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From: bcase@apple.UUCP (Brian Case)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: brash micros versus the Big Iron: not yet
Message-ID: <6248@apple.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 16-Sep-87 16:16:46 EDT
Article-I.D.: apple.6248
Posted: Wed Sep 16 16:16:46 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 19-Sep-87 11:47:01 EDT
References: <622@winchester.UUCP> <1980@sfsup.UUCP> <945@edge.UUCP>
Reply-To: bcase@apple.UUCP (Brian Case)
Organization: Apple Computer Inc., Cupertino, USA
Lines: 19

In article <945@edge.UUCP> doug@edge.UUCP (Doug Pardee) writes:
>Er, all of this presumes that you're hell-bent on making a single-chip CPU.
>
>We here at Edge make a nice little machine which has a fully 68010
>compatible instruction set, and which executes most instructions in
>one clock cycle (just like them there RISC machines).
>
>No, it doesn't fit on one chip.  More like a dozen.
>But then, our memory boards have more than one chip on 'em too  :-)

Well, I must say that a few months of employment at a relatively high-
volume manufacturer has done wonders to increase my awareness of cost
sensitivity; that is, system cost is everything.  (I was stunned to see
how far, say, $50 can go when you really put your mind to it.)  That is
why it is so important to have as much on one chip as possible, and to
have that chip mean something even without caches, etc.  However, the Edge
stuff is incredible when you think about the task at hand.  I thought the
latest incarnation fits in only 6 gate arrays (just the processor I mean),
true?