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Intel's 8086 passes the big 3-0

A bit of a belated Bday wish for the Intel 8086 in Classics Rock:

http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/classic-tech/?p=142

Intel's 8086 CPU celebrated its 30th birthday last week. Shipping in 1978, it was a big advance in microprocessor technology.

The 8086 family has completely dominated the desktop ever since. Even Apple has embraced the technology. Are we doomed to be stuck with ever faster computers based on technology from the Jimmy Carter era?

30 years of being stuck with the short sighted design and market decisions (remember the idiotic 64kb segment / offset memory addressing?) etc. Couple this with microsoft's legacy of lethargy and we've been through the 7 levels of hell. A perfect example of technically superior products losing out to 800lb gorillas with money and marketing muscle.

Those of you old enough would remember the Motorola 68000 series was a great leap forward, they totally abandoned backward compatibility and focused on the future, for example, 32-bit registers on a 16-bit processor. It could have made a great alternative to the 80x86 line had they positioned it that way, but we still have the 68000 series around today in microcontrollers and embedded systems.

That a 32 bit processor only needed a 32 bit address bus

Must have been Intel

At least the 8086 a 16 bit processor had a 20 bit address bus

Lets see
For 32 bit mode
40 bits addressing = 1048576 Megabytes or 1024 gigabytes
for 64 bit mode
80 bits addressing = ??
To tired to work it out but it is huge

The Motorola 68k was an elegent chip, with great capabilities, but it was slow out of the gate and never caught up. Intel was a *startup* that mainly manufactured memory chips - that was their core Integrated Circuit business, until Japan and other Pacific Rim companies drove them out of the business. In response, Intel began to focus on the CPU, and they were in the right time at the right place to leverage that. IBMs mismanagement of the PC architecture allowed IA86 clones to take off like wildfire. Intel's strong business stewardship, conservative business approach and singular focus over the last 30 years has helped them maintain their dominance in this market segment. All of the (significant) 68k machines were closed architecture. Mac, Atari, Amiga, and their designs and patents were jealously guarded. By contrast, anyone could make a DIY PC and put any IA86 OS on it. This was hugely significant in the success of Intel and Microsoft (although there never was any WinTel duopoly that PC conspiracists like to believe in).

Despite Intel's sometimes questionable business practices (and they're only questionable if you're the victim. The share-holders don't seem to mind, as long as they don't get caught. They haven't really been caught often, and the punishment has never offset the rewards, so what incentive would Intel have to behave otherwise?) the IA86 architecture is probably the most significant development for business technology in the last 30+ years. This platform has reshaped society. The way we work, play, communicate, have all been influenced by the emergent dominance of the Intel microprocessor platform.

People lose sight that Intel was a ragtag startup that disrupted the business model of business giants at the time.

As always, it isn't a matter of technical excellence so much as accessibility. The IA86 processor line is the most accessible CPU ever, and that is the key to success.

That?s not the history I know
Read this

http://silicongenesis.stanford.edu/transcripts/faggin.htm

Intel owes it existence to MS IBM and CBM

IBM for their choice of the non standard 8088
MS for the blind obsession toward the elimination of all non-MS standards
CBM for the mismanagement of a company that produced the number one selling computer of all time

?IA86 architecture is probably the most significant development for business technology in the last 30+ years.?

For business yes if you don?t count the ever increasing costs of IT
The price of hardware may have gone down the cost of maintenance in time and labour have gone up

For the home there has been much more significant development in entertainment

Overall the most significant development is in mobility
But the price of oil should kill off most future development in that field

The most disruptive force of all time in business will be generation y

Just to let you know the Atari ST was based on industry standard chips

The problem is that CBM never had a clear roadmap of a gradual evolution for their line - it was part of the general turmoil of the emerging PC industry of the time. Coupled with mismanagement and bad marketing, it was too much for Commodore to ever overcome. Position was important too. As console gaming grew and waned in popularity over the years, it impacted Commodore significantly. IBM PCs, built on business, had a single front to compete on. Games were secondary and not a driving force for the longest period.

A 40 column, 8 bit, serial I/O machine for under $200 was a great boon to introducing people to personal computing, and thus an incredible global sales machine, but all of these things were liabilities as well.

The Atari ST, like the Amiga, had custom chips.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atari_ST

"The project, codenamed "RBP" for 'Rock Bottom Price', began to form between April and July 1984 into a design that was almost identical to the ST that eventually shipped. The design was a combination of custom chips and commonly available parts in a highly integrated single-board design, fully equipped with standard and custom ports."

TOS on ROM alone basically counts as a custom chip. It wasn't practical to clone STs.

(ROM) chips were not custom
But the contents were

The Atari ST was based on industry standard chips
There were some custom chips
They increased the number of custom chips in later models

The main reason was Atari had no money to invest in production
The Amiga was a descendent of the Atari 8 bit home computers
Which were mostly custom chips
With the exception of the 6502C(yes some modifying was done to that)
The 6502B was totally standard
The other standard chip was the 6520 PIA

Atari 8 bit computers were designed for video games
The CBM tended to design its 8 bit computers around a single chip
Eg the VIC 20 and its video
The C64 and the sound device (SID?)

