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In Big Switch, Intel Will Offer 32/64-Bit Chip Feb. 23, 2004
Itanium sales lag, so company offers combo chip to better compete with rival AMD
By Larry Greenemeier, Darrell Dunn, Aaron Ricadela (Information Week)
After hinting for more than a year that it might need to offer companies a bridge between today's computer design and tomorrow's, Intel last week uncorked what CEO Craig Barrett called "the worst-kept secret in San Francisco" and confirmed plans to start delivering chips that can switch between 32-bit and 64-bit modes.
Intel had little choice. Sales of its high-end Itanium chips have been slower than predicted, and rival Advanced Micro Devices Inc. is grabbing market share with a 32/64-bit design that can run memory-hungry video-editing and engineering applications in 64-bit mode while also handling 32-bit software. "When AMD drew a line in the sand, it was simply a matter of time" before Intel had to respond, says Clark Fuhs, an analyst with securities research firm Fulcrum Global Partners.
During the second quarter, Intel will release a server version of its 32-bit Xeon chip with 64-bit extensions that can switch between modes depending on the needs of software. Eventually, the 64-bit extensions will find their way into desktop Pentium chips, though Intel won't say when. In April, Microsoft plans a wider release of beta versions of Windows that support both Intel's and AMD's mode-switching chips, with final versions due later this year. "Customers can get access to higher-performance processors today, on a platform they know," says Microsoft senior director Jeff Price. Also on tap from Microsoft: a new version of Visual Studio for writing apps with the new 64-bit extensions. Intel says versions of Linux that support the design also are coming soon.
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