IA64 and emulator performance
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From: Rob Warnock on 22 Oct 2006 05:34 John Dallman <jgd(a)cix.co.uk> wrote: +--------------- | * People with supercomputing problems that fit really well onto Itanium, | who are prepared for the idea that Itanium may go away in a few years. | That seems to be OK for "real supercomputing" people, who are used to | reworking their codes for different hardware. +--------------- It is this group, for example, that has continued to buy SGI's very large Itanium-based "Altix" ccNUMA systems right on through the bankruptcy. -Rob ----- Rob Warnock <rpw3(a)rpw3.org> 627 26th Avenue <URL:http://rpw3.org/> San Mateo, CA 94403 (650)572-2607
From: Nick Maclaren on 22 Oct 2006 06:00 In article <-tSdnWaWfJO4pqbYnZ2dnUVZ_oOdnZ2d(a)speakeasy.net>, rpw3(a)rpw3.org (Rob Warnock) writes: |> John Dallman <jgd(a)cix.co.uk> wrote: |> +--------------- |> | * People with supercomputing problems that fit really well onto Itanium, |> | who are prepared for the idea that Itanium may go away in a few years. |> | That seems to be OK for "real supercomputing" people, who are used to |> | reworking their codes for different hardware. |> +--------------- |> |> It is this group, for example, that has continued to buy SGI's |> very large Itanium-based "Altix" ccNUMA systems right on through |> the bankruptcy. Damn few bought them because they used Itaniums; almost all bought them for the SMP/Altix aspects, and would have been equally happy or happier with another CPU in an Altix. Yes, there ARE some (positive) things that Itaniums lead at, but not a lot, even for "real supercomputing" code. Regards, Nick Maclaren.
From: John Dallman on 22 Oct 2006 09:51 In article <6ccmj2pdatv0mt9l2g4hfb20cb8880plml(a)text.giganews.com>, bengtl7.net(a)telia.NOSPAMcom (Bengt Larsson) wrote: > Are you sure they do lose money on Itanium? Nobody knows how much HP > pays Intel to do Itanium. If HP doesn't want to use x86 in their big > servers, what can HP do? They (HP) could use PowerPC or SPARC :-) Well, I have the impression that the price of Itanium chips is only 3-4 times the price of x86, for vastly smaller production volumes - but can;t find the Itanium prices online at present, so the difference could be bigger. If that's true, I feel reasonably confident that Intel are, overall, loosing money on it. The cutbacks in development will have ameliorated that problem somewhat, but mean that Itanium is gradually losing performance competitiveness. One strongly doubts that HP are paying Intel /more/ than the rate at which anyone can buy Itaniums. --- John Dallman jgd(a)cix.co.uk "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a well-rigged demo"
From: Anne & Lynn Wheeler on 22 Oct 2006 10:15 jgd(a)cix.co.uk (John Dallman) writes: > Well, I have the impression that the price of Itanium chips is only 3-4 > times the price of x86, for vastly smaller production volumes - but > can;t find the Itanium prices online at present, so the difference could > be bigger. If that's true, I feel reasonably confident that Intel are, > overall, loosing money on it. The cutbacks in development will have > ameliorated that problem somewhat, but mean that Itanium is gradually > losing performance competitiveness. > > One strongly doubts that HP are paying Intel /more/ than the rate at > which anyone can buy Itaniums. other than the upfront design costs ... the costs are per wafer ... modulo some stuff about the number of steps/layers. if the chips share same process/line ... and the cost of the line is covered ... then the wafer price is relatively the same as long as you have at least a minimum sized wafer lot run. so first level approximation comparison can be number of chips per wafer.
From: Nick Maclaren on 22 Oct 2006 10:22
In article <memo.20061022145120.2988D(a)jgd.compulink.co.uk>, jgd(a)cix.co.uk (John Dallman) writes: |> In article <6ccmj2pdatv0mt9l2g4hfb20cb8880plml(a)text.giganews.com>, |> bengtl7.net(a)telia.NOSPAMcom (Bengt Larsson) wrote: |> |> > Are you sure they do lose money on Itanium? Nobody knows how much HP |> > pays Intel to do Itanium. If HP doesn't want to use x86 in their big |> > servers, what can HP do? They (HP) could use PowerPC or SPARC :-) |> |> Well, I have the impression that the price of Itanium chips is only 3-4 |> times the price of x86, for vastly smaller production volumes - but |> can;t find the Itanium prices online at present, so the difference could |> be bigger. If that's true, I feel reasonably confident that Intel are, |> overall, loosing money on it. The cutbacks in development will have |> ameliorated that problem somewhat, but mean that Itanium is gradually |> losing performance competitiveness. I don't. It depends entirely on how much money Intel is putting into Itanium development, and Intel is most definitely Not Saying. You are quite right that, if Intel is NOT losing money on it, it doesn't have long to go .... Overall, it is clear that the project has been a financial fiasco, though it HAS eliminated all of the RISC chips from 'general purpose' computing except POWER, SPARC. But that doesn't mean that it is still leaking money. |> One strongly doubts that HP are paying Intel /more/ than the rate at |> which anyone can buy Itaniums. God only knows whether HP is subsidising Intel, Intel is subsidising HP, or what. Intel and HP may know the tanglible cash flows, but that is a small proportion of the matter. Regards, Nick Maclaren. |