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An ARM based design would make sense, except unlike Apple they'd have to buy a license. Apple has a perpetual license so they don't have to pay a thing and can

An ARM based design would make sense, except unlike Apple they'd have to buy a license. Apple has a perpetual license so they don't have to pay a thing and can do what they want with it. Like the M1 processor. But Intel does not have that. So, developing risc v in the background without committing to it, yet, makes a lot of sense. It might actually give them a path to come up with an answer to the M1 that isn't just a slightly more efficient x86 processor. Apple just demonstrated that changing CPU architecture is not that big of a deal; so the value of x86 compatibility isn't what it used to be. You can just emulate it and it's fine. Even for games apparently. So Intel, backing an architecture that is already starting to compete with arm that is free makes a lot of sense. AMD has the same challenge. And despite Nvidia failing to buy ARM, it's pretty clear that their long term strategy is not going to be letting other companies supply CPUs but to provide a complete solution.

scrlk 4y ago
At one point, Intel stated that they retained their ARM architectural licence even after they sold their XScale line to Marvell. https://www.zdnet.com/article/intel-we-have-arm-license-no-plans-to-use-it/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/intel-we-have-arm-license-no-p...
ZiiS 4y ago
Intel used to make a whole line of StrongArm chips. Even today they ship Arm softcores with thier FPGAs. They have no issue with Arm's licensing.
- andromeduck 4y ago
  Intel SSDs used ARM cores too.
  - retrocryptid 4y ago
    I think I remember hearing that Intel's current or recent past networking products are Arm based. I had always assumed Intel was interested in RISC-V as a possible replacement for the wide array of non-x86 cores in network, baseband and storage controller products they fab.
- rjsw 4y ago
  Intel has "hard" ARM cores in their FPGAs, as does AMD (Xilinx).
- KerrAvon 4y ago
  IIRC, that turned into “XScale” and was sold off to Marvell.
cma 4y ago
> You can just emulate it and it's fine. Not quite.. Apple also had to modify ARM on the hardware side to support x64's stronger memory ordering. But RISC-V has options for both I think. For an attempt at doing it without modifying the hardware see Microsoft's slow emulation attempt on their ARM version that was rejected by consumers and increased battery consumption much more.
- brucehoult 4y ago
  TSO memory model is indeed a standard option on RISC-V, that no one had implemented yet as far as I know. Software designed for the normal RISC-V memory model will work perfectly on a TSO machine, if perhaps a bit more slowly. Programs that depend on TSO semantics may be buggy on the standard RISC-V memory model (or on ARM too). RISC-V also has a FENCE.TSO instruction that can be inserted as needed into software running on normal RISC-V. If you're going to use it a lot then you'd be better off implementing an actual TSO mode (not least because of code size). FENCE.TSO even works on (standards compliant) hardware that doesn't know about it, because unknown fences are supposed to be executed as FENCE RW,RW (the strongest fence), at some loss in efficiency. Alibaba T-Head unfortunately didn't read this part of the spec when they designed the C906 and C910 cores, which give illegal instruction trap if they encounter an unknown fence such as FENCE.TSO. OpenSBI now does trap-and-emulate if necessary, but of course at another loss of efficiency. This bug affects the Allwinner D1 and Alibaba ICE SoC. I don't know whether this errata in the C910 has been fixed in the TH1520 SoC in the Roma laptop (and other unannounced, cheaper, SBCs).
Havoc 4y ago
>Apple just demonstrated that changing CPU architecture is not that big of a deal; That's if you have monopoly like control over your entire eco-system...
- KerrAvon 4y ago
  Not sure what this refers to. The Mac isn’t a monopoly and isn’t locked down like the iPhone. And Apple’s done this before and made it look easy.
  - toast0 4y ago
    The Mac isn't locked down like iOS, but there's still no expectation that software built for one OS major release will continue to work for the next. If the Apple fandom wiki is correct, the 68k emulator for PPC was included in all PPC releases, but Rosetta was included in 10.4 and 10.5, optional in 10.6 and unsupported in 10.7; it's scope was more limited than the 68k emulator as well. I expect Rosetta 2 will have a similar limited lifetime.
dmitriid 4y ago
> An ARM based design would make sense, except unlike Apple they'd have to buy a license. License is the least of it. Apple released their first custom chip in 2013. And spent several years before that designing it. So, it took Apple up to 15 years to get to where they are now with M1. Even if AMD and Intel start now, and are twice as fast at developing new CPUs, they will need 6-7 years to reach parity with 2022 Apple in... 2028
- mkl 4y ago
  That doesn't make sense to me. Apple was starting from scratch (well, from PA Semi, which made Power not ARM), but Intel and AMD have been designing high-performance CPUs for decades, and already changed architecture (to AMD64) successfully. On top of that, both have experience with ARM processors.
  - dmitriid 4y ago
    It takes around 4 to 6 years to design a new processor even if you have experience with it. A new competitive processor in an area where all you have is "some experience"... Well, I wouldn't hold my breath. If (and that's a big if) AMD and Intel started looking into ARM seriously after Apple unveiled M1, I wouldn't expect any ARM processor out of them earlier than 2025-2026. Funnily enough I'd expect Amazon to perform better in this space (Graviton has been in deployment since 2019, three years ago, and is now in its third iteration).
    - fmajid 4y ago
      I would only take it seriously if Intel tasked this to its scrappy Israeli R&D, which saved the company from Itanic and Netburst irrelevance.
    - formerly_proven 4y ago
      AMD had K12 (Zen for AArch64)
      - dmitriid 4y ago
jabl 4y ago
> Apple has a perpetual license so they don't have to pay a thing and can do what they want with it. "Everybody" knows that Apple has an ARM architectural license, but AFAIU the terms haven't been disclosed. Presumably they got a sweeter deal than other ARM architectural licensees when they got rid of their ownership in ARM ages ago, but, "don't have to pay a thing" and "can do whatever they want" sounds a bit too sweet to be true? > So, developing risc v in the background without committing to it, yet, makes a lot of sense. TBH, I think Intel's interest in RISC-V is more about hurting ARM in the embedded market than about planning to sunset x86.
- MobiusHorizons 4y ago
  Intel is demonstrating the capabilities of their fab services including the ip blocks they have available. This scifive core is no different in that respect from the pci controller or ddr5 memory controller in that respect. Many companies want to build custom silicon for various reasons (although the current value proposition seems to be ML related). Those companies will need many pieces to get data in and out of their custom solution, and a Linux capable cpu core to handle networking or a small amount of traditional compute is often necessary. Intel building a risc V core should not be seen in light of their traditional cpu business, it’s not even in the same league in terms of performance. It’s just a technology demonstrator to prove to companies that intel can actually deliver designs that integrate intel designed ip and regular fabless semiconductor designs. The fact that risc V is guaranteed press is just icing on the cake.
  - jabl 4y ago
    > Intel is demonstrating the capabilities of their fab services including the ip blocks they have available. Oh yes, absolutely. (I was going to mention that earlier, but the edit timer had expired.) But yes, splitting fab service into a separate business unit that is seriously open for 3rd parties seem to be a major strategic shift since Gelsinger took over the helm. And it probably makes sense, as TSMC et al have demonstrated the merchant fab model can work for the top end designs as well and the entire rest of the industry is moving towards that. So in a way, unless Intel wants to be the odd man out with their own idiosyncratic workflows this is a route they must go down on.
hnaccount_rng 4y ago
I think the recognition of “Apple showed that it’s not a big deal” would end similar to the one “The US showed that military invasions from superpowers into middle powers are not a big deal”. The amount of raw effort that Apple put into making that transition _appear_ “no big deal” will be hard to adequately appreciate! It _noticeably_ affected software quality at least two MacOS versions prior (drop of 32-bit support and forcing all API accesses to go via their frameworks) and will have cost them hundreds of millions if not billions in engineering effort and unknowable amounts of lost sales in the mean time. Yes it paid off. Obviously. But emulating their move, I’m not sure if there is even a single company able to do that.

