A Merced & SGI threat? Read the entire article:
Samsung Promises Fastest PC-Market CPU - Alpha 21264
Newsbytes News Network
Mon, Apr 06 1998
LAS VEGAS, NEVADA, U.S.A., 1998 APR 6 (NB) -- By Craig Menefee,
Newsbytes. Samsung Semiconductor (parent company Samsung Electronics
{SK:64050}) announced its next-generation Alpha 21264 microprocessor
will finally arrive next month. An official of the firm told Newsbytes
Samsung is now "taking full and sole charge" of its future Alpha
development.
"We will be the ones going on to even faster processes," said Y.J. Kim,
Alpha marketing director, in a conversation with Newsbytes. "They're
exiting their own fab and we are already at 0.25 (micron feature size)
and have plans for 0.18 and even finer lithography, down to 0.13, in the
very near future."
Samsung's announcement that the "264," as Kim calls the fast central
processing unit (CPU), will ship within weeks was Monday's second
serious challenge to Intel's market dominance. Earlier Monday, National
Semiconductor promised an x86-based single-chip PC that could drive
low-end PCs below $400 by mid-1999 (see separate story in today's
Newsbytes).
In a separate Monday announcement, Samsung introduced a series of
entry-level servers based on existing KP21164 Alpha processors from
Digital, with performance ranging from 500MHz to 633MHz. Samsung says
they are targeted for the new SOHO (small office/home office) network
market and for firms of any size that need fast World Wide Web servers.
In still another separate Monday announcement, Samsung introduced a
series of motherboards and processors, the SMB-UXB entry-level server
platform series, designed for final assembly by system OEMs. The boards
will have integrated Ultra-II Symbios SCSI (Small Computer Systems
Interface) and 10/100Mbs (megabit per second) Ethernet controllers.
Suggested retail prices (SRPs) will range from $1,199 to $3,610, the
firm said.
"With this board, OEMs can sell an entry-level Windows NT server that
runs up to 2.5 times faster than a Pentium Pro, 200 megahertz (MHz)
server. They will sell from less than $2,995 with more than 30% margin,"
declared Kim. "They have the highest performance/price point for any
entry-level server under Windows NT."
Samsung's 64-bit 21264 central processing unit (CPU), intended for
high-end PC markets and for special markets that need speed on a
relative budget, will run up to five times faster than Intel-based
desktop and server processors, the firm claims. The chips will run NT
among other operating systems and will beat Intel-based system prices.
In a twist on the "total cost of ownership" issues that now take so much
time among corporate buyers, Samsung said the new chips will "coexist,"
that is, run on the same boards as planned AMD-K7 processors from
Advanced Micro Devices.
"That gives a small business that buys a K7 server a path up to Alpha
when it expands and needs more performance," said Kim. "They can have a
low-cost mother board and later they can put in the Alpha chip. It will
save a lot of money."
The Samsung announcement Monday at the NAB '98 trade show in Las Vegas
took another step in the expected, progressive hand-off of design and
manufacturing for the Alpha by Digital Equipment Corp. to various
partners.
If the "264" arrives from Samsung in May, as scheduled, it will beat
Intel's planned 64-bit "Merced" central processing unit (CPU) by two
years.
Samsung hopes to capitalize on Microsoft's announcement that NT 5.0 will
run as a native Alpha operating system, as well as on the chip design's
inherent high speeds. Samsung says the processor's SPEC95 benchmark
performance will more than double that of any other existing chip's.
"If Intel's IA-64 is known as the Merced, then I guess we should be
known as the Mercedes," quipped Kim.
At least one Hollywood animation studio has bought into Samsung's plans.
Station X Studios, formed recently by animators who worked at Digital
Domain during that firm's work on the movie "Titanic," will exclusively
work on Samsung Alpha products, Kim told Newsbytes.
"These guys can do it all," Kim said. "They can write the code, they can
produce the art, and they're doing it with Alpha workstations. They're
getting three to five time the performance of an SGI machine at much
lower cost. And with the 264 it will be even faster."
Kim acknowledged Samsung is providing the new animation studio with
"some alpha CPUs and motherboards" but said Samsung paid Station X no
money for what Kim sees as a ringing endorsement of Samsung's new Alpha
chip and boards.
Samsung Semiconductor is a wholly owned subsidiary of Samsung
Electronics, an $18.8 billion dollar division of Korea's $92.7 billion
Samsung Group.
Reported by Newsbytes News Network: newsbytes.com .
(Copyright 1998) |
