sb@pro-generic.cts.com (Stephen Brown) (02/26/90)
In a recent message, Andy Nicholas (nicholaA@batman.moravian.EDU) mentioned ASIC, a company which had allegedly designed a 65816 work-alike that operates at 20 Mhz. Andy leaned towards believing that this was true. I was cynical too. Until this weekend, when I visited Tony Fadell, the co-designer of this chip. After a very long discussion, during which he showed me parts of his chip's schematic, I came to the conclusion that this was not vapour. He said that he will begin shipping parts in a matter of weeks, and that YOU name the quantity, one or as many as you want to build your own computers. I am very excited, as this IS the first FOR REAL development in the Apple II world that makes a difference (other than, perhaps, System Disk 5.0.2). THERE IS NOW *** NO EXCUSE *** FOR APPLE TO COMPLAIN THAT THEY CANNOT GET PARTS. Mensch's alleged 12 Mhz 65816's, shown at AppleFest, with which he used to burn Gassee, were and are in extremely short supply because he cannot get them working right. It is well known that Western Digital's 65816's have problems running all instructions at high speed. When asked about this, Tony assured me that his chips DO NOT share this anomaly. THERE IS NOW *** NO EXCUSE *** FOR APPLE TO COMPLAIN THAT THEY CANNOT USE AVAILABLE PARTS. Sales of the Apple IIGS have now dropped to a critically dangerous level. Apple must do something NOW. Not tomorrow, not next week, NOW. The Apple IIGS will be D E A D if they don't. And the promise of "Apple II Forever" won't be worth "didley" if no one is buying Apple II's. Apple DTS: I'm sure you're trying your best, but DTS is no good if the product never sees the light of day. DTS has no control over that. So push whichever department that needs pushing, to get the stuff off the drawingboard, and into the open market. Don't rest on your laurels. Stephen Brown P.S. I have no relation to ASIC Enterprises, or Anthony M. Fadell, except possibly being one of his customers when the time comes shortly. P.S.S. Go ahead and flame me. But be careful. If Apple doesn't do something, then there will be nothing left to flame about. sb@pro-generic UUCP: crash!pro-generic!sb ARPA: crash!pro-generic!sb@nosc.mil INET: sb@pro-generic.cts.com
jm7e+@andrew.cmu.edu (Jeremy G. Mereness) (03/01/90)
WOW!!! I want to see someone test one of these things out!! It would probably require a caching scheme to test it on a present-day machine, but I want to hear from someone just what it's like to see the GS pumped up by a factor of ten!! I truly hope this thing flies. I just gave a demo of my 2.5MHz GS to a Mac/Appletalk hacker here and he was quite impressed with the machine as it is... cranked to 20 MHz the machine would scream!!! Is there anyway to push Apple Co. on this? Try experimenting? Corporations are typically shy of working with small upstart companies for vital parts... ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ |Jeremy Mereness | Support | Ye Olde Disclaimer: | |jm7e+@andrew.cmu.edu (internet) | Free | The above represent my| |a700jm7e@cmccvb (Vax... bitnet) | Software | opinions, alone. | |staff/student@Carnegie Mellon U. | | Ya Gotta Love It. | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel) (03/01/90)
sb@pro-generic.cts.com (Stephen Brown) writes: [ he's seen confirmed existence of the chip ] >THERE IS NOW *** NO EXCUSE *** FOR APPLE TO COMPLAIN THAT THEY CANNOT GET >PARTS. Mensch's alleged 12 Mhz 65816's, shown at AppleFest, with which he >used to burn Gassee, were and are in extremely short supply because he cannot >get them working right. It is well known that Western Digital's 65816's have >problems running all instructions at high speed. When asked about this, Tony >assured me that his chips DO NOT share this anomaly. This is because Mensch's design is, to be honest, microcoded, and he's had problems because you can't just shrink the circuit like he's trying to do because of scaling problems that occur at about the 1 micron level (according to people who know more than I do about this stuff, all I've done was a photolithographed inverter). The ASIC enterprises design is what I always knew would be possible: a true state machine. Our CPU is that simple, folks. And since the design (even Mensch's, actually) is small enough to fit on a high-density gate array, the chip can be manufactured using _industry_standard_technology_ which explains the instant availability of reliable high volume production. >Sales of the Apple IIGS have now dropped to a critically dangerous level. >Apple must do something NOW. Not tomorrow, not next week, NOW. The Apple IIGS >will be D E A D if they don't. And the promise of "Apple II Forever" won't >be worth "didley" if no one is buying Apple II's. This is precisely correct, as will be stated explicitly in the next rewrite of "The Apple //f" to be posted shortly (I have to remove the flaming and clarify it a bit). Todd Whitesel toddpw @ tybalt.caltech.edu
