When China launched its first microprocessor, the Godson 1 in 2002, it wasn't much of a competitor to what Intel and AMD had to offer. The 64bit Godson 2, released in 2005, still didn't worry the Western chip makers, but the chip did start to pop up here and there outside of China. Expect to see a lot more of them in the coming years, as the Godson 3 promises to be a chip that can compete head on with the big ones: quad-core, eight core version in the pipeline, and 200 extra instructions aiding in x86 compatibility.
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Member since:2005-07-06
why? *everyone* tried killing off x86, including Intel. But it stuck around. They gave up trying to kill it and went for improving it. The new chips are perfectly fine. The design still has its downsides, but all chip designs do.
Besides, They are slowly morphing the x86 architecture into something completely different. Just give it time 
The new nehalem core is awesome.
Member since:2006-11-17
I believe the conditions are there now. Open source software has enough quality and momemtum to provide a very functional system on any architecture. Previously, market share did matter a lot. Nowadays, even if your architecture has less than 1% marketshare, you can have a lot of functional and quality software to run on it.
Member since:2007-01-27
There are very good reasons to be excited. The processor performs reasonably well and consumes little power. The x86 compatibility will not be hard coded but provided by a combination of binary translation instructions and software.
For example SPARC compatibility is going to be provided as well, if I correctly remember what I read on Loongson 3. For now I'm happy with my Loongson 2E desktop and am looking forward to new 2F based desktop and notebooks.
The single core 2G processor is going to be taped out soon and it's likely Loongson 3 will contain four of these cores.
Member since:2005-07-15
Member since:
2006-11-17
The gdium lberty 1000 netbook will have a Loongson processor: http://www.gdium.com/
Very low power consumption and no fan needed. It should have been launched at start of september, but has been delayed until the end of the month. I can't wait to put my hands on it. I want one now. This is the first time I'm excited by a new machine in years. At last a machine that does not hold us back with compatibility issues and history. Godson 3 looks very promising. I hope they don't waste too much power on x86 compatibility, because it's high time we start moving forward.