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To: Richard Habib who wrote (17605)	9/6/1998 12:27:00 AM
From: Scott Crumley	Respond to of 213172

Richard, You said: One thing to note is that in the desktop arena, Intel chips still run at a higher Mhz than PPC chips will even with copper. While there is a heat problem it doesn't appear critical in desktop design and Intel will be moving on into the 500-600 Mhz rating by mid 1999. As you note the real benefit of copper is in portables and it appears clear that here copper will allow the PPC world to advance faster than the PC world for a while. I'm certainly no pundit when it comes to analyzing the fast-paced world of processor design, but your statements above seems to be missing some important points. First, you concede that copper technology will simply serve to add to the speed-lead/lower power consumption that Apple already enjoys in the laptop market. To my mind, this area alone would be reason enough for Intel to pursue any avenue available, in order to regain superiority (or at least parity) in these vital specs. Especially since the industry clearly seems to be headed toward smaller, more power efficient computing devices. If I were Dell, Compaq, Gateway or Micron etc., I would be more than a little concerned by Apple's superiority in this area. Especially when one considers that the iMac was also made possible by this technology, in that it is basically a Powerbook with a CRT. And correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't AMD (or whoever) sign up with IBM to produce copper technology chips? They must think it's worth something right now. Also, your statement about cycle/sec superiority of the Intel line over the PPC, flies in the face of everything I've heard about actual computing power. Is it not true that the fastest PPC chip beats the fastest Intel chip, when the rubber meets the road? Little by little, more and more folks are learning that greater cycles/sec does not necessarily translate to more computing power. I'm aware of the notion that copper technology will provide greater benefits in the future, when applied to die sizes that are smaller than current mass production offerings. But it is still effective enough at today's die sizes to enhances the PPC's existing lead in computing power and power consumption ratios. If Intel had a comfortable lead, or even parity in these areas, then I would agree that it would make sense for them to wait for a more efficient time to jump into copper. But that is not the case. From what I've read (re:Merced etc), they don't seem to be addressing the PPC's current and future path superiority very effectively. In a nutshell, IMHO, they're acting like a company that went down the wrong road, and are having a difficult time making transitional moves. Andy Grove always considered himself to be the most paranoid man in the Valley (I know he stepped down...some). It seems to me that a paranoid company, with the wealth and market share of Intel, would do whatever was necessary to crush Apple, IF THEY COULD. Therefore, the interesting question, to me, is "Why aren't they? Maybe......they can't. Please straighten me out if I'm missing an important point. Regards, Scott

To: Richard Habib who wrote (17605)	9/6/1998 4:49:00 AM
From: HerbVic	Respond to of 213172