fadden@cory.Berkeley.EDU (Andy McFadden) (03/01/90)
In article <10393.infoapple.net@pro-generic> sb@pro-generic.cts.com (Stephen Brown) writes: [ most of article thwacked ] >P.S.S. Go ahead and flame me. But be careful. If Apple doesn't do something, >then there will be nothing left to flame about. That's what Brian Greenstone, I, and a few others have been yelling. Let's hope that somebody listens. A lot of this would depend on the nature of the contracts between the foundry, the designer, and possible recipients... I believe Apple requires >1 source of a chip, so their own policies could choke them... But sometimes you've just gotta go for it. Right, Apple? >sb@pro-generic > >UUCP: crash!pro-generic!sb >ARPA: crash!pro-generic!sb@nosc.mil >INET: sb@pro-generic.cts.com -- fadden@cory.berkeley.edu (Andy McFadden) ...!ucbvax!cory!fadden
nicholaA@batman.moravian.EDU (Andy Nicholas) (03/02/90)
In article <1990Feb28.232226.7137@spectre.ccsf.caltech.edu>, toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel) writes: > [ he's seen confirmed existence of the chip ] > > >THERE IS NOW *** NO EXCUSE *** FOR APPLE TO COMPLAIN THAT THEY CANNOT GET > >PARTS. Mensch's alleged 12 Mhz 65816's, shown at AppleFest, with which he > >used to burn Gassee, were and are in extremely short supply because he cannot > >get them working right. It is well known that Western Digital's 65816's have > >problems running all instructions at high speed. When asked about this, Tony > >assured me that his chips DO NOT share this anomaly. > > This is because Mensch's design is, to be honest, microcoded, and he's had > problems because you can't just shrink the circuit like he's trying to do > because of scaling problems that occur at about the 1 micron level (according > to people who know more than I do about this stuff, all I've done was a > photolithographed inverter). No, it's NOT microcoded. Inherently, that's one of Mensch's problems... everything on the 65816 is done at the gate level. He hard-wires EVERYTHING. This is one of the reasons that stuff from WDC takes SOOOOoooo long to get out. I wish there were some kind of 'super-auto-router CAD program' for Mensch to use. His wife or daughter did the layout for the 65816, which is one of the reasons that the chip has problems -- one of the engineers from AE once told me that Mensch had told him that the problem with certain instructions not working at high speeds was the physical distance that some of the signals had to travel inside the chip. Make of that what you will... The 68000 is microcoded. Later versions (680x0) have taken the most-used instructions and hard-coded them. I don't really know about the 68040, though, since Motorola used VHDL to build it. WDC did a production run at 1.5 micron and was hoping for mass quantities of 10 Mhz 65816's... this was in July. They found that the yield was abismal, so they're latest production run was at 1.0 micron. I never heard what the yield was like at 1.0... In posts on GEnie, someone from ASIC said that they thought that initial runs of their 65816 at 1.5 micron could run as slow (hah) as 13-15 Mhz. If that was the case, the foundry was going to do a production run at 1.0 micron to get the true 20 Mhz speed. How awful, "just" 13-15 Mhz. shucks. I was kind of hoping that ASIC would be intelligent enough in later chips to put an internal data and instruction cache right onto the chip so that their chip could run at a really high rate of speed, but the ram wouldn't have to be the 25-35ns speeds that will be required at 20 Mhz. This might be "iffy" because one of the guys in ASIC used to work for Rocket until they got sued by Zip Technologies... > Todd Whitesel andy -- Yeah!
