What is the background behind the open source architecture of IBM's own CPU 'PowerPC'?
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IBM opened the PowerPC instruction set architecture ' Power Architecture ' to the Linux Foundation and made it open source. “This is both good news and bad news,” says Electronic Engineering Journal, a hardware news media.
OpenPOWER Foundation | The Next Step in the OpenPOWER Foundation Journey
https://openpowerfoundation.org/the-next-step-in-the-openpower-foundation-journey/
IBM Gives Away PowerPC; Goes Open Source – EEJournal
https://www.eejournal.com/article/ibm-gives-away-powerpc-goes-open-source/
PowerPC is a RISC type microprocessor developed jointly by Apple, IBM and Motorola in 1991. Not only was the Power architecture adopted by major home video game hardware, but 13 of the “ Top 500 World Supercomputer Performance Rankings ” in June 2019 were powered by the Power Architecture.
The good aspect of the open architecture of the Power architecture reported by Electronic Engineering Journal is “free”. In the future, Power Architecture will be handled by the Linux Foundation, a non-profit organization that promotes open source projects with the aim of promoting technological development and commercial activities, and any company can use PowerPC architecture for commercial use free of charge. I can do it.
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On the other hand, the downside that Electronic Engineering Journal points out is the process until the Power architecture is released as open source. Home game hardware such as Sony's PlayStation 3, Nintendo's GameCube, Wii, Wii U, Microsoft's Xbox 360, etc. all adopt PowerPC architecture, about 200 of the top 500 performance rankings of supercomputers in the world It seems that it was equipped with a PowerPC processor.
However, PowerPC was not successful as a computer chip. That's why the Electronic Engineering Journal cites 'IBM's license fee was high.' The Power architecture was much more expensive than the rival MIPS and ARM architectures , and its performance was almost the same as Intel's x86 processor . In 2006, Apple, who should have been involved in the development, gave up on the Power architecture and completely shifted to the Intel architecture. It seems that the development department of chipset for PowerPC is gone.
by Tom Carmony
The Electronic Engineering Journal describes this open source as 'as if you see Rockefeller or Rothschild begging on the street.' However, Electronic Engineering Journal says, “Open source is an opportunity for PowerPC.”
The reason is that the Power architecture is an architecture that has left the front line, but the licensing fee, which has cost millions of dollars, will be freed by open source, so it is expected to attract attention again among SoC developers Because. The Electronic Engineering Journal believes that PowerPC can replace RISC-V , which is also an open source architecture, if good attention is gathered.
Hugh Bremmings, executive director of the OpenPOWER Foundation , the development community for the Power architecture product, is positive at the beginning of the statement announcing the opening of this open source. He expressed his opinion, stating, “PowerPC development will accelerate in an open development environment.”
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in Hardware, Posted by darkhorse_log