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#1
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Did Intel ever develop its own x86-64 a long time ago?
There was a rumour not so long ago, after Intel had copied the AMD64
instruction set that Intel had already developed and abandonned its own extensions a long time ago, so it wasn't really copying AMD. I think either Barrett or Otellini or both implied as much in some statements, which I can't find right now. Anyways this old article from around the time of the Opteron's original release, there was an interview with an Intel official. The official stated that they had investigated adding 64-bit extensions to the x86, but decided it was too difficult. "Despite the advantages, converting a 32-bit machine into a 64-bit one isn't easy. Four separate design teams at Intel examined how the company could take one of its 32-bit chips and transform it into a 64-bit machine, said Richard Wirt, another senior fellow at Intel. After running simulations, all four teams concluded that such a transition wouldn't be economically feasible, he said." http://news.com.com/2100-1001-985432.html Obviously the following year after this article, Intel changed its mind completely and added x64 after all. But it does show it had no active pre-existing research project into the 64-bit extensions, and it just followed AMD's design lead on it. Yousuf Khan |
#2
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Did Intel ever develop its own x86-64 a long time ago?
There was a rumour not so long ago, after Intel had copied the AMD64
instruction set that Intel had already developed and abandonned its own extensions a long time ago, so it wasn't really copying AMD. That's not a rumor. I think either Barrett or Otellini or both implied as much in some statements, which I can't find right now. It wasn't just them. Anyways this old article from around the time of the Opteron's original release, there was an interview with an Intel official. The official stated that they had investigated adding 64-bit extensions to the x86, but decided it was too difficult. I really hope you don't believe everything you read. "Despite the advantages, converting a 32-bit machine into a 64-bit one isn't easy. Four separate design teams at Intel examined how the company could take one of its 32-bit chips and transform it into a 64-bit machine, said Richard Wirt, another senior fellow at Intel. After running simulations, all four teams concluded that such a transition wouldn't be economically feasible, he said." http://news.com.com/2100-1001-985432.html He's toeing the party line here, converting to 64b isn't that hard. The P4 made it a bit harder...but hardly impossible. Intel probably decided not to go down this route because they wanted folks to use IPF and because it didn't make sense to push desktop x86 to 64b. Now, that might have been a good differentiating feature for Xeons versus Pentiums, but I think it's too much of a change to be feasible between what are largely similar cores. Moreover, you should see the large hole in your theory: Intel might have more than 4 design teams. Oops, suddenly Wirt's statement isn't as insightful. Obviously the following year after this article, Intel changed its mind completely and added x64 after all. But it does show it had no active pre-existing research project into the 64-bit extensions, and it just followed AMD's design lead on it. No, they really did...a long time back. I can't speak for Wirt or any executives, but I know people who worked on 64 bit extensions to x86 that were canned. You're obviously entitled to believe what ever you want, but your conclusions are wrong. DK |
#3
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Did Intel ever develop its own x86-64 a long time ago?
Wasn't that the imfamous "Yamhill" project?
There's certainly a ton of old stuff still on the web about it. |
#4
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Did Intel ever develop its own x86-64 a long time ago?
gaf1234567890 wrote: Wasn't that the imfamous "Yamhill" project? There's certainly a ton of old stuff still on the web about it. No Yamhill was Intel's reverse engineering of AMD's x86-64 spec. What I am talking about is before Yamhill. DK |
#5
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Did Intel ever develop its own x86-64 a long time ago?
On Fri, 03 Feb 2006 00:00:34 -0500, Yousuf Khan
wrote: There was a rumour not so long ago, after Intel had copied the AMD64 instruction set that Intel had already developed and abandonned its own extensions a long time ago, so it wasn't really copying AMD. I think either Barrett or Otellini or both implied as much in some statements, which I can't find right now. Anyways this old article from around the time of the Opteron's original release, there was an interview with an Intel official. The official stated that they had investigated adding 64-bit extensions to the x86, but decided it was too difficult. "Despite the advantages, converting a 32-bit machine into a 64-bit one isn't easy. Four separate design teams at Intel examined how the company could take one of its 32-bit chips and transform it into a 64-bit machine, said Richard Wirt, another senior fellow at Intel. After running simulations, all four teams concluded that such a transition wouldn't be economically feasible, he said." Of course it "wouldn't be economically feasible" because it would sink Itanic - just as we are witnessing today. With all the billions of investment sinking with it. http://news.com.com/2100-1001-985432.html Obviously the following year after this article, Intel changed its mind completely and added x64 after all. But it does show it had no active pre-existing research project into the 64-bit extensions, and it just followed AMD's design lead on it. Was it pre-existing Yamhill design with some tweaks to get it compatible with AMD instruction set, or just a rush copy job (call it reverse-engineering of AMD64 or whatever) - doesn't matter at this point. Now AMD64 is a fact of life, and most likely Vista will take it mainstream. Yousuf Khan |
#6
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Did Intel ever develop its own x86-64 a long time ago?
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#7
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Did Intel ever develop its own x86-64 a long time ago?
David Kanter wrote:
gaf1234567890 wrote: Wasn't that the imfamous "Yamhill" project? There's certainly a ton of old stuff still on the web about it. No Yamhill was Intel's reverse engineering of AMD's x86-64 spec. What I am talking about is before Yamhill. In the end, didn't Intel trade SSE(X) for AMD64? |
#8
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Did Intel ever develop its own x86-64 a long time ago?
