04-10-2002, 12:05 AM
|
|
Contributing Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 8,228
|
|
AMD to enter PDA chip market
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/3/24758.html
Ok, we've received eleventy-two emails on this at last count, so we figured we'd better post on this. "AMD today launched a new chip, the first fruits of its recent takeover of Alchemy Semiconductor, and its first foray into the low-power PDA and information appliance CPU market. This is the Alchemy AU 1100: it runs on a MIPS32 instruction set."
MIPS? So, what PDA uses MIPS? If AMD wants to gain significant marketshare inthe PDA market like they have on the desktop, they would have to do it the same way, emulating the king of PDA chips, which is the ARM core that Pocket PC's and Palm's OS5 will be using. MIPS is being almost completely abandoned by PDA makers, save the Casio BE-300, and Casio has an ownership stake in the company they buy their chips from, so they won't be using AMD either.
I suspect their market will be more vertical, or proprietary like the BE-300. And the marketshare of the BE-300 is so small, I am not sure that is a business model I'd chase after.
If AMD wants to go after consumers and corporate IT departments, they are going to have to support Palm or Pocket PC, and that means ARM.
|
| |
|
|
|
04-10-2002, 12:28 AM
|
|
Thinker
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 400
|
|
I always knew you were a Genius! That is exactly what I have been saying since they announced their new chips. Hey maybe Hitachi will come out with anew SuperCool SH processor! AMD may how to use this new chip in the Smart Phone wars that are looming on the horizon, but I predict those will be mostly ARM based as well. 8O
|
| |
|
|
|
04-10-2002, 03:52 AM
|
|
Thinker
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 384
|
|
I agree ...
AMD MUST use the x86 instruction set to compete in the PC computer space.
Likewise, in order to competitive in the Handheld market, they must implement an ARM instruction set. Two years ago, they may have made a go at MIPS. However, the market has spoken and consolidated on ARM.
I really want to see AMD in the handheld space. A multi-provider market for ARM CPUs will improve the handheld space substantially. I believe that pushing MIPS at this point will only stratify the market place an burn through valuable AMD cash.
AMD please don't go against the grain. Switch to ARM cores.
|
| |
|
|
|
04-10-2002, 03:54 AM
|
|
Sage
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 792
|
|
Isn't it this chip is just a "left over" from Alchemy Semiconductor. Granted it is kind of dumb to release a product that you have to know would probably not be a large sell, I just wonder if AMD is just trying to hold up a little flag that says "we are doing mobile stuff." I would think if they made an ARM based product that Palm would probably throw it in their device. Supposedlytheir next gen is TI based, but I would think they might look for a more "main stream" processor name to try to hook some people on that. Microsoft is forever Intel, so I don't think that AMD really has that much room to grown in the Pocket PC market.
|
| |
|
|
|
04-10-2002, 04:13 AM
|
|
Intellectual
Join Date: Mar 2004
Posts: 116
|
|
eleventy-two? What number is that :P
|
| |
|
|
|
04-10-2002, 04:37 AM
|
|
Ponderer
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 100
|
|
Just to play a little devils advocate here - but why not MIPS? CE .NET is not ARM specific - in fact the ONLY thing that is ARM specific is PPC2002. How many PPC2002 devices are really out there - a pittance right now. It looks like they may targe .NET with this one (they even say that on their website), so I see no reason that they couldnt make the instructions backward compatible to enable all previous MIPS compiled software run compatible.
And as for Palm - backwards compatiblity will only be apps run on an emulator (so it really makes NO difference whether it's ARM or MIPS).
I, for one, am not going to believe wholeheartedly that there can only be one player (ARM chips in this case) in the PDA market (in fact I dont want one).
And I think that MIPS was "abandoned" by Microsoft - not PDA makers.
Aceze
|
| |
|
|
|
04-10-2002, 04:48 AM
|
|
Contributing Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 8,228
|
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Aceze
Just to play a little devils advocate here - but why not MIPS? CE .NET is not ARM specific - in fact the ONLY thing that is ARM specific is PPC2002. How many PPC2002 devices are really out there - a pittance right now.
|
Over 2M is not a pittance. ARM isn't Intel either. ARM is just a standard. If HP switched from SHx to ARM and Casio switched from MIPS to ARM for Pocket PC's, what makes you think AMD, who inherited this chip, could change the tide? Competition is good, but too many standards is not. I think it is fantastic HP, Casio, Compaq, etc. can buy ARM chips from a variety of vendors without making things more difficult on the Pocket PC team, the PPC dev tools, the hardware makers with drivers, etc.
