Intel, NEC show diverging CPU paths

[Idontcare]

Intel, NEC show diverging CPU paths

Intel detailed its most highly integrated CPU to date at the International Solid State Circuits Conference (ISSCC) here Monday (Feb 9). A separate paper from NEC showed a promising approach to building processors out of stacked memory and logic chips.

http://www.eetimes.com/conf/is...leID=213402076&kc=3681

You got to read this link just for the humor embedded throughout. I'm sure the author was being deadly serious, but it comes off as a little over-the-top IMO.

While that issue gets debated, Intel's dominance in microprocessors is increasingly apparent.

"It was a dry year," said Krste Asanovi, a computer science associate professor at Berkeley.

The gap between Intel and its rivals Advanced Micro Devices, IBM and Sun Microsystems is expected to widen. One rival remarked with amazement that, despite the deep recession, Intel still plans to ship 32 nm CPUs in 2009.

"We probably will not do that until 2011," said the engineer who asked not to be named.

(um yeah, who here doesn't think this particular "anonymous" engineer works for AMD? busted)

"In the 1990's our focus was on performance at all costs," said Kumar. "We built circuits that were inherently faster, but they were burning a lot of power for small gains. With Nehalem we could not afford that anymore," he added.

More laughs, I thought they couldn't afford to do that anymore once 90nm Prescott had come out :laugh: Oh Kumar, you slay me with your humor!