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From: doug@edge.UUCP (Doug Pardee)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.m68k,comp.sys.intel
Subject: Re: Recent Motorola ad seen in Byte
Message-ID: <678@edge.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 23-Apr-87 14:23:00 EST
Article-I.D.: edge.678
Posted: Thu Apr 23 14:23:00 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 25-Apr-87 21:15:56 EST
References: <930@intsc.UUCP> <1517@ncr-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM> <932@intsc.UUCP> <652@desint.UUCP>
Distribution: comp
Organization: Edge Computer Corporation, Scottsdale, AZ
Lines: 23
Xref: mnetor comp.sys.m68k:405 comp.sys.intel:196

Picking nits:

> 	The PDP-11 doesn't have any registers with
> 	wierd private characteristics.

I'm no expert on the 11, but aren't registers 6 and 7 the Program Counter and
Stack Pointer?  Not that this voids the argument -- the '86s are much more
restrictive with their weird registers.

> 	... Intel saw
> 	binary compatibility with the 8080/8085 as a critical goal.  That's
> 	forgivable;  nobody at the time could have seen that MS/DOS was
> 	going to kill CP/M-86.

Actually, the 8080 compatibility was *more* crucial for MS/DOS than for
CP/M-86.  MS/DOS was designed from the outset to be 100% upward compatible
with good-ol' CP/M, so that CP/M programs could be mechanically translated
from 8080 code to 8086 code and they'd run.  (It worked, too.  Many of the
early PC programs were mechanically translated CP/M programs.)  For some
reason, DRI didn't consider compatibility to be important, and CP/M-86
wasn't upward compatible.

-- Doug Pardee -- Edge Computer Corp. -- Scottsdale, Arizona