In article <6vp8rc$r8p$1@nntp.Stanford.EDU>, Mark Willey <willey@keymaster.etla.net> wrote: >Ken <landau@ymail.yu.edu> wrote: >: I agree that StrongARM is going nowhere. Intel bought it and will >: basically kill it. > >I am going more lukewarm on my "Intel will starve StrongArm" prediction. >Intel thinks StrongArm will hedge their bets in the sub-500 PC. So they >have to give it some room to grow. But I am aware of the "protect the x86 >PC" mentality that goes on there. Reason I am downgrading my prediciton is >that the SA-1101 companion chip has got a USB host controller in it. That >makes it a much more viable machine, IMHO. The x86 doesn't need Intel to protect it. It is very well protected by 20 years of evolution of x86-based software, hardware, and culture. That's a substantial head start for any competing architecture to catch up with. Other platforms with a nontrivial cultural head start include Sparc and to a lesser extent MIPS. The StrongArm's supposed advantage is a better performance-to-power ratio. If that advantage is intrinsic to its architecture then it may eventually overcome its competitors' big head starts (but when?). The more likely scenario is that equally low-powered high-performance x86, Sparc, and MIPS chips will start appearing and the StrongArm community won't grow large and fast enough to create a comparably rich culture because the vast majority will be content with the low-powered versions of what they've been using all along. And the coup de grace will be that the StrongArm architecture, whether owned by Intel or anyone else making rational choices about how to deploy their development dollars, won't command the resources needed to keep pace with the market-driven plummeting power requirements of the more entrenched platforms. The StrongArm will end up power-hungrier than its rivals. Vaughan Pratt
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