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

To: Jules B. Garfunkel who wrote (66668)	10/14/1998 7:54:00 PM
From: Scumbria	Respond to of 186894

why 4Q just slightly up Jules, Stock prices tend to be driven by increases in earnings. If the earnings aren't increasing, why should the stock price? That is exactly the problem with INTC as an investment in 1998. Until they open up new markets, they have little headroom to work with. Scumbria

To: Jules B. Garfunkel who wrote (66668)	10/14/1998 8:56:00 PM
From: Paul Engel	Respond to of 186894

Jules & Intel Investors - Intel Reveals More Merced Details as well as FOLLOW On products. Merced will implement large caches with a Level 0 and a Level 1 cache on the MERCED CPU itself as well as having an on-chip L2 cache similar to current Mendocino & Dixon processors. Lotta cache will hopefully generate a lotta cash ! Interestingly, the Merced package may be SMALLER than current Pentium II cartridges. Intel's comments are very bullish - regarding adoption and market success/penetration of the Merced family. Two NEW follow-ons to McKinley were revealed - Madison and Deerfield. This makes for a very long ROADMAP ! Paul {==============================} news.com Intel details Merced By Brooke Crothers Staff Writer, CNET News.com October 14, 1998, 5:40 p.m. PT Intel provided concrete details of its 64-bit Merced processor for the first time at the Microprocessor Forum today and announced a low-cost 64-bit chip architecture. Providing particulars that are esoteric but absolutely essential for moving Intel to a 64-bit future, Merced targets markets that Intel can only dream of now. The chip is due out in mid-2000. Interestingly, Merced will come in a cartridge that is similar to the current Pentium II cosmetically but slightly smaller, according to a presentation given by Stephen L. Smith, a vice president at the Microprocessor Products Group. Under the hood, however, it's a completely different beast. In addition to having a new instruction set--which has been already outlined in some detail last year and earlier this year--the chip will use an entirely new cache memory architecture. Cache memory is now taking up more and more real estate on processors and, in many cases, dwarfs the number of transistors found in the processor itself. For example, while a processor can consume between 5 million and 10 million transistors, a large cache memory can use well over 50 million. The upshot is that this is emblematic of the crucial role this memory silicon plays in boosting the speeds of the most complex chips. The Merced will have a "three-level cache hierarchy," compared to the two levels of cache used in the Pentium II chip. This will comprise a level-0 cache, a large level-1 cache, and a larger level-2 cache on the chip, delivering much higher levels of performance compared to the cache memory architectures used on Intel's current 32-bit chips. Merced also will have a completely ravamped floating point unit. A processor is made up of a number of discrete computing units, which together constitute the whole processor. The floating point is one of the most critical and is used extensively in number-crunching for high-end scientific, engineering, and multimedia applications. Intel also mentioned that it is planning a chip dubbed "Deerfield" that will be its first 64-bit design targeted for lower-cost computers. Smith was also quick to point out that Intel was on track for Merced, speaking to widespread concern about development delays. "Merced is well under way right now...we're in final stages of validating, he said. "We're running an operating system on a [Merced test platform]." He also added that Intel is "ramping final circuit layout" as well as "shipping silicon development vehicles," and that there "a large number of application porting centers," referring to the facilities that will allow software developers to write applications for the 64-bit Merced chip. Most large server vendors have committed to building systems around the chip, according to Linley Gwennap, vice president of MicroDesign Resources. "IA-64 is going to dominate the market," he said, "It is very likely that Intel will achieve a 50 to 60 percent market share within a couple of years." In addition to PC companies such as Compaq and Dell Computer, vendors such as Silicon Graphics and Hewlett-Packard have said they will convert to IA-64 in the future, abandoning proprietary in-house architectures, Gwennap said. Intel is an investor in CNET: The Computer Network, publisher of News.com. Related news stories • AMD unveils K7 chip design October 13, 1998 • Details of new chips emerging October 9, 1998 • Is Merced doomed? August 6, 1998 Tech Talk... Join the discussion! Go to Front Door \| Computing \| Search Short takes \| All the Headlines