OSNews: http://www.osnews.com/story/19350/Secret_Recipe_Inside_Intel_s_Latest_Competitor Exploring the Future of Computing en-us Copyright 2001-2009, David Adams adam+nospam@osnews.com Tue, 10 Nov 2009 07:23:22 GMT http://www.osnews.com/images/osnews.gif OSNews.com http://www.osnews.com Transmeta http://osnews.com/thread?301191 http://osnews.com/thread?301191 repeat? Sat, 16 Feb 2008 00:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (halfmanhalfamazing) Comments RE: Transmeta http://osnews.com/thread?301195 http://osnews.com/thread?301195 Only if they decide to hire Linus ... ;) Sat, 16 Feb 2008 00:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (PLan) Comments RE: Transmeta http://osnews.com/thread?301198 http://osnews.com/thread?301198 Yep. What we have is going to take the world by storm but we can't talk about it yet! And now Transmeta would be completely forgotten if Linus hadn't worked there.

It's called "delusions of grandeur". ;-) Sat, 16 Feb 2008 00:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (sbergman27) Comments Ahhhhhh.... http://osnews.com/thread?301202 http://osnews.com/thread?301202
Although it has designed a chip, Montalvo has not yet produced a chip based on its designs.


So, what we have here is a theoretical competitor, and we won't know whether asymmetrical cores will pay off until the design is reduced to silicon. In theory, though, it sounds like a interesting idea to have a mixture of low- and high-power consumption cores on a single chip. Of course, I'm not sure what that means for locality and pipelining. Sat, 16 Feb 2008 02:36:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (tomcat) Comments Future Busines Model - Sue Intel http://osnews.com/thread?301228 http://osnews.com/thread?301228 "Small, secretive start-up lays plans to challenge Intel"

Here's a prediction. A few years after the hype has died down, their business model will devolve into one based on suing Intel for alleged patent infringement.

Ah, this brings back memories. Anyone recall the frenzied excitement when someone found the "secret" message in the HTML of the early Transmeta webpage?
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Yes, there is a secret message, and this is it: Transmeta's policy has been to remain silent about its plans until it had something to demonstrate to the world. On January 19th, 2000, Transmeta is going to announce and demonstrate what Crusoe processors can do. Simultaneously, all of the details will go up on this Web site for everyone on the Internet to see. Crusoe will be cool hardware and software for mobile applications. Crusoe will be unconventional, which is why we wanted to let you know in advance to come look at the entire Web site in January, so that you can get the full story and have access to all of the real details as soon as they are available. Sat, 16 Feb 2008 09:40:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Meridian) Comments a serious misunderstanding http://osnews.com/thread?301256 http://osnews.com/thread?301256 Montalvo's chips will sport a mix of high-performance cores and lower-performance cores on the same piece of silicon, similar to the Cell chip devised by IBM, Toshiba, and Sony, according to sources close to the company.

By merging asymmetrical cores onto the same piece of silicon, Montalvo can cut power consumption by dishing applications that don't require a lot of computing firepower onto less-powerful, more energy-efficient cores. Applications could conceivably also be shuttled to low-power cores after their need for high-performance elapses

Here the article implies is that a chip having is inherently like the Cell BE

but since the Cell BE is "asimmetrical" in that the SPE cores perform stream processing on data sent to them by the PowerPC Processing Unit, which should be the only general purpose one that can run PPC code and performs I/O to and from the other cores, it is a completely different thing
At least something NOT to compare a cpu with a mixture of cores having different performance levels ( but all compatible to the same ISA and able to run the same general purpose x86 code, as the ability -referred to in the article- to migrate lightweight, or idle, processes to lower performing cores, would imply )

The author would have done better by citing the relevant patent ("scalable performance multiple core cpu".. ) than to take the Cell as an example ... Sun, 17 Feb 2008 11:42:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (silix) Comments RE: a serious misunderstanding http://osnews.com/thread?301260 http://osnews.com/thread?301260
Montalvo's chips will sport a mix of high-performance cores and lower-performance cores on the same piece of silicon, similar to the Cell chip devised by IBM, Toshiba, and Sony, according to sources close to the company.

