4 ms·

While I like this idea, I think supporting a full x86-64 instruction set for high-performance applications, from scratch, is likely years out. This company will

While I like this idea, I think supporting a full x86-64 instruction set for high-performance applications, from scratch, is likely years out. This company will need a 10-year runway to see any market impact.

throwGuardian 7y ago
Where is x86-64 mentioned? I assumed they were building ARM chips. In any case, they don't mention any secret sauce. Intel has strong channels, fabs and the x86-64 ISA with massive software compatibility on the server side. Even with better performance/power, Intel can simply undercut the competition to drive them out of business. If Qualcomm's sales channels couldn't dent the server space, I am sceptical about upstarts, unless their [power, performance, cost] is significantly better than Intel.
- lnsru 7y ago
  I was also immediately thinking about Qualcomm’s processors business. From this point of view I don’t see success for this startup: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/qualcomm-server-chip-exit-china-centriq-2400,38223.html https://www.tomshardware.com/news/qualcomm-server-chip-exit-...
- chrisseaton 7y ago
  Are there any chips which support multiple ISAs? Could a single chip decode both AMD64 and ARM instruction streams? Or could the memory models not be unified so it's not possible?
  - als0 7y ago
    Yes there are chips that support multiple ISAs...although typically one ISA is more native. At least, I believe NVIDIA Denver qualifies as that[1]. Also I believe some Itanium chips had a (slow) x86 hardware decoder that changed the instructions into the native EPIC instruction set[2]. However, unifying the memory models sounds like a performance disaster for the ARM code. And having multiple decoders in hardware (as well as having enough of them) doesn't seem like a justifiable use of silicon real estate. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Denver https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Denver [2] https://www.techsupportalert.com/pdf/r1048.pdf https://www.techsupportalert.com/pdf/r1048.pdf
    - my123 7y ago
      The x86 hardware decoder on Itanium turned out to be slower than a JIT, and was removed from hardware pretty quickly. Also note that the x86 memory model is a perfectly valid implementation for an ARM chip, as it's a superset of the ARM memory model constraints. And the performance impact isn't that big really.
      - als0 7y ago
        Yes, I agree with you. Many of the barrier instructions will end up as internal NOPs. Performance wouldn't be terrible. Power may suffer.
  - tyingq 7y ago
    Transmeta did this. It emulated the x86 ISA, though the actual ISA was not x86. They did a demo of it translating JVM bytecode directly to its own VLIW ISA with no x86 running at all.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
- WillSlim95 7y ago
  If Jon Masters is present, it is a very high guarantee that they are focusing on ARM server chips
raverbashing 7y ago
"Nobody" cares about x86 anymore except those married to the platform. Even Windows runs on Arm now For servers they care about price, performance, support and volume/availability If you can have a non-x86 platform that will save power/cooling to the big datacenter users (FAANG basically) they will be willing to give you money
- scarface74 7y ago
  Windows runs on ARM by a very generous definition of “run”. https://www.techspot.com/review/1599-windows-on-arm-performance/ https://www.techspot.com/review/1599-windows-on-arm-performa...
- fwxwi 7y ago
  >"Nobody" cares about x86 anymore except those married to the platform. You only get to read this kind of stuff in HN.
- imtringued 7y ago
  >For servers they care about price, performance, support and volume/availability ARM servers are extremely awful at all of these. Most ARM servers perform poorly compared to x86 servers, they have less software support and they require you to cross compile or switch your development machines to ARM as well and finally actually getting an ARM server is incredibly difficult because almost no one offers them and even those providers who offer some ARM instances don't give you the same variety as with x86. The worst part is that switching to ARM involves extra costs for your expensive developers in exchange for hardware that probably was already too cheap to care about because RAM has a much bigger impact on server costs than the CPU.
  - raverbashing 7y ago
    I don't disagree in essence with what you're saying. But if they can get an ARM server that checks those boxes the game may change. > involves extra costs for your expensive developers Which expensive developers? Web technologies run the same on ARM as on x86 (may I say it's even easier than developing for mobile - Node/Java/PHP/Python/etc run the same in ARM, Node might even benefit from optimizations done for ARM Chromium)
Symmetry 7y ago
A lot of the press has been talking about how they'll be taking on Intel and AMD but that's just because those are the only server chip makers their readers are familiar with. Don't take it literally.

