AMD to stop working on Geodes (Carlos Nazareno)

[Edward Cherlin]

On Sat, Jan 31, 2009 at 8:48 PM, Jordan Crouse <jordan at cosmicpenguin.net> wrote:
> Edward Cherlin wrote:
>
>> National Semiconductor, which bought the line from Cyrix. I edited
>> several of the pin- and register-level manuals for various chips for
>> them more than ten years ago, and updates of my work are still online
>> on the AMD Web site. OLPC has educated AMD on how to use the
>> power-management registers to do things that nobody previously knew
>> were possible.
>
> AMD may have made some odd decisions over the years, but they don't deserve
> the kicking they are getting.  AMD gave OLPC unprecedented access to the
> combined software and hardware expertise for the Geode - AMD didn't have to
> be so open and OLPC didn't ask for it. The AMD engineers (and there were
> many, many more than I) worked hand in hand with the OLPC designers from the
> beginning, long before virtually everybody on this mailing list or in the
> IRC room had jumped on the bandwagon.  I was fortunate to be working with
> brilliant developers such as Mark and Mitch who were able to read datasheets
> and ask interesting qeustions, and they were fortunate to be able to have a
> nearly direct connection to the silicon designers that designed the part.
>
> AMD and OLPC educated each other

My point. I took it as obvious that AMD had to teach OLPC about the
Geode processors, and commented that OLPC also found some other things
in addition to what they were taught.

> - and the result was arguably the most open
> processor in history on one side, and a little green machine on the other.
>  So I take exception to the idea that AMD was the bumbling fool in this
> partnership -

Which is not what I said. I know something about combinatory
mathematics, and a good deal about the definitions of the Geode
registers, and I think it would have been astounding if OLPC had not
found combinations and sequences with new uses. I am also well aware
that AMD contributed greatly to the design of the XO, as did Red Hat
and Quanta. I am also aware that power management design and
implementation is nowhere near finished.

> that is an unfair characterization, and an insult to the AMD
> engineers that spent a lot of hours reviewing schematics, looking at USB
> debug traces and writing code - much of which is still running on the system
> to this day.
>
> Jordan

-- 
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And Children are my nation.
The Cosmos is my dwelling place, The Truth my destination.
http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/User:Mokurai (Ed Cherlin)