpu engines, specialized functions - basically more performance and functionality) OR it let's you reduce die size. (Or mixture of both) Reducing die size means more dies per wafer and since wafer cost is somewhat fixed. your cost per die comes down and you can more aggressively compete on price. When you imply the better process technology means lower profits, you're not necessarily right - you can increase your % margin even on processors you're selling for less money. Of course, to make the same or better profit, you need greater revenue (more of those lower price but lower cost parts sold).
MSFT isn't interested in Intel Atom phones. There is no Windows Phone build for anything but ARM. All of the 5 or so Intel Medfield Atom phones out there run Android. Where did you get the idea Windows had anything to do with Windows in phones?
Wake up. There is native x86 NDK in the Android SDK. No need to emulate ARM native code. This has been true since last summer.
Nothing wrong with USB speeds, USB 3.0 is faster than Gigabit ( 5 times faster in fact). A dongle wont be degraded by the USB port.
US Federal Trade Commission is not likely to let either Intel (component market share ) or Apple (finished product market share, effect on direct competitors) buy ARM. Qualcomm, NVIdia, TI, Samsung and others would all be lining up to testify what havoc and destruction either aquisition would cause.
ARM may be based in the UK, but I'm sure this would have to pass US regulatory scrutiny.
Canada, the most similar economy to that of the US, does so well economically in part because it's had a huge tradition of immigrant entrepreneurship for decades.
Whereas the immigrant xenophobia in the US leads to incidents like a senior manager at a foreign car plant getting arrested for not having the right paperwork. If you treat foreign investors (who could put plants elsewhere) like that, what does it say to someone thinking of moving to the US to start a business?
under-performing the older "Sandy Bridge" is pretty damning to Intel.
In what category does Ivy Bridge 'under-perform' Sandy Bridge? It exceeds it in every category - esp performance per watt important in Ultrabooks - and is behind NO WHERE. Not living up to someone's expectations about how much better it is than SB is not the same as under-performing.
No, Tocks (Penryn, Nehalem, SandyB, Haswell) are new architecture, Ticks (Merom, Westmere, IvyBridge, Haswell-sucessor-on-next-gen-XXnm-process) are updated architecture on new process.
Terrible analogy given that there's no analog in the software for the alteration between manufacturing process and microarchitecture design steps that Tick / Tock represents.
Surreal in it's irrelevance...
Still waiting....
How can you sign up for 4G with Canadian telcos Rogers or Telus? According to the announcement:
"Apple's Tim Cook said. It will support U.S., U.K., and Australian English, French, German and Japanese voice dictation."
So there's no support for Canadian French or Canadian English.
I don't think Rogers or Telus are equipped to deal with foreign languages.
I hope they know what they're doing because I for one do not look forward to a PC marketplace dominated by only Intel and Nvidia.
Plus about 10 ARM companies. Intel has a bigger challenge now than AMD has given them for years.
I don't know what it makes you if you don't even own SHARES in a fab....
Only if you buy the inferior ARM Win8, not the real Win8, which is x86
I think creative people use tablets and phones as convenient, lightweight, supplementary devices. But any musician using ProTools or designer using Adobe CS on a powerful desktop or laptop doesn't think an iPad is going to replace that.
Anyone who's been paying attention realizes that MSFT was engaging it's traditional Apple-envy by trying to create a MSFT iOS tablet experience (we create, you consume and buy) with WOA. Despite (at least on boot) laying Metro on both, REAL Windows (x86) is very different and can be used to do creative tasks.
MSFT wants what Apple has:
APPLE: OS/X on x86 (general purpose computers) to create apps for ARM iOS (device OS) phones and tabs
MSFT: Win on x86 to (general purpose computers) create apps for ARM Win8 (device OS) tabs (phones later)
The money is in the consumption devices, so you focus on making sure the general purpose devices (computers running a real OS) have the tools to rapidly build app product for the devices.
Imagining the ARM ver of Windows be a thriving creative equal of x86 is typical Slashdot wishful thinking. A new, CHEAP fast, open platform that doesn't drive additional revenue isn't in any major player's interest and isn't going to happen.
You've got amazingly cheap and powerful x86 architecture that acquired a gigantic open ecosystem in spite of what the big players have wanted. Appreciate and protect this anomaly while you can.
