Gates: 64-Bit Desktop Computing Will Be Mainstream In Two Years

CRN ^ | 11:38 AM EST Wed., May 05, 2004 | Paula Rooney

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates predicted that 64-bit computing will become mainstream in the PC industry over the next two years because of 32-bit extended technology that preserves customers' existing investments.

"64-bit will be common sense in the next couple of years," Gates said, noting that the high-performance processor engine will take off on workstations and desktops as 64-bit/32-bit capable chipsets supercede stand-alone 32-bit processors in the next couple of years. "It puts us at the very high end of computing, and it will be a smoother transition than those previously."

To that end, Microsoft announced at WinHec 2004 in Seattle that its Windows XP 64-Bit Edition for 64-Bit Extended Systems is scheduled to be released in the fourth quarter.

The Redmond, Wash., software giant also unveiled the release of an enhanced Driver Development Kit for the 64-bit Extended environment that will support Visual Studio.Net 2003 and Microsoft .Net Framework 1.1, which will enable more application development for the 64-bit Extended environment.

Gates said Microsoft will take advantage of processors with "multiple cores" that enable parallel processing on the PC desktop and server. The company will support typical eight-core server processors and two-core desktop processors, Gates said. He also urged ISVs to begin developing applications that exploit the new architectures.

Microsoft's Windows Server 2003 for 64-Bit Extended Systems, now in beta testing, also is scheduled for release during the second half.

Extended is the second 64-bit architecture supported by Microsoft. The Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 Extended offerings are based on 64-bit extensions to the x86 instruction set and support both AMD 64 and Xeon processors with 64-bit extension technology.

[Jack Black]

The HP-PA RISC chip, the Sparc, MIPS, and even the DEC Alpha were all 64bit in the mid nineties.

Intel and MS are way way behind on this.

[bmwcyle]

In 1992 they could have used the Alpa Chip.

[CyberCowboy777]

Oct 99 - By contrast AS/400 database skills demand has dropped 3%, with market share declining from 11.7% to 8.6%

http://www.it-analysis.com/researcharchivepdf.php?id=239

[js1138]

... if they want to keep any semblance of binary backward compatibility between operating systems.

Apple has never been big on backward compatibility. I have some programs left over from the DOS 1.0 days that still run on XP.

[CyberCowboy777]

We run some DOS apps for drives and PLC that will run under 2K or XP - BUT for some of them we actually have to run a Slow Down program to make them work.

[js1138]

There were lots of DOS programs optimized for the specific IBM 8088 clock. Stuff like RM/COBOL ought to work.

[Quix]

Am eager to get back to Taipei . . . and replace my dual processor ASUS mother board AMD 1.X GigHz processors; 1 Gigbyte RAM etc. system with something comparable in 64 bit. But, probably won't be able to before fall 2005.

[NJ_gent]

"You kind of got that backward. Itanium is currently only excellent for dedicated floating point crunch, and doesn't scale well beyond two or so processors in a single system image."

Huh? Err, perhaps you need to take another look at the TPC-C benchmarks which show the Itanium-based HP Superdome systems occupying a good portion of the top 10 systems. 64-CPU Itanium 2 systems crush everything else tested. Itanium is not, and never was intended for 1-2p systems. That market, would be Xeon's. Hence the need for Xeon (1-CPU solutions), XeonDP (2-CPU solutions), and XeonMP (4+ CPUs). Itanium was designed from the start for memory addressing and scalability. While Intel does also sell them for single and dual processor machines, that's done primarily for single application solutions. Right on Intel's product overview page for Itanium 2, they talk about its support for large SMP and clustered solutions.

Opteron does scale very well, but for non-clustered solutions, Itanium owns the big tin. I'm a big supporter of Opteron, and I absolutely adore the architecture. Opteron was, however, always intended to primarily be a 1-8 way processor. The success with clustering and the Opteron has won AMD some pretty big-time customers, but Itanium's niche is, as yet, unchallenged by much of anything. That being said, Itanium's price and performance benefits against the Sparc and Power chips are easily consumed by Opteron and - soon - 64-bit Xeons. If those two processors push Itanium into a small enough niche at the top, it's not going to be economically viable to continue producing it, unless and until Intel can bring production and development costs down significantly. Itanium was originally supposed to replace x86 altogether. Since that time, it has slowly been further and further relagated to a niche. It's now sold exclusively as an 'enterprise' processor for enterprise software. That could very well be a stable spot for it, or it would be that's what kills it.

[CyberCowboy777]

I am waiting at this point - fall this year maybe....

I want to wait I think until Winchester or San Diego and definitly PCI Express.

