Saturn, you hit the nail right on the head:
<Which model will Merced based systems follow ? It looks like a combination of both.>
Intel is designing two different commodity platforms for Merced:
1) Lion: 4-way 460GX system, tons of memory and PCI buses
2) Big Sur: 2-way 460GX system, AGP-4x port, single-motherboard construction (w/ three daughtercards)
These commodity platforms will be your regular "cookie-cutter" stuff from Dell, Gateway, Compaq, etc.
In addition, Intel is licensing IA-64 and Merced to the big boys like IBM, HP, NEC, etc., so that they can build proprietary 8-way and higher systems. This way, Intel can leverage the high-end expertise from these companies in driving IA-64 technology into the enterprise.
Tenchusatsu |
