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Technology Stocks : Intel Corporation (INTC)
INTC 48.26-0.7%Feb 5 3:59 PM EST
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To: Gary G. Withrow who wrote (7196)1/3/1997 11:42:00 AM
From: Paul Engel   of 186894
 
Gary - Re:"...the 68000 was a better architecture..."

I agree - it WAS better. The 68000 was better than the 8086. However, Motorola introduced the 68000 2 1/2 years after the 8086 (1978= 8086, 1981 = 68000). It took them longer to spin an entirely new architecture (the 68000 was NOT an evolution to the 6800) and they had very few CAD tools available to help them accelerate the design/debug aspects.

But, timing is everything. Intel created the 8086 as a 16 bit upgrade to the 8080, and it carried a lot of baggage and then some! Mutiplexed address/data buses, segmented memory architecture, 1 Meg maximum memory space, etc.

But it was out 1n 1978 along with a complete host of supporting circuits (clock chips, DMA, I/O peripherals, etc.) as well as Intel Development Systems and software - including MASM 86!

And IBM began their PC design project in mid-1980 - the 8086/8088 was the best choice available to them at that time - it was conceived to run the same type of CPM software that was the rage on Z80 machines of the time.

It's funny how the future doesn't always turn out the way you think it should.

I hope Intel's stock performance compensates you for all the work you had to do managing those segment registers!

Paul
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