Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : Intel Corporation (INTC) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Gary Kao who wrote (38543)	11/1/1997 4:07:00 AM
From: Jeff Fox	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 186894

Gary, re: StrongArm processor Thanks for the post - good article for once with insightful description of the Intel challenges. I noted Strongarm before in post #37930 as a potential winner for Intel in the very low end "appliances", PDAs, etc. The low end machines aren't really intended to compute. They serve mainly to retrieve and present information. One concept is that they are "load and store" machines, designed primarily to move data from comm link to memory, from memory to screen. They are sprinters, not distance runners. They must not consume battery power while doing nothing most of the time, then respond quickly to request for service for screen updates, etc. The x86 isn't great as a load and store machine as it has lots of control circuits for memory management that really aren't needed for this application. It suffers on the metric of "mips per watt" compared to ARM and other simpler architectures. Intel has worked mightly to overcome the shortcomings by adding clock throttling and other power down logic to certain versions of x86. The code name "hummingbird" come to mind on the 486 generation. I was struck by the article mentioning internal resistance as a prime obstacle. I suspect there is a contingent inside Intel that would seek to kill off any non IA architecture. I'll be curious to see if they go after StrongARM. Finally, regardless of chip merit, it remains to be seen if Intel has the desire, or ability to rule the low end. Processors here sell for $40 or less. They are "embedded" processors, meaning there is little architectural loyalty, short production runs, and lots of competition. Add to this that short of GI cable boxes, nobody yet has produced a clear winner, let alone made good money! Jeff