WSJ (as pertains to AMD Geode vs Intel)

[Edward Cherlin]

On Nov 26, 2007 1:13 PM, Brian Carnes <bmcarnes_olpc at oddren.com> wrote:
>
> In the WSJ article, I read:
>
> "Intel and the One Laptop project, he says, have agreed to work together
> to design by early January a new 'Intel-based' One Laptop device."

That clearly means an early-stage prototype. Just as with the XO, it
will take time to iron out the kinks in such a design.

> Can someone more plugged into what's going on let me know what this means
> in terms of the AMD Geode in the XO?
>
> I'm guessing nothing (mass production has started...).

I'm guessing the same with great confidence.

> What is known about a possible XO (rev 2) platform based on Intel?

I would say, Nothing. Not by us, not by OLPC, not by Intel. After the
first prototype, and however many other prototypes they do in 2008,
the Intel and AMD devices will have to go head-to-head on cost,
performance, and power drain to determine which might be the XO-2.

> Should any efforts going towards Geode optimization be diverted to other
> areas of development which would benefit the project more?

No. The Geode optimizers should stick with it. This affects a few
kernel modules and the code generators in compilers. Nobody else is
involved. When Intel gets some hardware working with Rawhide and Sugar
running, then those who are interested can see about tweaking it all
for performance. Who says which line of development will benefit the
project more?

> Between this, and all the talk about getting a full Sugar environment on
> the EEE and Classmate and in VMware/QEMU distributions, makes me wonder
> where speedups from Geode-targeting on the XO hardware should fit into
> everything.

Sugar should run on everything. You can currently run the Live CD or
the emulator, or compile a lot of stuff for your own system. Pretty
soon everything should be in nice packages for each architecture.
Somebody will no doubt test the results and publish some findings.

> If the writing on the wall is to produce an image that will run in all
> these environments, it needs to avoid locking itself to the Geode.

What writing on what wall? Every Linux distro has versions of kernels
and packages for different architectures. Why would we go monolithic?

> Then again, if we tolerate the headache of maintaining a separate image
> for the XO, and due to such tuning/targeting it runs *better* there than
> on the other machines,

at the same price point,

> that breathes more life into the XO hardware...

There you go.

>   - Brian

-- 
Edward Cherlin
Earth Treasury: End Poverty at a Profit
http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Earth_Treasury
"The best way to predict the future is to invent it."--Alan Kay