It would appear that AMD is going to use DDR400 for A64.

[Thunderbird1GHz]

yea but no one wants an a64 at 1.6GHz that matches a stock 2.4GHz pentium4 when Intel has prescotts or pentium5's at 4GHz LOL. Also many gamers have tbreds past 2GHz and mine will too be past 2GHz when I get better cooling. the a64's just lack raw MHz

[irwincur]

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/cpu/di...0625113439.html

Did you read the entire article. The 'clawhammer' will not be successful because it will be replaced very soon by the .09u core. It will not be because they are bad chips and underperformers. The author (who I would suggest is rather shallow and twisted a bit towards Intel) also claims the A64 to be a 'hot babe' at 89w dissapation. The reality is that the Opteron and Clawhammer are designed (as an architecture) to max at 89w and the early processors are nowhere near that. Early this year - about a month before launch - AMD was taking the HSF off of an operating Opteron during use to show that it is thermally very capable. The author also fails to mention that Intel has a 'hot babe' in the 'C' series with 100w max heat dissapation.

About the memory issue. Sure there may be only one 'officially supported PC3200 brand', but official support rarely means much to consumers. How many of you are using 'official' heat sinks or RAM right now. Additionally the author fails to mention that these lists tend to take a while to build as the parts and components are put through the paces and tested for maximum compliance.

[Galen of Edgewood]

Originally posted by Moridin
... or the Atari Jaguar lost out to just about everything?

Well, remember it was only considered a 64-bit system because it was running 4 16-bit processors in it. It wasn't a true 64-bit system.

[EverlastingGod]

The main selling point is the compatibility with 32-bit x86. Let's look at the transition from 32 to 64 bit apps.

Slow transition, very few apps use the 64-bits - Unless there is a killer 64-bit app, 64-bit compatibility means very little, can just go with a faster pure 32-bit processor.

Medium transition, good mix of 32-bit and 64-bit apps - A64 would do well here.

Fast transition, most popular and new apps go to 64-bits fast - Unless there is still a killer 32-bit app, 32-bit compatibility means very little, can just go with a faster pure 64-bit processor.

At a slow or fast adoption rates for 64-bits A64 must be an extremely fast 32-bit or 64-bit processor respectively. With a medium adoption rate, A64 should do ok. Gut feeling is a slow transition since, in general, apps take a while to catch up with the newest technology and the need for 64-bits over 32-bits is not too apparent. This is not good for AMD because with a slow transition Intel will most likely have faster pure 32-bit processors.

[EverlastingGod]

Originally posted by Galen of Edgewood


Well, remember it was only considered a 64-bit system because it was running 4 16-bit processors in it. It wasn't a true 64-bit system.

Yes, but the target audience was oblivious to this fact and they are talking about marketing bits as a selling point. It was marketed as "64-bits!!!". And as I mentioned before, let's not forget about that 128-bit DreamCast too...

[Moridin]

Originally posted by irwincur


The problem is back then less than 1/100,000th fewer of them were being used. Also there were about 1/1,000th less applications for computers of all types existed. Sometime around 1997 to 1998 computer use rose dramatically for the first time. Prior to that period computer were used at work and in a small minority of home for simple apps such as spreadsheets and word processing.

But how does that change the needs of the people that are using computers? It would not change my needs one bit if instead of millions of people only a few thousand used internet explorer, word, the games I play, etc. The number of people using PCs doesn’t change what they use them for.

Originally posted by irwincur

Sure there were the databases but at that time ATMs were just getting popular. Every year since has seen an explosion of users an apps, think of everyday things that within the next five years will be computer based. All of your finances, appliances, medical systems, transportation system, communications, networks, internet etc

Many of these have been automated at the back end for decades, the new thing is that users can get some access to these backend systems over the internet.

Originally posted by irwincur

The argument is that computing now is different than it was fifteen years ago. Not just on its face, but to its core, there are fundamental differences, and if you argue that you are stuck in the past.

