MacSlash has an original editorial regarding different PowerPC projects that never made it to shipping. It mentions things like the obscure PowerPC 615 that could run x86 instructions, or the PowerPC 750VX, which would have been IBM's answer to the Motorola G4. This article reads like a requiem, but lest we forget: here, here, here, and of course, here. I'm starting to believe IBM won't miss Apple all that much.
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What heat problems? Core 2 is the most technologically advanced, energy efficient chip, coolest operating chip (in regards to clock speed) on the consumer market; quite frankly, if you look at the features of the chip, it gives me the willy's how complex it is!
Even if IBM did for example, go with the 750VX, the problems still would have remained in regards to performance issues; it wasn't just battery or performance, but a whole string of issues that when put together equated to a big problem for Apple in the long and short run.
IBM and Motorolla couldn't keep up with Apples demands - IBM wanted nice long cycles between pushing the clock speed up; Apple needed short bursts and rapid updates as to keep up to date with the latest Intel and AMD offerings; ultimately IBM had to ask themselves, are they in the consumer market for CPU's or would they be better off working with consumer companies where by they can design a processor, stick to a speed, and pump it consistantly out of the factory with the same specifications for the next 3 years.
Ultimately, it was more cost effective to go and design custom chips that need updating every three years rather than trying to update their processors every 3 months, resulting up higher and higher costs for the company.
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"IBM and Motorolla couldn't keep up with Apples demands - IBM wanted nice long cycles between pushing the clock speed up; Apple needed short bursts and rapid updates as to keep up to date with the latest Intel and AMD offerings"
Exactly right. IBM is hosed; low margin toys lik ethe XBox won't fill the hole left by AAPL's departure.
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In the article PPC980 was called a rumor, but I think it's more. IBM uses PPC 970 in its blades and in one quite cheap workstation. So either they will disconinue these products in the feature, or they will need a successor chip. Maybe they put a Cell as CPU for blades, but I'm not sure that Cell is capable enough for general purpose computing without adapted software. So probably there is still a need for a general purpose CPU for a cheap development workstation and for the blades. So PPC 980 (or how it will be called) is more than pure speculation.
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Anton
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Have a look at the POWER 6 design for instance; I'd hardly call that a conservative, 'doing as much work per clock cycle", low power usage and heat disappation design - its the P4 ideology taken to the extreme
POWER6 uses a simpler design in order to increase clock speed, they've also changed how they design the circuits and this has made the chip a lot more efficient. They're doubling clock speed but keeping the pipeline the same length.
Going for maximum work per cycle works but has it's limitations and can slow some operations down. Going for a higher clocked but simpler design doesn't necessarily mean higher power usage, e.g. the cores in the XBox 360 use less than 30W each but have high FLOP ratings.
