Samsung may be eyeing up AMD and Acer Packard-Bell

[Shintai]

or pay off about 52 more members of Congress and have the US government bend patent law again

And how would that work in all the other countries?

[nn_step]

And how would that work in all the other countries?

Which country has the single biggest impact on International Patent law
not to mention the native home of the x86 patent

[nemrod]

You're able to start a "flame war" on science fiction.

[Shintai]

Which country has the single biggest impact on International Patent law
not to mention the native home of the x86 patent

Try and tell the EU that.

The only real option for x86 CPUs for Samsung if they buy AMD is an emulated approach like Transmeta.

[Lightman]

Samsung is so big that it can abandon x86. To be honest it should be done looong time ago!

Besides, you don't need x86 license to emulate ISA . The only problem is efficient emulation in real time, but with 8 cores I think this will be non issue.

Real problem lies in lazy programmers, but if Samsung would go with PPC compatible design then we already have nice tools for devs and quite a number of applications for every possible new gen. consoles. Just recompile that engines...

All this I wrote above is unlikely to happen anytime soon, but Intel will not risk pushing us into that possible future and for that reason alone it would give a license to another big company interested in one....

[Shintai]

Which AMD is the largest share-holder of.

You make it sound like its some huge number. AMD owns 6.7% of Transmeta.

source

[nn_step]

Try and tell the EU that.

The only real option for x86 CPUs for Samsung if they buy AMD is an emulated approach like Transmeta.

umm I hate to tell you this but ever since the Pentium Pro, all x86 processors have not been natively x86. Rather they use hardware decode to convert to internal Risc

[Starscream]

Try and tell the EU that.

The only real option for x86 CPUs for Samsung if they buy AMD is an emulated approach like Transmeta.

the EU shouldnt be a problem, the EU doesnt like monopolys.
IF AMD loses its x86 license Intel would have the monopoly on x86 CPUs and they make up a to big chunk of the CPu busines so the EU would in 1 way or another force them to give the license to other companies.

So the EU takes care of itself, Samsung only needs pictures of some 52 members of congres with prostitutes.

edit:
owning 6.7% of the shares of a company IS a huge number.
if with 6.7% they are the biggest shareholder i dunno, its possible but unlikely.

[Shintai]

Samsung is so big that it can abandon x86. To be honest it should be done looong time ago!

Besides, you don't need x86 license to emulate ISA . The only problem is efficient emulation in real time, but with 8 cores I think this will be non issue.

Real problem lies in lazy programmers, but if Samsung would go with PPC compatible design then we already have nice tools for devs and quite a number of applications for every possible new gen. consoles. Just recompile that engines...

All this I wrote above is unlikely to happen anytime soon, but Intel will not risk pushing us into that possible future and for that reason alone it would give a license to another big company interested in one....

Heh..no, you cant abandon x86. Thats basicly the whole industy issue. x86 is close, if not the fastest generel purpose CPUs on earth. For emulated you need something alot faster. And you would need the first 5-10years development time. Just look how far Itanium have gotten now, after 10-20billion$ development cost.

And without very fast emulation, people aint moving nowhere to a new platform. The first Itaniums had x86 support/emulation. But it was too slow and people abandoned it. Its a roughless crowd.

Another problem is emulation as such dont scale well either in terms of cores.

If we could abandon x86, we would have done it. Only a 100% monopoly would have any chance at doing so.

[dexman]

The only way they would get a license is to buy Intel.

wrong

Try and tell the EU that.
The only real option for x86 CPUs for Samsung if they buy AMD is an emulated approach like Transmeta.

wrong again. What are you trying to say with EU and other countries talk? I think you lack basic principles of how patents work so please stop the FUD about this license.

If some company holds patent over something that doesn't mean the rest of world will watch unable to use it.

[Shintai]

the EU shouldnt be a problem, the EU doesnt like monopolys.
IF AMD loses its x86 license Intel would have the monopoly on x86 CPUs and they make up a to big chunk of the CPu busines so the EU would in 1 way or another force them to give the license to other companies.

So the EU takes care of itself, Samsung only needs pictures of some 52 members of congres with prostitutes.

There are still other x86 makers btw. The EU dont care about monopolies, but how its used. Its about business ethics so to say. Else MS would have lost all it patents by now and everyone would make Windows compatible code.

[Shintai]

wrong

wrong again. What are you trying to say with EU and other countries talk? I think you lack basic principles of how patents work so please stop the FUD about this license.

If some company holds patent over something that doesn't mean the rest of world will watch unable to use it.

You do know how international patent laws work? And how do you think the rest of the world would react if the rules and ways of patents was just instantly bypassed for one company vs another?

Thats right, the world dont work that way. If it did, welcome to the biggest patent mess in history ever. All patents would lose all value if they did.