unknown@ucscb.UCSC.EDU (The Unknown User) (03/02/90)
In article <AZv0Wci00VQFA12IU=@andrew.cmu.edu> jm7e+@andrew.cmu.edu (Jeremy G. Mereness) writes: >Is there anyway to push Apple Co. on this? Try experimenting? >Corporations are typically shy of working with small upstart companies >for vital parts... No, I don't think there's a way to push Apple to get this particular part, because, from the article that went around comp.sys.apple a few weeks ago, Applied Engineering [virtually certainly the "unnamed Texas company that makes peripherals for the Apple //"] has a 2 year sole-customer guarantee. So I guess we just have to buy TONS AND TONS of 20 mhz TransWarp GSes and get them to mail Apple the info on how many sales, etc. to get it through Apple's "Mac mentality". -- No floptical drives. Both companies said no. GET A CARTRIDGE drive instead to spite them. unknown@ucscb.ucsc.edu APPLE II FOREVER APL24VR GS tips? Mail me. unknown%darkside.com@ames.arpa Please use the former address for regular use.
toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel) (03/02/90)
In article <6904@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu> unknown@ucscb.UCSC.EDU (The Unknown User) writes: > No, I don't think there's a way to push Apple to get this >particular part, because, from the article that went around comp.sys.apple >a few weeks ago, Applied Engineering [virtually certainly the "unnamed >Texas company that makes peripherals for the Apple //"] has a 2 year >sole-customer guarantee. The bastards!! The selfish bloody bastards!! What are they trying to do, force Apple to go to Bill Mensch for faster CPUs? I hope they realize that they may have just signed the death warrant for the market they hope to monopolize. Todd Whitesel toddpw @ tybalt.caltech.edu
toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel) (03/02/90)
In article <1154@batman.moravian.EDU> nicholaA@batman.moravian.EDU (Andy Nicholas) writes: >No, it's NOT microcoded. Inherently, that's one of Mensch's problems... >everything on the 65816 is done at the gate level. He hard-wires EVERYTHING. >This is one of the reasons that stuff from WDC takes SOOOOoooo long to get out. >I wish there were some kind of 'super-auto-router CAD program' for Mensch to >use. His wife or daughter did the layout for the 65816, which is one of the >reasons that the chip has problems -- one of the engineers from AE once told me >that Mensch had told him that the problem with certain instructions not working >at high speeds was the physical distance that some of the signals had to travel >inside the chip. Make of that what you will... I'll make what I will of the 65816 data sheet: "The Timing Control Unit keeps track of each instruction cycle as it is executed. The TCU is set to zero each time an instruction fetch is executed, and is advanced at the beginning of each cycle for as many cycles as is required to complete the instruction. Each data transfer between registers depends on decoding the contents of both the Instruction Register and the Timing Control Unit." If that isn't microcode then PLEASE TELL ME WHAT IS!! Looks like Mensch is just suffering from the price of cutting corners. He needs to either redesign his mask so it will be easily manufacturable or maybe he should license the ASIC guys' mask. (I'd like to see him cooperate with them to make the 65816 a reality, but I don't know if any of them would go for the idea...) Todd Whitesel toddpw @ tybalt.caltech.edu
toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel) (03/02/90)
Hah! Silly me... that was "make the 65832 a reality."