In what way? IMO the basic tasks being performed by uses hasn't changed much at all in the last 15 years. A few new things like web browsing have arrived, but even instant messaging existed in a limited for 2 decades ago.

Originally posted by irwincur

I work for a relatively small company and some of our database systems are quickly running into the 32 bit wall. I would say that there are literally millions of companies out there around the world that are in the same situation that we are.

A properly configured database can support thousands of users with less then 4 GB of memory. I can't imagine a small company going past this limit, and if you do the software costs are easily high enough to justify 64-bit hardware from Sun, HPQ, IBM etc. The real bottleneck for a busy database is disk and I/O. If you have huge amounts of traffic it may pay off to have the entire database in memory, but if you are that busy you shouldn't be running X86 hardware at all. In any case disk is sill likely to be the bottleneck as transactions should still be logged before they are considered complete.

[irwincur]

But how does that change the needs of the people that are using computers? It would not change my needs one bit if instead of millions of people only a few thousand used internet explorer, word, the games I play, etc. The number of people using PCs doesn’t change what they use them for.

I am not talking of personal needs, but needs as a society. Computing is not the same that it was last year, let alone a decade and a half ago. Your needs with a computer have definitely changed since 1988. You now use the Internet, you may bank online, you play games which just ten years ago could only exist on super computers, you use a GUI that requires more resources than ever before, you need more RAM than all of the computers in existance in 1980 had combined. Just a few things that have changed. In just the last five years these changes have only accelerated as adoption of the net and true everyday computing rise. I was talking about new appliances, phones, watches, TVs, entertainment systems, the Internet, all tied into on large network. The world is massive quanities data, this data needs to be managed with new technology - it is what drives technology. Intel would not have made the itanium if the world was not moving directly towards a 64 bit need.

Tell me that you do less with your computer now than you did three years ago, tell me that your computer is not twice as powerful as it was, or that the software you are using has taken a step backwards.

Many of these have been automated at the back end for decades, the new thing is that users can get some access to these backend systems over the internet.

Sure for decades they had a few million users. In the last three years Internet banking and the ATM explosion has accounted for a massive new need. Some number, just ATM machine, not online credit transactions, online sales (not only consumer but business)...

ATM machines in 1995, 122,000, in 1999, 230,000, est in 2003, 300,000.
That is just in America, in the world there are over 1,000,000 right now. With over 15 billion transactions in the US alone that number is close to 60 billion worldwide. Just one simple example as to how the world is changing.

Take GM, the worlds largest e-commerce company. Every part they make, order, sell, or dispose of is run though their Intranet. It is estimated that GMs intranet has as much traffic at any given time as 1/3 of the entire Internet. There are literally millions of transactions per hour that must be stored and recorded. This did not exist five years ago, this is a new need for massive data processing.

And GM is just one company, the world has literally 1000 more just like it and 1000 more waiting to be just like it. Not to mention the worlds militaries and governments.

In what way? IMO the basic tasks being performed by uses hasn't changed much at all in the last 15 years. A few new things like web browsing have arrived, but even instant messaging existed in a limited for 2 decades ago.

Look above, the very basic and core uses for computers have revolutioniaed the world. Corporations have gone global, borders are almost non existant, 3D games rival billion dollar military simulators. There has been no change?

All I am saying is that the growth of computers and innovation in the 1990s and beyond has been nothing short of exponential. It even outpaces good old Moores Law in certain instances. My argument is that while a 32 bit to 64 bit transition will not happen overnight, it definitely will not take 15 years. I would be willing to put large sums of money on that.

[EverlastingGod]

This has more to do with the bandwidth of communication equipment than 64-bit processors.

[irwincur]

Databases my friend, that is what it will all be about. Your life, your money, everything will eventually be all bits and bytes. It will have to be stored and processed somewhere.

[EverlastingGod]

Databases is already an area where you'd find 64-bit cpus. Where's the expansion into other areas?

