Lining Up The Chip Shots
Sydney Morning Herald
Tuesday October 20, 1998
IT HAS turned out to be a busy year for most microprocessor vendors, although it appears we can expect even more next year.
The recent Microprocessor Forum held in California is the annual convention that allows the major microprocessor manufacturers to outline their plans for the coming year. Those plans inevitably end up in computers in retail stores during that year.
Among some of the announcements made, Intel expanded further on its up-coming second version of MMX, codenamed Katmai, which is expected to appear early in the new year on its first 500MHz processor.
AMD's new K7
HOWEVER, the big news came from Intel rival AMD with the announcement of details concerning its new K-7 processor.
Expected to run at 500MHz and beyond, the K7 will use technology borrowed from Digital/Compaq. The EV6 system bus will enable the processor to run more efficiently and at higher speeds.
AMD expects the K7 to hit speeds of 1,000MHz by 2000, when it will be constructed using copper technology and with a 0.18-micron process.
Current AMD and Intel processors are built using a larger 0.25-micron technique.
The K7 is expected to be launched about June next year starting at 500MHz with a system bus speed of 200MHz. Intel's latest 450MHz Pentium II processors run with a 100MHz system bus, although Intel is expected to use a 133MHz and eventually a 200MHz system bus during 1999.
The new K7 processor will also use a new connection bus. Mechanically similar to Intel's Slot One used in Pentium II systems, it will be known as Slot A.
It will also allow AMD to integrate secondary-level cache memory within the processor cartridge just as Intel has done with the Pentium II. The difference will be that AMD is talking cache sizes up to 8Mb. The current top-mark Intel uses in its latest Pentium II Xeon processors is 2Mb.
If the processor performs as well as its specifications suggest, AMD could well move up from the budget PC segment of the market into the professional mainstream, giving Intel something to think about.
Low-cost chips
NATIONAL Semiconductor, the chipmaker that bought Cyrix this year, outlined a new chip core codenamed Jalapeno, which is also expected to appear in 2000.
It will first appear in the next processor design, known as the M3, and will add 3-D graphics as well as video capture and playback as part of the processor's in-built functionality. It will be built using smaller 0.18-micron processing and start at between 600 and 800MHz.
The conference also heralded the arrival of another player in the X86 market.
Rise Technology has announced a low-cost, low-power processor clone called the mP6. It is designed to be low-power, making it ideal for notebooks. The company is hoping to do for the notebook market what Cyrix did for the desktop market in 1996.
While the company gave little away in details about pricing or clock speeds, it did give up some of its design details.
The chip is a super scalar design, able to process three instructions per clock cycle. Intel's Pentium II processor is the only X86 architecture that matches that figure.
It jumps ahead of Intel when it comes to MMX, handling three MMX instructions per clock cycle ahead of Intel's two per cycle.
The chip is said to be Socket 7-compatible and will run on a 100MHz system bus. Volume shipments are expected to begin during the first quarter of next year.
Compaq also announced its next version of Alpha, the 21364. This chip is also expected to reach the 1GHz mark.
It also outlined the new Alpha EV7, described as being a scalable single-chip SMP (symmetrical multi-processing) that includes memory controller, can be scaled anywhere between one and 64 processors and run beyond the 1GHz mark.
50GHz chips?
IBM announced last week, separately from the Microprocessor Forum, that it has released the first high-volume chips for mobile communications based on a new fabrication technique using silicon- germanium or SiGe for short.
Engineers discovered that by using germanium atoms embedded in the silicon wafer used to create the chips, electrical currents flow much faster. That enables chips to get up to speeds of 50GHz (50,000MHz).
Current wireless communications chips use a more expensive method involving gallium-arsenide (GaAs). SiGe-based chips are not only more powerful but also far more efficient.
IBM expects the SiGe breakthrough will lead to the development of tiny yet powerful hand-held devices capable of cell phone, e-mail and Internet functionality.
This is a revolutionary step in electronics development that certainly puts IBM ahead, at least in the communications field. Time will tell whether the company can also translate it into microprocessor superiority.
© 1998 Sydney Morning Herald
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