David Kanter wrote:
Anyways this old article from around the time of the Opteron's original release, there was an interview with an Intel official. The official stated that they had investigated adding 64-bit extensions to the x86, but decided it was too difficult. I really hope you don't believe everything you read. You are really going to have to be more specific here. How far did Intel get in its design? Did it define new instructions, new memory models, lay down circuits, etc.? Or did it just run some preliminary simulations? From what I can see here, all they ever did was run some simulations and then declared it a lost cause. "Despite the advantages, converting a 32-bit machine into a 64-bit one isn't easy. Four separate design teams at Intel examined how the company could take one of its 32-bit chips and transform it into a 64-bit machine, said Richard Wirt, another senior fellow at Intel. After running simulations, all four teams concluded that such a transition wouldn't be economically feasible, he said." http://news.com.com/2100-1001-985432.html He's toeing the party line here, converting to 64b isn't that hard. The P4 made it a bit harder...but hardly impossible. Intel probably decided not to go down this route because they wanted folks to use IPF and because it didn't make sense to push desktop x86 to 64b. Now, that might have been a good differentiating feature for Xeons versus Pentiums, but I think it's too much of a change to be feasible between what are largely similar cores. Actually it was a pretty major feat. I certainly didn't think it was possible, either. They increased some things, and reduced other things; up until that point the x86 design was just a continuous series of adding stuff in, but never removing things. I didn't see them doubling the number of general purpose and SSE registers. Removing the segment mechanism. And they did this while still maintaining backward compatibility in the 32-bit modes. I knew if they kept the segment mechanism, they'd have a lot of trouble, but I never imagined they could actually decide to get rid of it. Moreover, you should see the large hole in your theory: Intel might have more than 4 design teams. Oops, suddenly Wirt's statement isn't as insightful. All Wirt said was that they assigned 4 design teams to work on this specific project. They're not going to assign all of their design teams to work on this project. And the 4 teams just did simulations, and then stopped. We don't know how detailed of a simulation they did. Obviously the following year after this article, Intel changed its mind completely and added x64 after all. But it does show it had no active pre-existing research project into the 64-bit extensions, and it just followed AMD's design lead on it. No, they really did...a long time back. I can't speak for Wirt or any executives, but I know people who worked on 64 bit extensions to x86 that were canned. You're obviously entitled to believe what ever you want, but your conclusions are wrong. But you don't know how far along the design process these guys got into. Yousuf Khan |
#9
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Did Intel ever develop its own x86-64 a long time ago?
chrisv wrote:
In the end, didn't Intel trade SSE(X) for AMD64? I think they didn't have to trade anything for anything. Intel's cross license allowed it to take AMD64, while AMD's cross licence allowed it to take SSE. However, AMD's cross license didn't allow it to take Intel's FSB, therefore Intel's cross license didn't allow it to take Hypertransport, either. Yousuf Khan |
#10
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Did Intel ever develop its own x86-64 a long time ago?
You are really going to have to be more specific here. How far did Intel
get in its design? Did it define new instructions, new memory models, lay down circuits, etc.? Or did it just run some preliminary simulations? From what I can see here, all they ever did was run some simulations and then declared it a lost cause. Unfortunately, I cannot be much more specific in public...since a lot of this information could get someone fired or in trouble. "Despite the advantages, converting a 32-bit machine into a 64-bit one isn't easy. Four separate design teams at Intel examined how the company could take one of its 32-bit chips and transform it into a 64-bit machine, said Richard Wirt, another senior fellow at Intel. After running simulations, all four teams concluded that such a transition wouldn't be economically feasible, he said." http://news.com.com/2100-1001-985432.html He's toeing the party line here, converting to 64b isn't that hard. The P4 made it a bit harder...but hardly impossible. Intel probably decided not to go down this route because they wanted folks to use IPF and because it didn't make sense to push desktop x86 to 64b. Now, that might have been a good differentiating feature for Xeons versus Pentiums, but I think it's too much of a change to be feasible between what are largely similar cores. Actually it was a pretty major feat. I don't really agree. I think the path to 64b was pretty obvious, and both AMD and Intel probably filled in the dots (so to speak) in their specs. I bet if you talked to smart engineers from AMD and Intel in...let's say 1997 about a hypothetical 64b x86 they would come up with very similar notions about what to do. I certainly didn't think it was possible, either. They increased some things, and reduced other things; up until that point the x86 design was just a continuous series of adding stuff in, but never removing things. I didn't see them doubling the number of general purpose and SSE registers. Removing the segment mechanism. And they did this while still maintaining backward compatibility in the 32-bit modes. I knew if they kept the segment mechanism, they'd have a lot of trouble, but I never imagined they could actually decide to get rid of it. Keeping segments in 64b would have been retarded. I wouldn't have done it, and if I could figure that out, I'm sure Intel and AMD could. Moreover, you should see the large hole in your theory: Intel might have more than 4 design teams. Oops, suddenly Wirt's statement isn't as insightful. All Wirt said was that they assigned 4 design teams to work on this specific project. They're not going to assign all of their design teams to work on this project. And the 4 teams just did simulations, and then stopped. We don't know how detailed of a simulation they did. His statement also doesn't rule out that the fact that another team might have gone a lot farther. Let's just pretend for a second, suppose one of the teams found that it was a great idea to go to 64b and would improve performance, cure cancer, end world hunger etc. Now, suppose someone said: "this will kill Itanium" and Intel therefore decided x86 should be 32b as a result. Do you expect someone from Intel to say "We decided not to pursue x86 for marketing reasons relating to IA64?" in public? Maybe 20-30 years from now, but not in 2003. No, they really did...a long time back. I can't speak for Wirt or any executives, but I know people who worked on 64 bit extensions to x86 that were canned. You're obviously entitled to believe what ever you want, but your conclusions are wrong. But you don't know how far along the design process these guys got into. I know a bit; not a lot, but I can't really share a lot of that information. DK |
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