r so that systems using the 600-MHz 21164 now cost. The first 21164PC-based systems were expected to start shipping this fall, according to officials at Digital.
With the 21164PC, Digital retained the 21164's basic core but did several things to reduce costs, including moving the 21164's modest (96-KB) Level 2 cache off-chip and reducing the pin count by eliminating support for multiple processors and limiting the size of the L2 cache to a maximum of 4 MB (down from 64 MB).
The 21164PC processor costs $495 in OEM quantities for the 533-MHz model and just $295 for the 400-MHz version. At those prices, the chip compe
tes with both the Pentium and the Pentium II, although the 21164PC's chip set, the 21174, costs about $60 more than Intel's 440LX Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP) set. The 21164PC's motion-video instruction set enables it to perform streaming video compression (e.g., full-frame and full-motion digital videodisc [DVD] acceleration) that can't be done on the x86 architecture without additional hardware, such as a graphics accelerator with DVD support, Digital officials say.
The 21164PC isn't Digital's first attempt to enter the RISC PC market. The company's 21066, a less expensive version of the 21064 Alpha CPU, fared poorly and illustrates the many reasons why penetrating the mainstream PC market is such an uphill battle for a RISC vendor. At the time, Digital officials blamed the 21066's tepid reception on a lack of native Alpha NT applications and other market factors. But analysts say the main reason the 21066 sank was due to poor price/performance. Results from running our BYTEmarks on a reference sys
tem based on the 21164PC indicate that the new CPU will deliver plenty of performance for the dollar: It beats the 300-MHz Pentium II in both integer and floating-point performance.
Alpha chips are still dogged by nagging questions about the number of native applications available for the platform, although Digital and its partners have done much to improve this situation since the days of the 21064. Today, Digital claims 2000 to 2500 native applications are available for the platform, and it's pushing the creation of more by offering hardware discounts for software vendors and by helping vendors port their applications to Alpha. "We have been driving the porting of applications to Alpha for all OSes -- with the focus on NT, and Unix a close second," says Aaron Bauch, manager of technical marketing for Digital's Alpha Microprocessor. Another technology, Digital's FX!32 emulation/translation software, improves the performance of native x86 programs when executing on Alpha NT hardware.
Nevertheless,
there are some holes. For example, Microsoft currently has native Alpha versions of Excel 97 and Word 97, but none of any other applications in its Office family. Getting more Alphas onto more desktops will make the platform a more attractive one for software developers to target.
Many Alpha-powered systems are still geared toward high-end applications, such as animation, graphics production, and databases, and most smaller companies apparently don't need all that power at the prices Alpha systems command (see this month's Survey "Small Companies Snub Alpha"). Bauch believes that this will change with the continued evolution of Windows NT. "Our advantage in the NT marketplace is performance and the longevity of a system," he explains.
By the first half of 1998, Digital will be ready to release a new CPU, the 21264. This is to be the company's flagship processor; it will target high-performance servers and workstations and offer both uniprocessor and multiprocessor configurations.
In the pa
st, Digital has simplified the CPU core while gunning for the highest speed. The new 21264, which features a complex, out-of-order CPU core, will process up to 80 instructions at once. It has a bandwidth several times higher than that of previous chips, channeling up to 5.3 GBps of cache data and 2.6 GBps of main memory into the demanding new processor core. The new 21264 will start life at 500 MHz, still far ahead of any competitors in terms of speed. And you can expect Digital to release a PC version of the 21264, according to Pippa Jollie, product manager for the 21164PC.
Digital is trying to emulate the success of x86 manufacturers in building a base of OEM customers by making the technology more readily available. During the past few years, for example, Mitsubishi and Samsung have begun producing Alpha chips, VLSI Technology has begun producing third-party core logic (and it might release a less expensive alternative to the 21174 chip set), hundreds of options from third-party hardware vendors' ad
d-in cards now exist, and 2000-plus independent software vendors now support the platform.
What's missing -- and what Digital covets -- is a design win for the 21164PC with a top-tier PC vendor, such as Compaq or Dell. "It's always been a primary goal to get a tier-1 company," says Digital's Jollie. Tier 1 vendors are interested, she says, but they're currently in wait-and-see mode. "With the 21164PC, we are providing vendors a product that we hope they will adopt. I would be thrilled if they did."
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A Chip Off the Old Block