^^^^^
Todd Whitesel
toddpw @ tybalt.caltech.edunicholaA@batman.moravian.EDU (Andy Nicholas) (03/03/90)
In article <1990Mar2.081825.28966@spectre.ccsf.caltech.edu>, toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel) writes: >>No, it's NOT microcoded. Inherently, that's one of Mensch's problems... >>everything on the 65816 is done at the gate level. He hard-wires EVERYTHING. > > I'll make what I will of the 65816 data sheet: > > "The Timing Control Unit keeps track of each instruction cycle as it is > executed. The TCU is set to zero each time an instruction fetch is executed, > and is advanced at the beginning of each cycle for as many cycles as is > required to complete the instruction. Each data transfer between registers > Timing Control Unit." > > If that isn't microcode then PLEASE TELL ME WHAT IS!! Actually, it sounds like the control logic for a 1984 vintage microprocessor. Todd, you get excited easily, don't you? Maybe we don't have the same definition of microcode. I was taught that the 68000 was microcoded. This came out of an Andrew S. Tannenbaum book (2nd Ed, not the newly released 3rd). Read the chapter on the MIC and MAC microprocessors. 2 years ago, I had to write a simulator in C which simulated the flow of the microcode for the MIC machine, so I'm taking a wild hunch that I know what I'm talking about. If the 65816 were really microcoded (still haven't convinced me, according to what I've been exposed to), then wouldn't it have a microsequencer and a microcode store on the chip? Look at the mask sometime, I don't think you'll be able to find anything like that... the ASIC guys are *NOT* deriving their speed increase from going from microcoded to gate-array. They are deriving their speed increase by designing their chip more efficiently with a decent CAD system to predict defect-free silicon. A human did the mask layout for WDC. A computer did it for ASIC, and it looks like it worked. Call the ASIC guys and ask them if the WDC 65816 is microcoded, or call WDC and ask if it's microcoded. C'mon guy, if you really want to know, don't post this stuff on the net, give the folks that KNOW a call... :-) >Looks like Mensch is just suffering from the price of cutting corners. He needs >to either redesign his mask so it will be easily manufacturable or maybe he >should license the ASIC guys' mask. (I'd like to see him cooperate with them >to make the 65816 a reality, but I don't know if any of them would go for the >idea...) If you look at the transscipts from America Online, you'll find out that the ASIC guys have had very few words from Bill Mensch, and the ones that were said were not too nice. Mensch didn't think they could do it, and since it steals some of his business (of which the Apple II is a TOTALLY INSIGNIFICANT AMOUNT), I doubt that ASIC and WDC will get along. Bill is proud because the 65c02 (WDC's) is something like one of the only cpu's certified by the FDA for implantation into the human body. WDC gets a LOT of their revenues from medical stuff... > Todd Whitesel andy -- Yeah!
fadden@cory.Berkeley.EDU (Andy McFadden) (03/03/90)
In article <1990Mar2.080606.28826@spectre.ccsf.caltech.edu> toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel) writes: |In article <6904@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu> unknown@ucscb.UCSC.EDU (The Unknown User) writes: [snip] |>a few weeks ago, Applied Engineering [virtually certainly the "unnamed |>Texas company that makes peripherals for the Apple //"] has a 2 year |>sole-customer guarantee. | |The bastards!! The selfish bloody bastards!! | |What are they trying to do, force Apple to go to Bill Mensch for faster CPUs? | |I hope they realize that they may have just signed the death warrant for the |market they hope to monopolize. Let's not get too excited about a rumor shall we? I also heard about the guarantee, but we don't know for a fact that it's with AE, Zip Technologies, or what. We also don't know the terms of the contract. If Apple chooses to strangle itself with a slower processor, it won't matter what kind of chips are available. If Apple really wants the 20-25MHz chips, I'm sure they will be able to get them (it's amazing what a few well-placed phone calls can do). But lets face it. Utter blindness in upper Apple is hurting the Apple II line, the pre-Mac SE/30 line, and now their brain-damaged pricing schemes are about to obliterate any chance they have of really entering the workstation market. In a couple of years they may drop the Apple II just to keep afloat. Apple was heading down a similar path a few years back. About that time, Sculley gave Jobs the boot... Maybe it's time for history to repeat itself...? |Todd Whitesel |toddpw @ tybalt.caltech.edu -- fadden@cory.berkeley.edu (Andy McFadden) ...!ucbvax!cory!fadden "Pepsi leaves a bad aftertaste for some reason..."