Excuse my mistake. The article was about IBM, Compaq and HP (not Motorola). But the reference to the "information channel circuitry" was rather vague and got me started down the path of thinking that the companies may be pushing copper & SOI onto Intel's plate sooner than later. The prospect does raise some interesting intra-industry ironies. I finally caught up with "the rest of the story." You are correct in that the dispute is over PCI. semibiznews.com In answer to your question, "Where do you get info that Intel 1 Ghz chips are begin delayed beyond current roadmap??" I have been looking for several hours for the online article that I read, but to no avail. The article was not about the Intel chips, but was about the wafer fabrication industry. It painted a picture of an industry in the midst of severe over supply and steep price cuts. In order to maintain Moore's law (performance value per $ doubles every 18 months) the next wave, aside from exotic technologies, would have to come from the combination of going to a larger wafer, 300 mm, and smaller die, .18 micron. Intel seemed to favor that route, having put little emphasis on copper or SOI. The entire chip making industry was balking at the increased expense with yet no end in sight to their pricing dilemma and was calling for more support from equipment makers for development funding. Their reluctance was cited as potentially delaying the full scale, low cost production of 300 mm wafers till 2002 to 2005. While using the .18 micron standard will increase performance and boost economies of production with the 200 mm wafer, the increased rejection rate of the smaller scale will diminish some of the economic gains. Translated: the faster chips will be expensive even in mass production. On the other hand, there's IBM and Motorola with an almost florescent path toward the goal of 1 ghz by 2000. Economically independent of the 300 mm wafer economy of scale solution, they would meet Moore's Law through the refinement of copper and SOI technology performance gains combined with bi-cmos technology for Motorola and fine tuning the design parameters for IBM. Going into mass production, the SOI technology results in a lower rejection rate, though will add about 10% to production costs. (IBM is going to the smaller die in combination with SOI and copper. I was not aware of that last night.) I did, however, find this article on c/net: -EXCERPTED- Industry experts have called into question the wide-ranging commercial rollout of Merced, which has been pushed back from late 1999 to mid-2000. Instead, it now appears that the chip which will propel Intel deep into the 64-bit computing arena will be McKinley, a Merced successor that's touted as having "twice the performance" and likely to come out in 2001. news.com That article goes on to place the McKinley at 800 mhz speed with copper technology. In an Electronic News interview with Hector Ruiz, president of Motorola's Semiconductor Products Sector (SPS) -EXCERPT- EN: Basically Apple is the only large customer using PowerPC as a desktop processor. Is that sustainable over the long term, just to have one customer who uses it in that form? Motorola: "Only in our business plan that we have. See, if we were customizing products only for the desktop, that might be a tough thing to answer. But, you know, our current approach is that we want to make sure that everything to do with PowerPC has a networking opportunity that's pretty strong. "But as you probably know, networking is pretty closely tied to a pretty powerful desktop. So in the networking space, you'll need a gigahertz machine in the year 2000. Well, it turns out that Apple also would like to have a gigahertz machine. So what we've done together now is, we're working very closely with Apple, and we say, 'You can benefit from all this work if we work together to make these chips very useful for both markets.' And they've been working with us pretty well. So in that sense, you know, Apple can live as long as they want to." electronicnews.com HerbVic

To: Richard Habib who wrote (17605)	9/6/1998 8:09:00 AM
From: isdsms	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 213172

<<Intel chips still run at a higher Mhz than PPC chips >> They may have faster clock speed, but they do not perform faster. Ira

To: Richard Habib who wrote (17605)	9/6/1998 12:39:00 PM
From: Doren	Respond to of 213172

Richard, Intel recently admitted it was having problems with Merced. They may not even manufacture it, going with what was to be the next generation after Merced (I've forgotten the name)! Heat is indeed a problem with their chips, contributing to the delay in multiprocessor Xeon chip systems (past two). Alpha an PPC are way ahead in this area. In addition, die size contributes much to the cost of chip manufacture so IBM and MOT have a large profit margin advantage over Itel. IBM uses PPC chips in their RS6000 (UNIX) servers and AS400 (proprietary) systems. AS400 systems are very successful in MidSized businesses (50Mill to a Billion in size?). RS6000 systems are way scalable and are used for supercomputing as well as servers for very large companies (such as Tower Records which moves gigantic amounts of data daily around the world). Although IBM may be making more on services, these services depend on the continued success of their systems to some extent. The PPC chips in these systems are more advanced than the chips in Apple desktop systems just as Xeons are more powerful than Pentium IIs. Intel may be in a real pickle over the heat and size issues here, only time will tell though because they may have something up their sleave. If you combine this with Y2K issues and Justice Dept. issues Intel/Microsoft hegemony may become a thing of the past. Intel is also up against three other chip makers who have gained marketshare on the lower end. I may buy a PC to complement (3D apps) my Mac, and at this time I'd have no problem with a K6 chip. On the Mid/higher end systems PC geeks don't have a big problem with K6 chips which are less expensive. My brother bought a K6 system for his business, and it has no more problems than your average Wintel system. On the lower end, many consumers don't know the difference, and many oth those who do are losing their fear of alternatives to Intel. Celerons have gotten a nasty reputation, although Intel has corrected the flaw (no L2 cache) in older Celerons. So Intel has problems all over the place, not just Xeon. If it weren't for MicroSoft's dominance, Intel would be in terrible shape. Of course this is what you are betting on when you buy stocks related to these companies.