{"id":6741,"date":"2012-12-24T15:40:49","date_gmt":"2012-12-24T20:40:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/?p=6741"},"modified":"2020-04-23T14:11:59","modified_gmt":"2020-04-23T18:11:59","slug":"the-end-of-x86-an-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2012\/12\/24\/the-end-of-x86-an-update\/","title":{"rendered":"The End of x86? An Update"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/fernstrategy.com\/2012\/12\/21\/the-end-of-x86-an-update\/\">Michael J. Fern<\/a> (via <a href=\"http:\/\/news.ycombinator.com\/item?id=4954170\">Hacker News<\/a>):<\/p>\n<blockquote cite=\"http:\/\/fernstrategy.com\/2012\/12\/21\/the-end-of-x86-an-update\/\"><p>x86 shipments <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pcworld.com\/article\/2013579\/x86-processor-shipments-drop-steeply-in-third-quarter-as-intel-gains-on-amd.html\">dropped<\/a> by 9% in Q3 2012. Furthermore, the expected surge in PC sales (and x86 shipments) in Q4 due to the release of Windows 8 has failed to materialize. <a href=\"http:\/\/bits.blogs.nytimes.com\/2012\/11\/29\/research-firm-says-windows-8-had-a-rocky-start\/\">NPD data<\/a>&nbsp;indicates that Windows PCs sales in U.S. retail stores fell a staggering 21% in the four-week period from October 21 to November 17, compared to the same period the previous year. In short, there is now falling demand for x86 processors. Computer buyers are <a href=\"http:\/\/www.informationweek.com\/byte\/personal-tech\/desktop-pc\/pc-budgets-shift-to-tablets-and-smartpho\/240008918\">shifting their spending<\/a> from PCs to next generation computing devices, including smartphones and tablets.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>It&rsquo;s interesting to consider that Intel&rsquo;s problem may be more with its business model than its technology. I think they&rsquo;ll be able to make processors that are competitive in terms of performance and power, but what about in terms of dollars?<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, <a href=\"http:\/\/grack.com\/blog\/2011\/05\/07\/how-apple-can-make-use-of-arm-and-intel-in-its-laptop-line\/\">Matt Mastracci<\/a> has an interesting idea about how Apple might use ARM chips in Macs:<\/p>\n<blockquote cite=\"http:\/\/grack.com\/blog\/2011\/05\/07\/how-apple-can-make-use-of-arm-and-intel-in-its-laptop-line\/\"><p>There is a fair bit of space on inside of a MacBook compared to an iPad or iPhone. Apple would use some of this space to drop one of the A5 chips on the motherboard next to the Intel chip, effectively [building] themselves a hybrid ARM\/x64 system.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>In other words, ARM can&rsquo;t replace x86 on the desktop because it&rsquo;s far too slow for certain tasks, particularly at running existing x86 software in emulation. But what if you could have an x86 that&rsquo;s powered down most of the time? You could have a lot of battery life without sacrificing performance when the Mac is plugged in.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Michael J. Fern (via Hacker News): x86 shipments dropped by 9% in Q3 2012. Furthermore, the expected surge in PC sales (and x86 shipments) in Q4 due to the release of Windows 8 has failed to materialize. NPD data&nbsp;indicates that Windows PCs sales in U.S. retail stores fell a staggering 21% in the four-week period [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"apple_news_api_created_at":"2020-04-23T18:12:02Z","apple_news_api_id":"13291b7e-93d5-457d-a05a-1b8071955c39","apple_news_api_modified_at":"2020-04-23T18:12:02Z","apple_news_api_revision":"AAAAAAAAAAD\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/w==","apple_news_api_share_url":"https:\/\/apple.news\/AEykbfpPVRX2gWhuAcZVcOQ","apple_news_coverimage":0,"apple_news_coverimage_caption":"","apple_news_is_hidden":false,"apple_news_is_paid":false,"apple_news_is_preview":false,"apple_news_is_sponsored":false,"apple_news_maturity_rating":"","apple_news_metadata":"\"\"","apple_news_pullquote":"","apple_news_pullquote_position":"","apple_news_slug":"","apple_news_sections":"\"\"","apple_news_suppress_video_url":false,"apple_news_use_image_component":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[262,1941,261,30,260],"class_list":["post-6741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-technology","tag-arm","tag-arm-macs","tag-intel","tag-mac","tag-processors"],"apple_news_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6741"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28777,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6741\/revisions\/28777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}