Intel releases the last Itanium chip, the 9700

Re:Intel releases the last Itanium chip, the 9700 by ChuckMcM on Saturday May 13, 2017 @01:05PM (#14331895)

As an interesting data point, (and the article doesn't do it justice), when I saw the presentation on AMD's "Sledgehammer" architecture (the AMD64) at Microprocessor Forum I wrote to the CTO of NetApp at the time "If you're wondering, Itanium just died." And then more than 16 years later it actually is going to cease development.

It also started a multi-year effort to convince NetApp to use an AMD chip in their filer :-).

I think the events reinforce three good things to know;

1) Adapting the existing system to do new things can trump entirely new systems, even if those new systems are 'better' in some way.

2) You can change hardware "overnight for free" compared to how difficult it is to migrate large software systems.

3) "Eat your young" - Keep innovating in your own products, even if that means it makes previous versions obsolete, because if you don't your competitors will.

So long Itanium.

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Re:Intel releases the last Itanium chip, the 9700 by RcouF1uZ4gsC on Saturday May 13, 2017 @03:08PM (#14332468)

I agree with your assessment. It seemed Intel tried to use the 32-bit limit of x86 to drive the high end computing to Itanium. AMD did x86-64 and removed that limit, and Intel was forced to play along and x86 escaped from its artificial limits and removed much of the justification for Itanium.

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