That was the golden age of hardware design
The skill of the programmers of that day make today?s crop look like amateurs

Now its all about the OS and designing around it

Be careful with what you read on Wikipedia it is not all true
It also leaves out a lot of the more important explanations

For the IBM PC
The most significant thing apart from open architecture
(Which is the sole reason for the existence of today?s PC not software)
Was the separate video adaptor

Most of the rest of the design leaves a lot to be desired
One of the biggest failings of the industry is the development of a standard sound device

What is most puzzling is the obsession with legacy (compatibility) and the almost insane need to change everything

I can always blame the salesmen anyway

It wasn't practical to clone STs because they were the fastest color computer at the time
But they were able to emulate the PC and Apples 16 bit computers

The thing is, I could still be relatively effective using Office 97 on my XP machine (not so sure about if it will run on Vista). As it is, I *am* running Office 2003, not 2007.

For home users without a corporate budget, being able to move their $200 software package with them to newer, fancier hardware is a benefit.

Having a piece of software tied to a particular machine and no clear migration path to your new hardware platform is a liability.

Now, at some point, you move on, and it all gets thrown out. I get that, and nowhere else is this more clearly seen than in console gaming where emulation or backwards compatibility very rarely have any significant value - more clearly illustrated in the most recent generations of console games.

But for business, productivity and entertainment machines in general, software longevity becomes an issue.

Wiki was simply the first hit on the google page. There were dozens of other pages. If you want a definitive answer on custom chips in the ST, I'd suggest you check out the forums at atariage.com where you will find some real die-hard Atari Fans from the original pong units all the way through to the Jaguar and Falcon and Flashback 2.

What I find most amusing are the MS fan boys who insist that Microsoft is solely responsible for the modern PC

Most of the Intel fan boys have disappeared

With XP the choice of office is limited to 2000 till 2003
You will have problems with word 97 and the proofreader on XP
But if you use Fat 32 instead of NTFS I think that disappears
I have heard that XP and 2007 have problems
Then there is ODF

Or you can use open office
One thing that people forget is you can use OO and MS Office at the same time
This is one of the best ways to cut training costs
Same hardware, same OS, two choices of office
Let them learn at their own pace

Don?t forget with MS office the license is between MS and the Owner
You are limited on how many PC it can be installed and used on
But it is more flexible than the windows license

Honestly games are a pain in the ass
Most of them are used for a short time then forgotten about
But that is entertainment for you
Over hyped and lacking in real value

If you want to keep the old software running on PC?s
Check out DOSBox and any of the other emulators you can find
At the moment I am trying out Suns VM VirtualBox
That is when I get the time and energy

It was in my Amiga 500!! GAWWD! Tell me that computer
didn't totally blow away any Intel/PC of the day!!!

It did. They couldn't keep pace, though. And not just a Commodore Amiga issue. It was a fault of the 68k design. It couldn't scale as well. Nothing has. PowerPC, the RISC processors (Sparc, etc).

When they talk about Moore's law being broke, as it applies to CPU ICs, it has already broken for several CPU families that couldn't double speed and half price every 18 months.

IA86 is the only (consumer grade) processor family that has consistently reinforced Moore's Law (with maybe a minor blip here and there). That is why it dominates.

and their decedents dominate because of one thing and only one thing

Marketing

That?s it and nothing else
Changes in the design of other microprocessors would have made zero difference

When IBM decided to create the first desktop PC they first looked at buying existing companies

10 points to anyone who can tell me which companies they looked at
10 points if you can tell me what they did not like about those companies

Heres a hint
The main factors were cost and image

The most interesting thing is none of those companies used Intel cpu?s

The problems with the 68000 would have been solved

The 8086 family still has a long way to go before all the problems are solved

The commodore 64 is the highest selling computer of all time
Not bad for an 8 bit based 64K system

What was its 1 Mhz CPU well it was the jolly old 6502
Not really but the same chip with a small modification

It was king in its time

The duel core and 64 bit CPU were opportunity?s for Intel and AMD to drop the 8088/6 legacy
They decided in their infinite wisdom not to

The most significant change in PC design is yet to come
Multi CPU data/address bus

I'm not going to undersell the value of good marketing. I still remember ads that showed stacks and stacks of PC apps behind an IBM XT, and a single, small stack behind a competitor's product.

But an easily duplicated architecture using off-the-shelf available components didn't hurt things, either. The emergency of the clone/compatible market did far more for the success of the IA86 than any marketing.

Ultimately, there were a bunch of factors, and it depends on how you frame the question. The Intel Inside campaign was very expensive and very well engineered. The Bunnyman campaign was also a huge success for Intel. So you can certainly argue that Intel's marketing was a huge part of INTEL's success - but I don't think that necessarily translates into IA86 success. Intel success is about a company, IA86 success is about an architecture that Intel just happened to design.

Here is a great example. Although the IA86 architecture could just as easily be associated with IBM as Intel, IBM certainly has had significant struggles since the introduction of the original IBM PC.

As far as the 68000, who knows. Fact is, those issues weren't solved.

Intel WANTED to dump IA86 for IA64 and their design roadmap called for that. The public wouldn't have it. AMD kept the IA86 architecture viable and alive, and so Intel had no choice but to continue to compete in that arena.

I think this is just another example of where if the 68000 had become the dominant architecture, people would be hating it and be lamenting the loss of IA86. The grass is always greener.

Not just Intels marketing but others
Who have a great deal invested in keeping customers locked into the current hardware/software model?

Ten points if you can list them all

Here is the most well known

Intel
AMD
Microsoft
VIA

Intel was not interested in dropping its legacy hardware
It was only testing the market
Well maybe

The legacy of the hardware is not the real problem anyway
It is the lack of standards in the software

You have to remember the PC was such an awesome machine that software emulation of it is totally impossible
Just ask Microsoft