Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!apple!vsi1!wyse!mips!mash From: mash@mips.COM (John Mashey) Newsgroups: comp.arch Subject: Re: Architecture Wars, again; survey Message-ID: <7744@winchester.mips.COM> Date: 5 Nov 88 23:21:46 GMT References: <7316@winchester.mips.COM> <75478@sun.uucp> <10770@cup.portal.com> <1742@garth.UUCP> Reply-To: mash@winchester.UUCP (John Mashey) Organization: MIPS Computer Systems, Sunnyvale, CA Lines: 58 In article <1742@garth.UUCP> walter@garth.UUCP (Walter Bays) writes: >I believe that rumors of SPARC's death have been greatly exaggerated, >though one could wish... :-) The RISC wars are over?! It seems more >like they're just beginning in earnest now that some of the more recent >combattants are just taking the field. Since posting <7361@winchester>, I've had a bunch of e-mail exchanges with people who read it as "demise of SPARC" or equivalent thereof. Let me clarify a few things where I said what I meant, but wasn't careful to explain all of things I didn't mean! 1) The posting was NOT intended to imply the demise of SPARC. Why would it? I don't believe that. It is CLEAR that SPARC has enough presence to survive. I do believe that it will be difficult for SPARC to win enough of the yet-to-be-committed large companies to become "the industry-standard" (as I noted, whatever THAT means). Note that "not being the industry standard" is NOT EQUAL to demise. It is also clear that MIPS Rxxxx also has enough presence to survive. 2) What is still unclear is whether or not Motorola can do the things needed to be a clear survivor with the 88K: a) Sign up more industry leaders b) Get customers thru the design cycle, and out the door with systems in volume, including 3rd-party software. soon enough to catch up with MIPS & SPARC. If Moto can accomplish these things, there will be 3 winners; if not, then 2. When I say it is unclear, I mean that it is NOT clear to me. (I also meant that the $64K question was not yet answered.) 3) People asked about the ordering of chips in each of the two wars, and why it was that way. It was alphabetical by war; I should have said so, as nothing else was implied. 4) Once again, the reason I claimed that the war would be over (or at least the first major battle to secure lots of important design-ins) is because I've been in too many meetings with people who claim they're going to decide before the end of the year. (It's not like major players haven't been evaluating the situation for some time; after all, many of them were getting briefings YEARS ago on products publicly announced this year. Thus, the "recent combatants" actually took the field a while back, even if they didn't say so publicly.) It is quite possible that some of them will delay their choices, and it is very likely that few of them will make their choices public when they make their choices. Nevertheless, a lot of them will choose pretty soon, and my claim is that their choices will determine what's really going to happen (at least in the systems war), even if it's not publicly obvious at that time, and even though much work will remain to be done. Argh! now, back to technical things.... -- -john mashey DISCLAIMER: UUCP: {ames,decwrl,prls,pyramid}!mips!mash OR mash@mips.com DDD: 408-991-0253 or 408-720-1700, x253 USPS: MIPS Computer Systems, 930 E. Arques, Sunnyvale, CA 94086