[saaya]

umm I hate to tell you this but ever since the Pentium Pro, all x86 processors have not been natively x86. Rather they use hardware decode to convert to internal Risc

exactly, which makes me wonder what the x86 license is all about anyways...
is it about having the hardware decode from x86 to xxx?
or is it for having some chip that can, among others, process x86 code?

it cant be the latter because every processor can process x86 code if you translate it to the native instructions.

so is it all about having the hardware decode instead of a software decode?
that would be ridiculous...

so in the end, imo, the x86 license has lost all its value a looong time ago.
its completely worthless and only exists as a materialization of big players like amd and intel trying to keep others out of the x86 game.

[dexman]

You do know how international patent laws work? And how do you think the rest of the world would react if the rules and ways of patents was just instantly bypassed for one company vs another?

Thats right, the world dont work that way. If it did, welcome to the biggest patent mess in history ever. All patents would lose all value if they did.

ever heard of royalties? it's not like the patent holder is left empty handed. and again, intel would be forced to grant that license because of the nature of this market.

[Shintai]

ever heard of royalties? it's not like the patent holder is left empty handed. and again, intel would be forced to grant that license because of the nature of this market.

Yes, AMD pays royalties today. You cant force a company to do what you like in a free market. You can regulate prices. But thats about the only thing.

[nn_step]

exactly, which makes me wonder what the x86 license is all about anyways...
is it about having the hardware decode from x86 to xxx?
or is it for having some chip that can, among others, process x86 code?

it cant be the latter because every processor can process x86 code if you translate it to the native instructions.

so is it all about having the hardware decode instead of a software decode?
that would be ridiculous...

so in the end, imo, the x86 license has lost all its value a looong time ago.
its completely worthless and only exists as a materialization of big players like amd and intel trying to keep others out of the x86 game.

not to mention the fact that you can just add Microcode and do hardware supported software decode, which would technically be software decoding.
Or did everyone here forget Cyrix? Cyrix NEVER Bought or rented the rights to x86, but they clean room reversed engineered first the x87 Coprocessor and later the whole processor. Got sued by Intel and Intel LOST to them, if it wasn't for their lack of ties with Oems, they would still be here today.

[Shintai]

exactly, which makes me wonder what the x86 license is all about anyways...
is it about having the hardware decode from x86 to xxx?
or is it for having some chip that can, among others, process x86 code?

it cant be the latter because every processor can process x86 code if you translate it to the native instructions.

so is it all about having the hardware decode instead of a software decode?
that would be ridiculous...

so in the end, imo, the x86 license has lost all its value a looong time ago.
its completely worthless and only exists as a materialization of big players like amd and intel trying to keep others out of the x86 game.

To put it roughly, it covers all HW x86 abilities. Thats why Transmeta had to do it in software.

[nemrod]

Or did everyone here forget Cyrix? Cyrix NEVER Bought or rented the rights to x86, but they clean room reversed engineered first the x87 Coprocessor and later the whole processor. Got sued by Intel and Intel LOST to them, if it wasn't for their lack of ties with Oems, they would still be here today.

It's not so easy. Cyrix was using foundries which had had x86 licence from Intel in the past. (IBM, SGS-thomson...)

[dexman]

Yes, AMD pays royalties today. You cant force a company to do what you like in a free market. You can regulate prices. But thats about the only thing.

right, then intel gave its license to AMD absolutely willingly? this is getting tiresome. read some economics and what anti-monopoly agency can and can't do. it's much more than just price regulation.

[Shintai]

right, then intel gave its license to AMD absolutely willingly? this is getting tiresome. read some economics and what anti-monopoly agency can and can't do. it's much more than just price regulation.

The x86 license to AMD was part of the settlement after the 486 cloning. So yes, they gave it willingly away back then.

[nn_step]

The x86 license to AMD was part of the settlement after the 486 cloning. So yes, they gave it willingly away back then.

Correction they cut a deal with AMD after losing a lawsuit that could have cost them billions

[Verisimilitude]

uh, rumor is for something that is happening or has happened. predicting things over the next 10 years is, fortune telling.

but judging from the design cost at 65nm/45nm, I don't think that 'rumor' of yours is false. semiconductor industry will be M shaped, where only very large companies (intel, samsung, ti, qualcomm) and very small start-ups could exist.

Normally I'd say it is fortune telling, but since I've heard it straight from the mouth of some TSO execs... I'm telling you that the bigger companies will rely heavier on outsourcing and acquisations in the next 10 years.

[situman]

Samsung buying AMD will be a good thing. It will give AMD something they never had or never seem to achieve: Competent executives. Currently the company is run by infantile monkies with overbloated paychecks.

[Starscream]

Yes, AMD pays royalties today. You cant force a company to do what you like in a free market. You can regulate prices. But thats about the only thing.

actualy in a way you can force a company to do what you like.

You do what we want or else we will forbid you to sell ur product in our country/region

there is no really free market on this planet.

[vitaminc]

Normally I'd say it is fortune telling, but since I've heard it straight from the mouth of some TSO execs... I'm telling you that the bigger companies will rely heavier on outsourcing and acquisations in the next 10 years.

right, and that's why there will be no medium sized companies.

bigger companies will use Cisco's R&D model and buying up all those start ups thats about to turn into net profit, and outsource manufacturing to taiwan. even intel/samsung outsource part of their manufacturing to taiwan.