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Are there only two chip manufacturers now?

HP is still making the PA-RISC family , current incarnation is the PA-8900 used in the seriously big servers and some of the smaller stuff too.
Were to be replaced with Itanium through shared tech with Intel.
Not sure if the new multi-core might alter HPs long term plans.
 
Jokester said:
Think the XBox360 uses an IBM PowerPC based chip? and the PS3 uses an IBM Cell processor.
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In addition to these two IBM also makes the Broadway chip that powers the Wii. It's an SOI version of the PowerPC architecture by IBM. As such IBM has all three of the big name consoles on the market right now.
 
BillytheImpaler said:
In addition to these two IBM also makes the Broadway chip that powers the Wii. It's an SOI version of the PowerPC architecture by IBM. As such IBM has all three of the big name consoles on the market right now.
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Like they said on the Inq, who's gonna win the console war? Well IBM already have. ;)

One that hasn't been mentioned is transmeta, and the transmeta crusoe, which i have heard of but know nothing about.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusoe
 
lol I used to have a 6x86-P166... ran games slow as *language!*... ahh those were the days... *wipes nostalgic, dewy eye*

-Oops, genuine slip-up there...
 
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That reminds me, i think i have a cpu in the garage which is an ibm. Not mine so i never used or bought it but an interesting piece of history. Might get it running again in an old system one day.
 
Richdog said:
ran games slow as *language!*...
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Wasn't it all rendered in software by the CPU though?

I'm trying to remember what graphics cards were knocking about in those days . . . wasn't it the 2MB/4MB S3 Virge?. First proper hardware 3D I saw was a matrox 'add-in' card of some sort?
 
Big.Wayne said:
Wasn't it all rendered in software by the CPU though?

I'm trying to remember what graphics cards were knocking about in those days . . . wasn't it the 2MB/4MB S3 Virge?. First proper hardware 3D I saw was a matrox 'add-in' card of some sort?
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Indeed... but the FPU's on the Cyrix were horrible compared to the Intels... same as the old AMD K2's I had. In fact, this Core 2 is the first Intel CPU i've had in oh... 15 years? :D
 
Jokester said:
Do Via still make their low power processors?

Jokester
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yup,the C3 processors very popular in poorer country's too, cheap easy to produce, available with enough power for modern applications, very very low power. :)
 
FrostedNipple said:
and dont forget the scientific super computers, completly incompatible with everything except its one use, working out a specific number LAWL

i saw one once that was literaly as big as a room, they said it had over 100x the proccesing power of the top of the range (back in about 2000). i think those sort of computers are a waste just sitting there working out pi, or prime numbers
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Most 'scientific' clusters use the same x86 processors as you will have in your desktop. Here in my department we have a cluster of 512 dual core opterons.

As for them 'being a waste' that's simply because you have no idea what they are used for. When you design a car, a train, an aeroplane, or even a nuclear weapon you need to know how it will respond to various forces. The interactions between the various physical components (and particularly fluids like air or water) have to be modelled within the computer. This takes masses of computing power, but without it you could kiss goodbye most of the modern products you enjoy using.
 
Wasn't it all rendered in software by the CPU though?

I'm trying to remember what graphics cards were knocking about in those days . . . wasn't it the 2MB/4MB S3 Virge?. First proper hardware 3D I saw was a matrox 'add-in' card of some sort?
Click to expand...

I remember needing a Hercules Graphics Board just to run lotus 123 charting functionalitly, the cpu alone couldn't handle it! in the old IBM PS2 Model 30's

What is funny though, how the socket PS2 ended up becoming standard after all that time, and originated by IBM on the PS2 PC's! :p
 
Intel
AMD
Chips and Technologies
Cyrix
IBM
IDT
National Semiconductor
NEC
NexGen
Rise Technology
SGS-Thomson
SiS
Texas Instruments
Transmeta
UMC
VIA


These are all the companys still making x86 CPU's
 
beast said:
Is it just AMD and Intel producing CPU's? When I was learning about PC's I heard the name Cyrix bandied about, although I never saw one. What happened, just couldn't compete?
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what about mac?
 
Vegetarian said:
Intel
AMD
Chips and Technologies *graphics chipset company, bought by Intel*
Cyrix *bought out by VIA*
IBM *used to make x86 chips for Cyrix*
IDT *bought by VIA*
National Semiconductor *bought Cyrix, but later sold them to VIA*
NEC *only made 8086 clones*
NexGen *bought out by AMD*
Rise Technology *bought by SiS*
SGS-Thomson *can find no evidence of them producing an x86 clone*
SiS *chipset manufacturer, not x86 CPU*
Texas Instruments *can find no evidence of them producing an x86 clone*
Transmeta
UMC *chipset manufacturer*
VIA


These are all the companys still making x86 CPU's
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They're still a chip design house, but they now just license their chip designs to third party fabs.

EDIT: Technically speaking, the Transmeta chips weren't x86 compatible instruction set wise, but were able to dynamically translate x86 function calls to it's own instruction set and back.
 
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