scrlk 4y ago

At one point, Intel stated that they retained their ARM architectural licence even after they sold their XScale line to Marvell. https://www.zdnet.com/article/intel-we-have-arm-license-no-plans-to-use-it/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/intel-we-have-arm-license-no-p...

ZiiS 4y ago

Intel used to make a whole line of StrongArm chips. Even today they ship Arm softcores with thier FPGAs. They have no issue with Arm's licensing.

andromeduck 4y ago
Intel SSDs used ARM cores too.
- retrocryptid 4y ago
  I think I remember hearing that Intel's current or recent past networking products are Arm based. I had always assumed Intel was interested in RISC-V as a possible replacement for the wide array of non-x86 cores in network, baseband and storage controller products they fab.
rjsw 4y ago
Intel has "hard" ARM cores in their FPGAs, as does AMD (Xilinx).
KerrAvon 4y ago
IIRC, that turned into “XScale” and was sold off to Marvell.

cma 4y ago

> You can just emulate it and it's fine. Not quite.. Apple also had to modify ARM on the hardware side to support x64's stronger memory ordering. But RISC-V has options for both I think. For an attempt at doing it without modifying the hardware see Microsoft's slow emulation attempt on their ARM version that was rejected by consumers and increased battery consumption much more.

brucehoult 4y ago
TSO memory model is indeed a standard option on RISC-V, that no one had implemented yet as far as I know. Software designed for the normal RISC-V memory model will work perfectly on a TSO machine, if perhaps a bit more slowly. Programs that depend on TSO semantics may be buggy on the standard RISC-V memory model (or on ARM too). RISC-V also has a FENCE.TSO instruction that can be inserted as needed into software running on normal RISC-V. If you're going to use it a lot then you'd be better off implementing an actual TSO mode (not least because of code size). FENCE.TSO even works on (standards compliant) hardware that doesn't know about it, because unknown fences are supposed to be executed as FENCE RW,RW (the strongest fence), at some loss in efficiency. Alibaba T-Head unfortunately didn't read this part of the spec when they designed the C906 and C910 cores, which give illegal instruction trap if they encounter an unknown fence such as FENCE.TSO. OpenSBI now does trap-and-emulate if necessary, but of course at another loss of efficiency. This bug affects the Allwinner D1 and Alibaba ICE SoC. I don't know whether this errata in the C910 has been fixed in the TH1520 SoC in the Roma laptop (and other unannounced, cheaper, SBCs).

