Intel Corp (INTC)

[jhalada]

wbmw,

If you were to take Intel's prediction at face value, they would have forced *themselves* to offer a 64-bit x86 ISA by 2008. The only difference is that AMD forced them to do it 4 years earlier, and the result was a new processor feature that has no applicability to consumers. It's now 2006, and the only segment that can arguably make use of this is in servers and high end workstations. Perhaps Intel should have pulled in the server 64-bit schedule (for Xeon in addition to IPF), but adding it in consumer products has been ineffective up until this point

Good points. Let me add:

64 bit has great applicability to the server market, and AMD matched the timing of the mainstream of the server market nearly perfectly.

One are where I differ - or actually, one thing you are missing - is that in x86 market, moving a 64 bit core (that is already available in the server market) from server market to the consumer market is basically free, because the server and desktop markets use the same core.

Intel's problem with missing the boat, and later being forced to adopt AMD64 are entirely Itanium inflicted. In absence of Itanium, Intel would not have made the mistake of ceding 64 bit leadership to AMD.

Joe