[Moridin]

Originally posted by Galen of Edgewood


Well, remember it was only considered a 64-bit system because it was running 4 16-bit processors in it. It wasn't a true 64-bit system.

No, it was a fully 64-bit machine, in fact it had 3 fully programmable processors in it. It booted from a 16 bit processor, but as soon as that was done it turned control over to it's 3 64-bit processors. (1 graphics, 1 audio, 1 general purpose if I'm not mistaken.) The count is still 4 processors, but only one of those is 16-bit.

This isn't altogether different from the BIOS on today's system which if I'm not mistaken runs in 16-bit real mode before turning control over to the OS which controls things from there. An even better comparison may be the service processor found in many servers. If I'm not mistaken, most Opteron servers have a 32-bit PPC processor filling this role.

[Moridin]

Originally posted by irwincur

Intel would not have made the itanium if the world was not moving directly towards a 64 bit need.

There is definitely a need for 64-bit computing on servers, but even there the vast majority of servers are ok with 32 (36) bit addressing. Where 64-bits is requires, it already exists. What does this have to do with people demanding 64-bit computers for their desktop?

Originally posted by irwincur


Tell me that you do less with your computer now than you did three years ago, tell me that your computer is not twice as powerful as it was, or that the software you are using has taken a step backwards.

I don't do any more then I did 3 years ago, and hardly more then I did 10 years ago.

Originally posted by irwincur


Sure for decades they had a few million users. In the last three years Internet banking and the ATM explosion has accounted for a massive new need. Some number, just ATM machine, not online credit transactions, online sales (not only consumer but business)...

ATM machines in 1995, 122,000, in 1999, 230,000, est in 2003, 300,000.
That is just in America, in the world there are over 1,000,000 right now. With over 15 billion transactions in the US alone that number is close to 60 billion worldwide. Just one simple example as to how the world is changing.

Yes, but what I'm saying is that it's individual needs that drive a move to 64-bit computing, not the number of systems.

Also, This doesn’t mean that the number of transactions handled has gone up in the same proportion. Before these services became available people still made withdrawals, purchases, etc, they just didn't enter the information themselves.

Originally posted by irwincur

Take GM, the worlds largest e-commerce company. Every part they make, order, sell, or dispose of is run though their Intranet. It is estimated that GMs intranet has as much traffic at any given time as 1/3 of the entire Internet. There are literally millions of transactions per hour that must be stored and recorded. This did not exist five years ago, this is a new need for massive data processing.

Again, GM was purchasing parts and tracking them with computer systems long before the advent of the internet, so the rise in computing transactions is not nearly so great as these numbers would lead you to believe.

Another thing to consider is that there are 4 way, 32-bit servers completing 80 000 transactions per minute in TPC-C. This translates into 5 million transactions per hour from a single 32-bit server. Granted, TPC-C transactions are unrealistically simple, but it isn't out of the question for 32-bit servers to handle hundreds of thousands of transactions per hour, and if you need more then this there are already plenty of 64-bit alternatives. IOW, this doesn't support the widespread adoption of 64-bit hardware, it only supports the need for 64-bit bit servers, something we already have, and indeed have been around since the early 90's.

[irwincur]

Look Moridin, all I am saying is that there are more uses for computers now than there were fifteen years ago. There are also more complex uses. Sure a 64 bit revolution will not happen overnight, but the transition is not going to take fifteen years to complete this time around. After all it is starting now, within three years, approx 20% of the consumer market (about AMD and Apples share) will be on a 32/64 bit platform. That is a fairly rapid transformation. Not to mention an even faster adoption rate for servers, I would guess that they would be at double the level of acceptance. Mainly due to lower costs. If you have the option between what looks to be a strong 32 bit and a good 64 bit system rolled into one, for about 30% less than the leading, but underperforming 32 bit server system, which would you realistically look at first. Right now, there is no advantage to buying a Xeon other than the fact that Intel is stamped on it. That right there will be AMDs biggest challenge, and they will need IBMs help to do it.