Intel's new Medfield Atom will run Android phones and tablets, Tizen devices, Win 8 tablets and (if MSFT get's their head screwed on correctly) Win Phone. Since the underlying firmeware environment in the medfield platforms is driven by Intel's reference design, MSFT will not be able to dictate whether other OSes can boot any more than they can in the rest of the x86 world. (Assuming OEMs will be smart enough to let customers control UEFI authentication)
Apple's unwillingness to yield to 3rd party apps for core functions such as enterprise mail is very infuriating. I frequently need to send out updates to attendees on a calendar item and Blackberry (and every other email /call system on PC or phone I've ever seen) makes the process of sending an email to fellow meeting attendees very straightforward -but the iPhone ( iOS 5) mail client doesn't let you do this and even makes it very hard to gather all the email addresses in a meeting to copy them and create a fresh mail send. Now, I could understand if Apple followed the model of "we make dumbed down the default apps shipped with the phone and if you want real functionality, get a more powerful 3rd party app". But Noooooooo...... Apple has designated email as something others are not allowed to provide, so you have to live with Apple's belief that if they don't give you that feature, you don't need it and you need to reexamine your life to see where you've gone wrong.
I miss my Blackberry. There's so much it doesn't do, but the core business functions and enterprise mail/calendar integration is still the best.
I think you want to take that back. GM is producing good products now.
KDE and Gnome obviously yes, but Unity is one of the top 3? Just because most recent Ubuntus foist this on users (and most feedback I've seen has been negative) - is there any data to show that Unity has even 10% of Linux desktops? While Ubuntu is popular, that just means it's bigger than any other. My totally unsubstantiated guess would be that Ubuntu is less than 30% of all desktop Linuxes installed and of that, not all are 11.x gen and many of those users have installed another desktop. So...
I would be SHOCKED if Unity is running on 5% of Linux desktops - does anyone have any hard evidence to counter this?
I wouldn't be surprised if Enlightenment or Fluxbox had bigger install base.
(I can't believe no one else has pointed this out)
One of the silliest ideas to come around in the last few years is broadcast HD. The intersection set between people who are dependent on broadcast TV (vs cable/telco or other wired provider) AND those who care about HD is practically NIL.
Smartest thing to do is to leave those few users who are dependent on plain old fashioned low-def broadcast TV alone and not make them buy or use converter boxes they don't want and leave that old VHF and UHF spectrum alone. AND free up the HD broadcast spectrum (take it back from the networks) which hardly anyone is consuming and make it available for some real useful purpose.
What SHOULD happen is wireless spectrum should only be used for mobile applications. Fixed sites should use cabled connections.
... that the customer for a SQL (or other) db is not the end user. Except for freakish entities like Facebook that write their own application layer that uses the db, most users have a commercial application which is really what the db is serving. For instance, an application tier software vendor will support MS-SQL or Oracle or MySQL or DB2 (or some combination of these) depending on end user preference. But if an end user decided to be clever and wants a next gen database architecture, they can't decide that for themselves, they need to ask their app vendor to please use and support the db we want. The app tier vendor doesn't particularly want to incur the costs of re-architecting the app to support a different db ESPECIALLY (horrors!) if you want a non-SQL db which will REALLY make the re-engineering painful and create two codes steams - one for you funky odd customers and one for the sensible ones that want to stay on an SQL db.
So, you need a value proposition for app vendors to make this huge change occur. Don't try saying that the overall solution will perform better - from the app vendor's point-of-view, customers can fix that by throwing lots of hardware at it and (golly!) that also means more app tier system (cpu, core, socket or whatever) licenses for the app vendor. So existing app vendors are not likely to do this.
This is only going to happen when the performance of app solutions (probably wholly new ones) that will use non-SQL dbs is so massively superior that insurgent app vendors threaten to displace the incumbents. Don't hold your breath for this though. There are lots of fine application solutions out there with many many person-years of code which are solving real problems and for a large enterprise application, simply having a much faster db backend won't overcome lack of features so the insurgent app vendors will have to be superior there too. Tough job.
So. I'd bet on inertia (never a risky proposition) and assume that for large databases, non SQL dbs (or even new SQL entrants in the dbs market) are not going to make much headway over the next 5 years of so.
My DIY setup: booksized chassis Mini ITX formfactor H67 board with Core i7 2600K and 5750 graphics board, 8GB RAM, SSD boot and multi Terabyte spindle disk. On any metric (FPS etc) or subjective criteria, any games available as console and PC totally suck compared to the PC system. DIY game machines rule.