"Those platforms got abandoned not out of some strategic affinity to x86 (much less to Intel), but simply because they didn't offer the advantage to be worth th

"Those platforms got abandoned not out of some strategic affinity to x86 (much less to Intel), but simply because they didn't offer the advantage to be worth the bother." I disagree. MIPS and Alpha offered significant performance advantages during the 90's. Even though Windows NT was available on these platforms, very little 3rd party software was provided in Alpha, MIPS or PA RISC compatible binaries. In industries where key applications were available, such as 3d animation, Alpha was quite popular, and the others somewhat so. Running these applications Alpha offered 2x-3x the performance of anything available from intel, and so compared well on a price/performance basis despite higher cost. If they were ever shipped in volume comparable to the P5 the advantage would have been staggering. If you read the archives of comp.arch you'll see a general sentiment of how highly regarded the architecture was, including postings by intel's own designers at the time. In fact I'd say the only thing more highly praised there would be the transputer (which was probably 3 decades ahead of its time).