throwGuardian 7y ago

Where is x86-64 mentioned? I assumed they were building ARM chips. In any case, they don't mention any secret sauce. Intel has strong channels, fabs and the x86-64 ISA with massive software compatibility on the server side. Even with better performance/power, Intel can simply undercut the competition to drive them out of business. If Qualcomm's sales channels couldn't dent the server space, I am sceptical about upstarts, unless their [power, performance, cost] is significantly better than Intel.

lnsru 7y ago
I was also immediately thinking about Qualcomm’s processors business. From this point of view I don’t see success for this startup: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/qualcomm-server-chip-exit-china-centriq-2400,38223.html https://www.tomshardware.com/news/qualcomm-server-chip-exit-...
chrisseaton 7y ago
Are there any chips which support multiple ISAs? Could a single chip decode both AMD64 and ARM instruction streams? Or could the memory models not be unified so it's not possible?
- als0 7y ago
  Yes there are chips that support multiple ISAs...although typically one ISA is more native. At least, I believe NVIDIA Denver qualifies as that[1]. Also I believe some Itanium chips had a (slow) x86 hardware decoder that changed the instructions into the native EPIC instruction set[2]. However, unifying the memory models sounds like a performance disaster for the ARM code. And having multiple decoders in hardware (as well as having enough of them) doesn't seem like a justifiable use of silicon real estate. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Denver https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Denver [2] https://www.techsupportalert.com/pdf/r1048.pdf https://www.techsupportalert.com/pdf/r1048.pdf
  - my123 7y ago
    The x86 hardware decoder on Itanium turned out to be slower than a JIT, and was removed from hardware pretty quickly. Also note that the x86 memory model is a perfectly valid implementation for an ARM chip, as it's a superset of the ARM memory model constraints. And the performance impact isn't that big really.
    - als0 7y ago
      Yes, I agree with you. Many of the barrier instructions will end up as internal NOPs. Performance wouldn't be terrible. Power may suffer.
- tyingq 7y ago
  Transmeta did this. It emulated the x86 ISA, though the actual ISA was not x86. They did a demo of it translating JVM bytecode directly to its own VLIW ISA with no x86 running at all.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
WillSlim95 7y ago
If Jon Masters is present, it is a very high guarantee that they are focusing on ARM server chips

raverbashing 7y ago

"Nobody" cares about x86 anymore except those married to the platform. Even Windows runs on Arm now For servers they care about price, performance, support and volume/availability If you can have a non-x86 platform that will save power/cooling to the big datacenter users (FAANG basically) they will be willing to give you money

scarface74 7y ago
Windows runs on ARM by a very generous definition of “run”. https://www.techspot.com/review/1599-windows-on-arm-performance/ https://www.techspot.com/review/1599-windows-on-arm-performa...
fwxwi 7y ago
>"Nobody" cares about x86 anymore except those married to the platform. You only get to read this kind of stuff in HN.
imtringued 7y ago
>For servers they care about price, performance, support and volume/availability ARM servers are extremely awful at all of these. Most ARM servers perform poorly compared to x86 servers, they have less software support and they require you to cross compile or switch your development machines to ARM as well and finally actually getting an ARM server is incredibly difficult because almost no one offers them and even those providers who offer some ARM instances don't give you the same variety as with x86. The worst part is that switching to ARM involves extra costs for your expensive developers in exchange for hardware that probably was already too cheap to care about because RAM has a much bigger impact on server costs than the CPU.
- raverbashing 7y ago
  I don't disagree in essence with what you're saying. But if they can get an ARM server that checks those boxes the game may change. > involves extra costs for your expensive developers Which expensive developers? Web technologies run the same on ARM as on x86 (may I say it's even easier than developing for mobile - Node/Java/PHP/Python/etc run the same in ARM, Node might even benefit from optimizations done for ARM Chromium)

Symmetry 7y ago

A lot of the press has been talking about how they'll be taking on Intel and AMD but that's just because those are the only server chip makers their readers are familiar with. Don't take it literally.