Here's a thought...

[kitkat22]

Intel made the attempt with Itanium and for the most part it has been unsuccessful. Sure they are being sold, but no where near what Intel has wanted. However, on the flip side AMD has done very well in working this 32/64 bit thing. What I was thinking was taking a quad-core and working in x86 and some other form of processor. Basically dual dual core with one being x86 the PowerPC, or Itanium or some new variant. It makes sense to me, what with virtualization now making it's start. Makes me wonder if this is what AMD and Intel are attempting in future processors. Who knows? Thoughts?

 

[zagood]

http://www.anandtech.com/tradeshows/showdoc.aspx?i=2713

 

[A5]

Conroe is still x86. The OP was thinking more along the lines of having 2 dual core packages on one die - one x86 and the other something else. This would be really, really expensive and largely impractical - x86 (and its extensions) is the only thing for the desktop in the forseeable future.

 

[JimPhelpsMI]

Hi, If I remember correctly X86 only means that the new CPU can still process all the functions of the original X86 in addition to any new ones it has. Jim