sb@pro-generic.cts.com (Stephen Brown) (03/03/90)
In-Reply-To: message from unknown@ucscb.UCSC.EDU In this article, it is said: > No, I don't think there's a way to push Apple to get this > particular part, because, from the article that went around comp.sys.apple > a few weeks ago, Applied Engineering [virtually certainly the "unnamed > Texas company that makes peripherals for the Apple //"] has a 2 year > sole-customer guarantee. Well, not exactly. Let me check my disk and see... "The contract stipulates that Fadell cannot release the terms of the contract nor reveal the name of the company until the chip is in production). In return for a two-year exclusive in the Apple market, the manufacturer signed a large purchase order and agreed to pay for a two year exclusive". I don't see that preventing Apple from buying chips, though it might prevent another third party from walking in. Besides, it would be in AE's best interest to have Apple buy the chips... then at least there would be some committment from Apple that they weren't going to abandon the Apple II. It would also give the manufacturer the extra volume to lower prices further, and perhaps develop the chip on 1.0 micron, or GaAs technology. This sort of stuff is market driven... There must be a demand, and frankly, AE's demand would be completely dwarfed by Apple's. Yes, Apple, buy some chips. Buy lots of chips. And put them into a machine that we can all enjoy, not just the folks who play at Apple DTS, and have signed non-disclosure agreements (so they can't say how much fun they're having on their super-duper IIGS's)!! UUCP: crash!pro-generic!sb ARPA: crash!pro-generic!sb@nosc.mil INET: sb@pro-generic.cts.com
bsherman@mthvax.cs.miami.edu (Bob Sherman) (03/03/90)
In article <22579@pasteur.Berkeley.EDU> fadden@cory.Berkeley.EDU (Andy McFadden) writes: >If Apple chooses to strangle itself with a slower processor, it won't >matter what kind of chips are available. If Apple really wants the 20-25MHz >chips, I'm sure they will be able to get them (it's amazing what a few >well-placed phone calls can do). >But lets face it. Utter blindness in upper Apple is hurting the Apple II >line, the pre-Mac SE/30 line, and now their brain-damaged pricing schemes >are about to obliterate any chance they have of really entering the >workstation market. In a couple of years they may drop the Apple II just >to keep afloat. From what I just heard today based upon the Developers Assn meeting with Apple this week, I doubt very much if Apple is looking for ANY speed processor chips for anything with the Apple II name on it... -- bsherman@mthvax.cs.miami.edu | bsherman@pro-exchange | MCI MAIL: BSHERMAN >> Miami's Big Apple - 305-948-8000 - 24 hours - 300/1200 - PCP'able << >> Oldest Apple support board in Southeast. Now in it's ninth year. <<
jerryk@pro-tcc.cts.com (Jerry E. Kindall) (03/04/90)
In-Reply-To: message from toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu Re: AE hogging the 20 Mhz ASIC 65816... I think that AE signed a contract to buy chips only from ASIC, not that ASIC signed a contract to sell chips only to AE. I think the original article said only that it was an "exclusive contract"... though I could be mistaken. _____ ||___|| Jerry Kindall | Internet: jerryk@pro-tcc.cts.com | o | 2612 Queensway Drive | UUCP: nosc!crash!pro-tcc!jerryk |__O__| Grove City, OH 43123-3347 | GEnie: A2.JERRY ALine: A2 Jerry The diskette icon is a copyrighted portion of the "Look and Feel" of this signature. All rights reserved. (grin)
sb@pro-generic.cts.com (Stephen Brown) (03/04/90)
In-Reply-To: message from bsherman@mthvax.cs.miami.edu >>From what I just heard today based upon the Developers Assn meeting with >Apple this week, I doubt very much if Apple is looking for ANY sped >processor chips for anything with the Apple II name on it... Ok, what exactly did you hear? UUCP: crash!pro-generic!sb ARPA: crash!pro-generic!sb@nosc.mil INET: sb@pro-generic.cts.com