By merging asymmetrical cores onto the same piece of silicon, Montalvo can cut power consumption by dishing applications that don't require a lot of computing firepower onto less-powerful, more energy-efficient cores. Applications could conceivably also be shuttled to low-power cores after their need for high-performance elapses

[q]Here the article implies is that a chip having is inherently like the Cell BE[q]



[q]but since the Cell BE is "asimmetrical" in that the SPE cores perform stream processing on data sent to them by the PowerPC Processing Unit, which should be the only general purpose one that can run PPC code and performs I/O to and from the other cores, it is a completely different thing

At least something NOT to compare a cpu with a mixture of cores having different performance levels ( but all compatible to the same ISA and able to run the same general purpose x86 code, as the ability -referred to in the article- to migrate lightweight, or idle, processes to lower performing cores, would imply )


Your point is correct (your description of Cell isn't). However I think the author means it's like Cell in that there are a number of cores and they are not identical. That much is true but the analogy can't be taken beyond that point.

It'll be interesting to see what this processor can do, current x86 processors have to cripple themselves to get a low power rating and even then they are nowhere near low enough for the power ratings needed in smartphones.

If someone can figure out how to get down lower they'd have quite a serious advantage over Intel and AMD (and Via for that fact).

Don't expect them to be an independent company for long though, Nvidia needs to get into the desktop processor game. Sun, 17 Feb 2008 15:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Nicholas Blachford) Comments Oops. Forgot about VIA? http://osnews.com/thread?301261 http://osnews.com/thread?301261
Cyrix, Transmeta, Rise--none of them ever lived up to its advance billing. Only AMD has survived,...


Looks like they forgot about VIA. Ever since they hit the market with their Mini-ITX platform 6 years ago, they've been taking the x86 industrial, embedded, and appliance markets by storm. Granted they already had quite the successful chipset business, but tapping into the processor market was quite new for them when they bought Cirix in 1999. They've definitely proven themselves to be a worthy competitor in the "bigger isn't better" markets. Sun, 17 Feb 2008 16:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (CodeMonkey) Comments RE: Transmeta http://osnews.com/thread?301262 http://osnews.com/thread?301262 Transmeta is exactly what I thought of as soon as I read the blurb. Sun, 17 Feb 2008 18:32:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (KenJackson) Comments RE: Oops. Forgot about VIA? http://osnews.com/thread?301264 http://osnews.com/thread?301264 Very good point.

I wonder if Montalvo will produce a processor that draws low enough power to not require a fan, but has enough processing power for desktop use. That would be a seller. Sun, 17 Feb 2008 18:40:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (KenJackson) Comments Things are starting to change http://osnews.com/thread?301265 http://osnews.com/thread?301265 slowly. Although it's true people still want a powerfull processor, they also want a cooler, quiter, more efficient processor. It's the only way to continue with the rapid increase's in the number of new computers. Very encouraging news if they can pull it off, and it may force other manufacturers to sit up and rethink thier own paths. If they can get it to market, and if the ultra portable guys want it, they could finally end the need for speed, mines faster than yours era we've just come through.Eeepc proved that cheap works, maybe cheap and efficient is next. Sun, 17 Feb 2008 18:57:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (fasted) Comments RE[2]: Oops. Forgot about VIA? http://osnews.com/thread?301269 http://osnews.com/thread?301269
I wonder if Montalvo will produce a processor that draws low enough power to not require a fan, but has enough processing power for desktop use.


Intel's 80386 did that. Sun, 17 Feb 2008 20:06:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (sbergman27) Comments RE[3]: Oops. Forgot about VIA? http://osnews.com/thread?301296 http://osnews.com/thread?301296 I meant today's desktop. Not the 80's. Sun, 17 Feb 2008 22:41:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (KenJackson) Comments RE[4]: Oops. Forgot about VIA? http://osnews.com/thread?301297 http://osnews.com/thread?301297 The 1988 desktop was really about like the 2008 desktop... except for the TCP/IP stack and the constant whining by users regarding how they're unhappy with their fonts. Those are definitely facets of the 90's and continue into the 2000's.

What we need are not new processor designs... but new users. ;-) Sun, 17 Feb 2008 22:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (chicklet) Comments x86 decoding http://osnews.com/thread?301361 http://osnews.com/thread?301361 Just too much silicon has to be burned on x86 instruction translation. An architecture like ARM has a far better instruction set with a good balance of risc/cisc instructions which have very good instructional density and ability to directly execute. Smaller dies and lower power.

Well maybe they truly have some vast innovation...or maybe innovative patents at least... Mon, 18 Feb 2008 15:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (bnolsen) Comments RE: x86 decoding http://osnews.com/thread?301375 http://osnews.com/thread?301375
Just too much silicon has to be burned on x86 instruction translation.


The fact they have Transmeta people on board could indicate it won't be a native x86 but rather use a translation / JIT system like transmeta did.
That'd be one way to get power usage down. Mon, 18 Feb 2008 19:55:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Nicholas Blachford) Comments