Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uflorida!ukma!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!att!ihlpl!knudsen
From: knudsen@ihlpl.ATT.COM (Knudsen)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.m6809
Subject: Re: MC6809 almost picked by IBM
Summary: 16 bit bus too expensive
Keywords: IBM PC, 6809 based PC
Message-ID: <9904@ihlpl.ATT.COM>
Date: 30 Mar 89 17:04:14 GMT
References: <392@aucis.UUCP> <1176@pilchuck.Data-IO.COM>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories - Naperville, Illinois
Lines: 19

In article <1176@pilchuck.Data-IO.COM>, del@Data-IO.COM (Erik Lindberg) writes:

> -true?  If so, why would IBM have picked the 8 bit 6809 over the 16 bit
> -68000, which I belive was avaliable at roughly the same time?

> Maybe for the same reason they picked the 8 bit 8088 over the 16 bit 8086?

I definitely recall hearing that IBM management considered that a 16-bit
bus, with its bigger circuit board connectors and all, would be
too expensive for a "personal" computer, so it had to use an 8088
(or 68008, or 6809?) rather than 8086 or 68000.

This is really humorous when you remember that IBM originally charged
close to $2K for the big iron-cased PC!  Hard to imagine 16 bits
being any bulkier or costlier....
-- 
Mike Knudsen  Bell Labs(AT&T)   att!ihlpl!knudsen
Round and round the while() loop goes;
"Whether it stops," Turing says, "no one knows!"