Having 2M devices or 10M devices is really too small to justify multiple platforms just for the sake of doing it, IMHO.
|
| |
|
|
|
04-10-2002, 05:08 AM
|
|
Pupil
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 21
|
|
Don't underestimate
MIPS brings a lot to the table. a 400 MHz processor that consumes 250 mW is nothing to sneeze at. And like Aceze said, there's no reason to believe CE.Net wouldn't work on these chips. The other capabilites STANDARD on this chip are better than current ARM standards as well. And who says AMD is even looking to do business with Microsoft concerning these chips(altought that is most likely the case). I'm far from business savvy, but I wonder if it might be smart for AMD to team up with another OS player to offset the Intel/Microsoft alliance. Perhaps a Linux distro. Perhaps a UNIX distro. Perhaps Apple. There are many, many, rumors about on that last one, culminating in the "news" that June will see OSX running on AMD desktops. Wouldn't THAT be something! If that's the case, Apple would be a formiddable handheld opponent. They're style, intuitiveness, and understanding of sound hardware/software design would lead to a really solid handheld. Though they got a lot of bad press for early handwriting recognition(give them a break . . . they were the FIRST!!!), the Newtons were amazingly capable of recognizing even bad handwriting in late revisions. Better, many say, than the best current offerings for Pocket PC and Palm handhelds.
And let's not forget Symbian. That's a bulletproof platform that AMD could employ.
(like the devil needed another advocate 3
|
| |
|
|
|
04-10-2002, 05:10 AM
|
|
Pupil
Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 33
|
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Ed Hansberry
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Aceze
Just to play a little devils advocate here - but why not MIPS? CE .NET is not ARM specific - in fact the ONLY thing that is ARM specific is PPC2002. How many PPC2002 devices are really out there - a pittance right now.
|
Over 2M is not a pittance. ARM isn't Intel either. ARM is just a standard. If HP switched from SHx to ARM and Casio switched from MIPS to ARM for |
I'm sure you know Ed, but for everyone else, ARM is a company, not just a standard (the ARM ISA standard). They designed the ARM instruction set and they've designed a lot of synthesizable CPU cores for it. If AMD wanted to design and sell their own ARM chips, they would have to license the ISA from ARM. If AMD wanted to really get serious, they might want to just license a core from ARM, add on some custom features to set it apart from the StrongARM and start making them, I don't imagine it would take a lot more than 6 months to have chips out if they started with a complete core.
|
| |
|
|
|
04-10-2002, 05:15 AM
|
|
Ponderer
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 100
|
|
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Ed Hansberry
Over 2M is not a pittance. ARM isn't Intel either. ARM is just a standard. If HP switched from SHx to ARM and Casio switched from MIPS to ARM for Pocket PC's, what makes you think AMD, who inherited this chip, could change the tide?
|
Well, this is not quite right here - I dont think HP and Casio's switch was particularly voluntary here. Microsoft decreed, and HP and Casio HAD to move to ARM to preserve future brand mindspace with the PPC2002 devices. But .NET is a whole new ballgame - it is not going to be platform dependent just like CE3 wasnt. The whole reason CPU uniformity right now is important is for the next platform to have backward compatible software (dev tools will be upgraded anyway, so how much of a difference is it really going to be when you're moving to a MORE capable platform anyway - assuming no huge gaffes like the old MIPS compiler problems). I argue that the MIPS platform does have a backwards compatible market there already. There is no low level programming that needs to be redone to compile software to the different chip.
Oh and btw, ARM is not Intel, but the version that PPCs are using is. StrongARM is an Intel product - as are the Xscale CPUs.
Quote:
|
Competition is good, but too many standards is not. I think it is fantastic HP, Casio, Compaq, etc. can buy ARM chips from a variety of vendors without making things more difficult on the Pocket PC team, the PPC dev tools, the hardware makers with drivers, etc.
|
I dont think 2 CPUs are "too many standards". And as I said before, StrongARM chips are Intel only - so they cannot buy them from any old vendor. Even so, what really, does this change? I dont believe dev tools are a big deal - they were a big deal in the past because of problems never fixed that caused big disparities in performance. On an even keel - why should CPU matter? Compile for two code branches, make your installer aware of it, and off you go. In one fell swoop, Microsoft also makes sure all their eggs arent all in one basket as well (e.g. what happens if vendors find Intel chips too expensive, etc, etc).
Quote:
|
Having 2M devices or 10M devices is really too small to justify multiple platforms just for the sake of doing it, IMHO.
|
That's a bit of a copout. It's not for the sake of doing it. If that were the case, why does MS come out with all the various builds of CE that allow it to run on MIPS, SH, x86, Motorola PPC, etc? You cant argue there - the more platforms, the larger the distribution - obviously, in a market where consumers are directly involved, you dont want excessive confusion, but I do think that much of the problems stemmed from poor vision concerning the various original PPC2000 initial specs (too different in hardware speeds, dev tools were too slanted to the SA chips performance wise).
If you want to argue numbers like that, you could argue that we should never innovate and should be happy with all our 16mhz Dragonballs!!
Aceze
|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
Linear Mode