Havoc 4y ago

>Apple just demonstrated that changing CPU architecture is not that big of a deal; That's if you have monopoly like control over your entire eco-system...

KerrAvon 4y ago
Not sure what this refers to. The Mac isn’t a monopoly and isn’t locked down like the iPhone. And Apple’s done this before and made it look easy.
- toast0 4y ago
  The Mac isn't locked down like iOS, but there's still no expectation that software built for one OS major release will continue to work for the next. If the Apple fandom wiki is correct, the 68k emulator for PPC was included in all PPC releases, but Rosetta was included in 10.4 and 10.5, optional in 10.6 and unsupported in 10.7; it's scope was more limited than the 68k emulator as well. I expect Rosetta 2 will have a similar limited lifetime.

dmitriid 4y ago

> An ARM based design would make sense, except unlike Apple they'd have to buy a license. License is the least of it. Apple released their first custom chip in 2013. And spent several years before that designing it. So, it took Apple up to 15 years to get to where they are now with M1. Even if AMD and Intel start now, and are twice as fast at developing new CPUs, they will need 6-7 years to reach parity with 2022 Apple in... 2028

mkl 4y ago
That doesn't make sense to me. Apple was starting from scratch (well, from PA Semi, which made Power not ARM), but Intel and AMD have been designing high-performance CPUs for decades, and already changed architecture (to AMD64) successfully. On top of that, both have experience with ARM processors.
- dmitriid 4y ago
  It takes around 4 to 6 years to design a new processor even if you have experience with it. A new competitive processor in an area where all you have is "some experience"... Well, I wouldn't hold my breath. If (and that's a big if) AMD and Intel started looking into ARM seriously after Apple unveiled M1, I wouldn't expect any ARM processor out of them earlier than 2025-2026. Funnily enough I'd expect Amazon to perform better in this space (Graviton has been in deployment since 2019, three years ago, and is now in its third iteration).
  - fmajid 4y ago
    I would only take it seriously if Intel tasked this to its scrappy Israeli R&D, which saved the company from Itanic and Netburst irrelevance.
  - formerly_proven 4y ago
    AMD had K12 (Zen for AArch64)
    - dmitriid 4y ago

jabl 4y ago

> Apple has a perpetual license so they don't have to pay a thing and can do what they want with it. "Everybody" knows that Apple has an ARM architectural license, but AFAIU the terms haven't been disclosed. Presumably they got a sweeter deal than other ARM architectural licensees when they got rid of their ownership in ARM ages ago, but, "don't have to pay a thing" and "can do whatever they want" sounds a bit too sweet to be true? > So, developing risc v in the background without committing to it, yet, makes a lot of sense. TBH, I think Intel's interest in RISC-V is more about hurting ARM in the embedded market than about planning to sunset x86.

MobiusHorizons 4y ago
Intel is demonstrating the capabilities of their fab services including the ip blocks they have available. This scifive core is no different in that respect from the pci controller or ddr5 memory controller in that respect. Many companies want to build custom silicon for various reasons (although the current value proposition seems to be ML related). Those companies will need many pieces to get data in and out of their custom solution, and a Linux capable cpu core to handle networking or a small amount of traditional compute is often necessary. Intel building a risc V core should not be seen in light of their traditional cpu business, it’s not even in the same league in terms of performance. It’s just a technology demonstrator to prove to companies that intel can actually deliver designs that integrate intel designed ip and regular fabless semiconductor designs. The fact that risc V is guaranteed press is just icing on the cake.
- jabl 4y ago
  > Intel is demonstrating the capabilities of their fab services including the ip blocks they have available. Oh yes, absolutely. (I was going to mention that earlier, but the edit timer had expired.) But yes, splitting fab service into a separate business unit that is seriously open for 3rd parties seem to be a major strategic shift since Gelsinger took over the helm. And it probably makes sense, as TSMC et al have demonstrated the merchant fab model can work for the top end designs as well and the entire rest of the industry is moving towards that. So in a way, unless Intel wants to be the odd man out with their own idiosyncratic workflows this is a route they must go down on.

hnaccount_rng 4y ago

I think the recognition of “Apple showed that it’s not a big deal” would end similar to the one “The US showed that military invasions from superpowers into middle powers are not a big deal”. The amount of raw effort that Apple put into making that transition _appear_ “no big deal” will be hard to adequately appreciate! It _noticeably_ affected software quality at least two MacOS versions prior (drop of 32-bit support and forcing all API accesses to go via their frameworks) and will have cost them hundreds of millions if not billions in engineering effort and unknowable amounts of lost sales in the mean time. Yes it paid off. Obviously. But emulating their move, I’m not sure if there is even a single company able to do that.