Don't be surprised if the K7 is spread over various platforms. A server chip, a workstation chip even a high end consumer chip.
In other words, if this is the case, AMD will be doing exactly what Intel did with the Deschutes. We had a Deschutes Pentium II, a Deschutes Xeon, a Deschutes Celeron, and a mobile Deschutes. Like I said before, it will be very, very interesting to see the platform. (I'm a platform kind-of-guy.)
And upgradable to an Alpha Chip...
Is this really necessary? Let's say that there's an imaginary processor out there called the Alpha Overdrive for Slot 1. Even if I were to plug it the chip, I would also need to change the BIOS, install a different OS (or different version of the same OS), then install new drivers and programs. Software emulation isn't going to cut it, and we all know that no software company out there is brave enough to try and make one version of an OS or application which will run on two different processors seamlessly. (Heck, even Java apps can't do that yet.)
The advantage of using Digital's EV6 bus comes from AMD's current strategy of using technology that others have developed and tested. AMD wants to borrow Motorola's copper technology, and now AMD wants to borrow Digital's EV6 platform. This is in stark contrast to Intel, who until recently chooses to develop almost everything in-house.
The die size is smaller than you might think...
Well, either your assumption here is wrong, or AMD really didn't put in a whole lot of new features into the K7, or the K7 is going to be radically different from its previous generations. By the way, why would the K7 *need* to have a small die size at 0.25 microns? By the time the 0.18 micron process is in full swing, AMD will be underutilizing the available real estate. Microprocessor Report had an article which surveyed the possible uses of the increased transistor and silicon budgets of today's and tomorrow's process technologies. In light of this article, it doesn't make sense to me to restrict the die size to a small area.
By the way, how many transistors are in the K6-2, compared with then Pentium II?
Tenchusatsu |
