The Intel/HP Merced project was set up in 1994. Not much was made public about it, but it was pretty well known to be in trouble right from the start. Here's what google turned up.
Ironically, Merced is slipping so far behind schedule, that now it is only one year after Merced ships the follow-on (called McKinley) should ship, and double performance. Of course that isn't a reflection on Intel doing something good (by doubling performance) but more a reflection on the poor job at shipping Merced and IA64 on time. (Merced was originally scheduled for '97 -- and here we are, it has slipped a few times, and now '00 is the year... really, this time they mean it). mackido.com
The bad news, from the perspective of other processor vendors, is that Intel will have its own contender
for unseating the x86--the Intel/HP architecture, also called IA-64, which will debut in the Merced
processor (see MPR 1/22/96, p. 4) around 1998. Because it will be several years newer than the
youngest of today's mainstream RISCs, IA-64 has the opportunity to leapfrog current designs, since it
will be optimized for highly parallel processors implemented with many millions of transistors (see MPR
8/5/96, p. 14).
The PC industry may not welcome IA-64 with open arms--switching to another Intel-proprietary
architecture would certainly give pause to many PC companies--but given the combined power of Intel
and HP, it would be foolish to count it out. Unless the two companies blunder badly, IA-64 seems likely
to be the second most popular desktop computer architecture around the year 2000. The x86 will
continue to be a strong, if not dominant, player for some time, even if Intel puts all its weight behind
IA-64. mdronline.com
The 64-bit chip from Intel and HP, known as P7, has been renamed the Merced chip. Contrary to Intel reports that the chip would premiere in 1997, it has been pushed back to begin shipping late 1998. It seems that HP’s role was more in helping to define the 64-bit instruction set and software interfaces for the chip rather than a design partner in the initial P7 project. HP will probably produce its own chips based on the 64-bit set.
The Merced will be fully compatible with X86 code and will not require emulation or translation software. However, there may be a discrepancy between the chip’s performance when running X86 code vs. the new native 64-bit software. The disparity should be comparable to the Pentium Pro’s performance difference in running 16-bit and 32-bit code. [PW 1/19]http://www.sil.org/computing/noc/151echnote.htm
Sidebar: The P7 and Beyond
"Last year, Intel formed a much talked-about partnership with Hewlett-Packard to design a new
microprocessor that is expected to appear in 1997 or 1998."
Update: It's 2001, so where is Merced, er, Itanium? (See Itanium or Itanic? for more on our favorite
no-show CPU.)http://www.lowendmac.com/blast/byte0495pf.html
Down the road, the company not only has its next generation of processor under development, but has set a
tentative release date of late 1997 or early 1998. Currently code-named Merced and jointly developed with
Hewlett Packard, it was formerly known as the P7-- and, say company insiders, it's optimized for 64-bit
applications. Microsoft has already announced that a 64-bit version of Windows NT is under development to
take advantage of the new CPUs. computerwriter.com
Finally, there's this amusing article, which goes deeper into the history than most of the others. It's all pretty funny.
Merced systems were originally expected in 1997 or 1998; Intel has already publicly announced a six-month delay for Merced, pushing it into mid-2000, and has missed internal targets for packaging issues, support circuitry, architecture and the like, sources said.
"No one will acknowledge [the internal delays] because, technically, it's not a slip until you publicly have to restate your schedule," said a source familiar with the development timetable. http://www.zdnet.com/eweek/stories/general/0,11011,372094,00.html
So there you go. It's not a slip. And none of these sources could have possibly gotten the allegedly made up 1997 date from Intel. Intel wouldn't dream of FUDding around like that, would they? Some other funny bits from that last article:
Merced's focus will be on backward compatibility with Intel's X86 architecture. The follow-on chip--which Intel has code-named McKinley--is the one that will go head-to-head with high-end 64-bit RISC architectures. . . .
Intel, the chip company with the deepest pockets, was in a precarious position of its own in 1994. Its 2-year-old 64-bit effort, known as P7, was having problems. Intel later abandoned P7 for EPIC, although some properties of P7 were incorporated into Merced.
It's all a joke, really. It would be a lot funnier if fear of Merced hadn't suppressed a lot of other architectural R&D, though. |
