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From: doug@edge.UUCP (Doug Pardee)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Intel Microprocessors
Message-ID: <899@edge.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 11-Aug-87 14:59:05 EDT
Article-I.D.: edge.899
Posted: Tue Aug 11 14:59:05 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 16-Aug-87 06:44:06 EDT
References: <1112@lznv.ATT.COM> <399@aucs.UUCP> <3225@cucca.columbia.edu> <412@parcvax.Xerox.COM>
Organization: Edge Computer Corporation, Scottsdale, AZ
Lines: 21
Summary: Revisionist history?

> Guys, you are missing the point. IBM obviously chose the 8086 because it was
> an easy upgrade from the 8080.

Sigh.  Try this for a better explanation:  what other choice did they have?

The PC wasn't designed yesterday; it was designed in '80-'81.  The only real
choices were an 8-bit CPU (probably Z-80 like every other micro on the
market at the time) or the 16-bit iAPX86.  I think most of you would agree
that as warty as the '86 is, it's better than the Z8000.  And National's
16-bit offering of the day was already dying, due to be replaced with the
32000 line (called the 16000 line back then).

What about the 68000, you say?  Back then, Motorola had this bug up their
behinds about the 68000 being for use in *real* computers.  They wouldn't
talk to anyone who wanted to use them in micros.  They actively blocked any
attempt to use them in micros.  Ask the folks at Digital Acoustics, who
developed a 68000 add-in board for the Apple II at about that time.  Sure,
Motorola finally caught on, and eventually we got Macs and Amigas and STs.
But that was years later.
-- 
Doug Pardee, Edge Computer Corp; ihnp4!mot!edge!doug, seismo!ism780c!edge!doug