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New russian 8-core CPU

mcst.ru

1–10 of 58 posts

Re: New russian 8-core CPU

#3
post #2

Seems not to be "new" but an implementation of a Sparc V9 ?

Elbrus team worked on that architecture before collaboration with Sun - they can continue to improve it now. So it may have something new?

Re: New russian 8-core CPU

#4
This is entirely hopeless - their development budget is 0.05% of that of Intel. So these will never leave drawing board to become usable product, and this is not a field rational to invest in - general purpose processors are olygopoly market with decades long learning curve worth too much. Even if someone puts hundreds of billions dollars and decades of time to become competitive, this will only diminish returns in the industry as whole so will be anyway bad investment: at best they could sink Intel into unprofitably small ROIs, and get similar ROIs themselves. So aside from pure politics ('Russia is the motherland of elephants') i see no purpose for anyone doing it.

Re: New russian 8-core CPU

#5
post #4

This is entirely hopeless - their development budget is 0.05% of that of Intel. So these will never leave drawing board to become usable product, and this is not a field rational to invest in - general purpose processors are olygopoly market with decades long learning curve worth too much. Even if someone puts hundreds of billions dollars and decades of time to become competitive, this will only diminish returns in t…

The idea of boosting national pride might be the end goal in mind. They don't need commercial success. If they want to convey the idea to the nation that we can design and build on par and maybe even better than the rest of the world. Just feeling good about yourself has benefits.

Re: New russian 8-core CPU

#6
post #4

This is entirely hopeless - their development budget is 0.05% of that of Intel. So these will never leave drawing board to become usable product, and this is not a field rational to invest in - general purpose processors are olygopoly market with decades long learning curve worth too much. Even if someone puts hundreds of billions dollars and decades of time to become competitive, this will only diminish returns in t…

I guess it is purely political.

Russia wants to be independent from the US for computers, because they fear (rightfully) American chips to be bugged.

Having slow, expensive chips made in Russia is probably more interesting to certain agencies than fast and cheap American chips - or relying on typewriters :)

Re: New russian 8-core CPU

#7
post #6
post #4

This is entirely hopeless - their development budget is 0.05% of that of Intel. So these will never leave drawing board to become usable product, and this is not a field rational to invest in - general purpose processors are olygopoly market with decades long learning curve worth too much. Even if someone puts hundreds of billions dollars and decades of time to become competitive, this will only diminish returns in t…

I guess it is purely political. Russia wants to be independent from the US for computers, because they fear (rightfully) American chips to be bugged. Having slow, expensive chips made in Russia is probably more interesting to certain agencies than fast and cheap American chips - or relying on typewriters :)

Yes. Bugging your own chips is cheaper than bugging Intel's.

Re: New russian 8-core CPU

#8
post #4

This is entirely hopeless - their development budget is 0.05% of that of Intel. So these will never leave drawing board to become usable product, and this is not a field rational to invest in - general purpose processors are olygopoly market with decades long learning curve worth too much. Even if someone puts hundreds of billions dollars and decades of time to become competitive, this will only diminish returns in t…

This would not be hopeless to the people who own the chip's design and production facilities, if the government also passes a law saying all government-related work must be done on computers with this specific chip installed. If the government can give a company a complete, enforceable monopoly, this would make at least some sense. Still, a total waste of resources.

Re: New russian 8-core CPU

#10
post #6
post #4

This is entirely hopeless - their development budget is 0.05% of that of Intel. So these will never leave drawing board to become usable product, and this is not a field rational to invest in - general purpose processors are olygopoly market with decades long learning curve worth too much. Even if someone puts hundreds of billions dollars and decades of time to become competitive, this will only diminish returns in t…

I guess it is purely political. Russia wants to be independent from the US for computers, because they fear (rightfully) American chips to be bugged. Having slow, expensive chips made in Russia is probably more interesting to certain agencies than fast and cheap American chips - or relying on typewriters :)

China has a team developping a mips like architecture, with several produced iterations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loongson

I don't know if Russia has the industry to mass produce it, but surely it has the skilled people to design it, and it may probably use foreign fabs for the remaining steps if necessary.

As for the software, with an established ISA, they may quickly leverage exising open source solutions. Of course, Windows and OSX support will be a problem (given that they are the major desktop players).

Politic or not, they know it's doable.

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