Desktop High-End (Athlon 64 FX)
San Diego (90nm, H2 2004)
Toledo (90nm, H1 2005)

Desktop Mid-Range (Athlon 64)
Newcastle (130nm, H1 2004)
Winchester (90nm, H2 2004)

Desktop Low-End (Athlon XP)
Paris (130nm, H2 2004)
Palermo (90nm, H2 2005)

Workstation/Server (Opteron)
Athens (90nm, 8-way, H2 2004)
Troy (90nm, 2-way, H2 2004)
Venus (90nm, 1-way, H2 2004)
Egypt (90nm, 8-way, H2 2005)
Italy (90nm, 2-way, H2 2005)
Denmark (90nm, 1-way, H2 2005)

Mobile High-End (Athlon 64)
Odessa (90nm, H2 2004)
Oakville (90nm, H1 2005)

Mobile Low-End (Athlon XP)
Dublin (130nm, H2 2004)
Trinidad (90nm, H2 2005)



AMD Athlon 64 FX-55 (San Diego) is the 90nm successor to Clawhammer (Athlon 64), expected to be released in Q4. The Athlon 64 FX-55 is expected to run at 2.6Ghz and contain a 1Mb L2 cache.

AMD Athlon 64 3700+ & 4000+ (Winchester) is the 90nm successor to the Newcastle Athlon 64 core, expected to be released in Q4. The Athlon 64 3700+ is expected to run at 2.4Ghz and the 4000+ at 2.6Ghz. Both will contain 512Kb L2 cache.

AMD Athlon FX (Paris) is expected to be released in Q4. The Victoria core is built on a 130nm process and is expected to contain 256Kb of L2 cache.

2005

AMD Athlon 64 FX (Toledo) is 90nm successor to San Diego, expected to be released in H2.

AMD Athlon XP (Palermo) is 90nm successor to Paris, expected to be released in H2.

2006

AMD K9 CPU is expected to be released in H1 2006. The K9 core will initially be present in the Opteron 870, 868 and 866 CPUs. The K9 is expected to incorporate a number of new technologies including being based on a threaded architecture, chip level microprocessing and media/vector processing extensions The K9 core is expected to offer much higher performance than the K8 and is expected to operate around 10Ghz, with Ghz performance I/O, and contain huge caches.

[An.American.Expatriate]

By contrast AS/400 database skills demand has dropped 3%

That may have a lot to do with the fact that the DB2 as implemented on the AS/400 (now iSeries) is extremely easy to use and, unlike Oracle and others, NO DBA is needed.

BTW, your link doesn't work for me - is it okay??

As to market share, please use current stats. I used a 1996 article to show simply that 64 bit computing (real, not "faked") has been around for quite a while - I believe the first as/400's with the 64 bit rsc rolled out in 94 or 95 (at the time that M$ was rolling out it's flagship 32 bit system).

[meatloaf]

Did everybody forget about the alpha chip that debuted back in the 80's?

[Hodar]

If the hyperthreaded CPU acts identically to a real 2 CPU machine, I'll spring for one of those ASAP.

Prepare to spring. There are presently dual processor motherboards on the market, so the 'proof of concept' has been ironed out for decades.

AMD has announced a dual core chip that is coming out next year. I am not at liberty to discuss this more than what is published here . But to paraphrase someone who would indeed know what he's talking about (despite my disdain for the man, personally)

One of the most powerful things next year is going to be our dual-core product. To me, that's going to really shock the hell out of everyone, because it's going to be hardware-compatible, infrastructure-compatible, pin-compatible. I mean, people that have a 2-P system can slap in a dual-core product and end up with a 4-P system for the price of a 2-P.

[GOP_1900AD]

I agree. Can't go into details, but.... I agree.

[CyberCowboy777]

I used 99 stats to show that the AS/400 market was on a downturn right after your article.

The link works fine for me.

The AS/400 is not a small medium business solution - a market that will embrace the 64-bit Windows and Linux platforms (Linux depending on application presence).

[GOP_1900AD]

A signal integrity nightmare.... good riddance to it!

[An.American.Expatriate]

No offense intended, but I do believe that you need to learn more about the iSeries - it is NOT the old green screen terminal machine, and hasn't been for quite a while - check it out, you'd be surprised!

[CyberCowboy777]

We should remember that the title is "64-Bit Desktop Computing Will Be Mainstream In Two Years.

This is certainly not mainstream.

[tortoise]

Opteron does scale very well, but for non-clustered solutions, Itanium owns the big tin.

Only because nobody has yet released a big Opteron machine, nothing more. I know there are already very large SSI Opteron systems in the works.

The bottom line is that the Itanium only scales to big SSI systems if you strap on a third-party ccNUMA system. The ccNUMA system built into the Opteron was originally designed to be the next generation Cray fabric but was acquired by AMD, and is generally excellent, if not fully utilized in what you can buy off-the-shelf today.

Itanium's claim to fame is largely floating point, which nothing can touch currently. But for a lot of SSI codes that aren't particularly floating point bound (including mine), the equivalent Opteron system will beat it handily. Again, part of it is just the relative new-ness of the Opteron compared to the Itanium. As more and more companies start experimenting with massively scalable Opteron fabric implementations (e.g. Cray), I expect the Itanium to have trouble keeping up.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

It's a marketing ststement .....

[B Knotts]

Fair enough, but I think with the popularity of the AMD64 chips, there will be mainstream 64-bit PCs earlier than Bill Gates thinks.

I'd argue that AMD64 is mainstream now.

My next home machine will have an x86-64 in it. Or two, maybe.