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64bit didn't come in 2003, it came in 1991 in MIPS, in 1992, in Alpha, and in 1995, in SPARC. Nintendo 64 and Playstation 2 were using 64-bit CPUs before PCs.

by 4ad 5y ago

64bit didn't come in 2003, it came in 1991 in MIPS, in 1992, in Alpha, and in 1995, in SPARC. Nintendo 64 and Playstation 2 were using 64-bit CPUs before PCs. x86 was really late in the game.

kasperni 5y ago
He explicitly said x86.
- kergonath 5y ago
  They did not; they just quoted a Wikipedia article on x86. But then, if you ignore everything but x86 the argument is much weaker, because technology did not stop and wait for Intel. It would not be that surprising if x86 ceases to be dominant in the future, at which point when the x86 became 64-bit is about as relevant as, say, the release of the PowerPC 620 (first 64-bit PPC chip, released in 1997).
- CalChris 5y ago
  The post said "I think a better argument is to look at history" and then left out 12 years of history. x86_64 was on the trailing edge of that history.
Someone 5y ago
Yes, you can argue a lot about the years, and about what constitutes a x-bit machine. The first 32-bit CPU was from 1948, for example (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchester_Baby https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchester_Baby), the IBM/360 had 128-bit registers in 1969 (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_System/360_Model_85 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_System/360_Model_85) and the Pentium Pro is considered 32-bit, but has a 36-bit address bus. I think the analogy with Moore’s law still holds if you pick machines used in comparable roles. Reason is that you can’t make much use of more memory unless your computer gets faster (an exception would be extremely sparse hash tables, but those would need amounts of memory we don’t have yet) Assuming an extremely generous 2 cycles/byte, a 1MHz 6502 would take 2 seconds to clear 1MB of RAM, or 2,000 to clear 1GB. That’s over half an hour. That first Alpha also only had a 34-bit address bus, limiting it to 16GB of physical RAM (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_21064#Address_unit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_21064#Address_unit) I picked x86 because it was used in more or less the same role for decades and because it made the 16-32-64 steps.

by 4ad 5y ago

64bit didn't come in 2003, it came in 1991 in MIPS, in 1992, in Alpha, and in 1995, in SPARC. Nintendo 64 and Playstation 2 were using 64-bit CPUs before PCs. x86 was really late in the game.

kasperni 5y ago

He explicitly said x86.

kergonath 5y ago
They did not; they just quoted a Wikipedia article on x86. But then, if you ignore everything but x86 the argument is much weaker, because technology did not stop and wait for Intel. It would not be that surprising if x86 ceases to be dominant in the future, at which point when the x86 became 64-bit is about as relevant as, say, the release of the PowerPC 620 (first 64-bit PPC chip, released in 1997).
CalChris 5y ago
The post said "I think a better argument is to look at history" and then left out 12 years of history. x86_64 was on the trailing edge of that history.

Someone 5y ago

Yes, you can argue a lot about the years, and about what constitutes a x-bit machine. The first 32-bit CPU was from 1948, for example (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchester_Baby https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manchester_Baby), the IBM/360 had 128-bit registers in 1969 (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_System/360_Model_85 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_System/360_Model_85) and the Pentium Pro is considered 32-bit, but has a 36-bit address bus. I think the analogy with Moore’s law still holds if you pick machines used in comparable roles. Reason is that you can’t make much use of more memory unless your computer gets faster (an exception would be extremely sparse hash tables, but those would need amounts of memory we don’t have yet) Assuming an extremely generous 2 cycles/byte, a 1MHz 6502 would take 2 seconds to clear 1MB of RAM, or 2,000 to clear 1GB. That’s over half an hour. That first Alpha also only had a 34-bit address bus, limiting it to 16GB of physical RAM (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_21064#Address_unit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_21064#Address_unit) I picked x86 because it was used in more or less the same role for decades and because it made the 16-32-64 steps.