Next Generation Pandora

[lulzfish]

If I'm getting a full-sized notebook with a DVD drive, I expect the motherboard to use the whole case.
Cutting down on the size, even for a small ARM CPU, means making it that much more expensive or that much less powerful.

And then you'd have something like this:
x86 mode: Laptop is decently powerful, runs any sort of x86 software almost as well as other models
ARM mode: Laptop is minimally useful, but has great battery life. Essentially a netbook stuffed into a 10-pound chassis.

And for all the design trouble of grafting an x86 and ARM motherboard together, I would rather just buy a 19-inch workstation laptop and a Pandora and have my x86 and ARM cake separately.

Edit:
Yes, but there are APIs for normal x86 programs to call on the GPU.
There is no x86 software that expects an ARM processor to be available. You could offload video processing to it, I suppose, if you gave it a DMA channel or something, but not even VLC knows how to do that because the hardware simply doesn't exist.

 

[bzar]

I never said that they would be used together??
You can boot the laptop into using the ARM CPU and if you need more power for a task you can restart to use the X86 CPU.

Sssooo... You'd have two sets of binaries? One for each architecture? Sounds complicated.

 

[Enverex]

That makes -no- sense. How on earth do you expect the laptop to use two processors as the main CPU when they are completely different architectures?

The PS2 used the PS1 processor as one of it's subsystem processors. That's how it achieved backwards compatibility, by simply starting up the second processor as a primary when it was needed.
Most modern graphics cards have their own processors on the board which have absolutely nothing in common with the x86, just waiting for a program to be fed to them. Desktops don't have any problems with these "dual" setups.
The NDS has both an ARM7 and an ARM9 based CPU which, while very close, are not the same architecture, and both CPUs operate mostly independently within the system.
Bringing closer to home, the Pandora has a primary processor, but it also carries a DSP, which is a processor in its own right and yet another different architecture.

So there's no reason that two CPUs of differing architecture can't exist within the same system, with one acting as primary and the other just waiting to be turned on and given a task.

You're completely missing the point here. Those were consoles and the software was designed to use the processors in this way. PC's expect 1 (or more) processors of the same architecture, there is no software that can use different processors of different arch. Also GPU's have nothing to do with this, I was referring specifically to CPUs.

The "can boot with one or the other" idea is ludicrous as well, none of the software that works on one would work on the other, you'd basically have a dual-boot setup so different that it would be like having 2 different machines.

 

[Exophase]

What do you think of this "xpPhone" coming this fall: http://www.slashgear...rty-3g-2945295/

sounds interesting, but the info is too scarce, and the power characterstics given sound more like optimistic estimates.
also, its cpu is clearly a geode (there are no other AMD cpu's that could fit the bill), and depending whether that's the GX or the LX geode (NX is out of the device's league), the device would be somewhere in the ARM11's, maybe cortex A8's performance ballpark. unfortunately, all geodes are produced at rather old litography nodes (130-150nm, as per AMD's product page) and thus are not particularly competitive with the 65nm OMAP3 watt-wise.

I'm going to go with ARM11, since these CPUs are single-issue. So long as it's not a GX1 it'll have a lot of L1 cache, but you pay for it with latency, especially with this way-miss penalty it has going on. The L2 cache is also pretty high latency/low bandwidth (and only 4-way set associative) and the RAM bandwidth makes even OMAP3530 look good. See this for more information: http://7-cpu.com/cpu/GeodeLX.html

Peripheral-wise the OMAP3530 looks much more attractive too, with a 3D accelerator and DSP.

 

[Trip]

If I'm getting a full-sized notebook with a DVD drive, I expect the motherboard to use the whole case.
Cutting down on the size, even for a small ARM CPU, means making it that much more expensive or that much less powerful.

And then you'd have something like this:
x86 mode: Laptop is decently powerful, runs any sort of x86 software almost as well as other models
ARM mode: Laptop is minimally useful, but has great battery life. Essentially a netbook stuffed into a 10-pound chassis.

And for all the design trouble of grafting an x86 and ARM motherboard together, I would rather just buy a 19-inch workstation laptop and a Pandora and have my x86 and ARM cake separately.

Edit:
Yes, but there are APIs for normal x86 programs to call on the GPU.
There is no x86 software that expects an ARM processor to be available. You could offload video processing to it, I suppose, if you gave it a DMA channel or something, but not even VLC knows how to do that because the hardware simply doesn't exist.

I never said that they would be used together??
You can boot the laptop into using the ARM CPU and if you need more power for a task you can restart to use the X86 CPU.

Sssooo... You'd have two sets of binaries? One for each architecture? Sounds complicated.

The ARM CPU and a minimal install of Linux would offer an almost instant on for doing basic stuff like internet, email or messaging while offering much better battery life, but you would still be able to use the laptop like normal if you so wished.

Very useful for people who travel a lot or do business on the move and don't need to boot to the full OS everytime.

 

[ldesnogu]

Didn't Dell make a laptop with an x86 and an OMAP3 chip?

 

[WizardStan]

You're completely missing the point here. Those were consoles and the software was designed to use the processors in this way. PC's expect 1 (or more) processors of the same architecture, there is no software that can use different processors of different arch. Also GPU's have nothing to do with this, I was referring specifically to CPUs.

If I'm missing the point, you're not even trying to find it. To load a program onto the GPU, you load it into memory, and send a command to the GPU basically saying "here, run this."
It wouldn't be easy, but there's no reason you can't make a program (a heavily modified Wine, for example) which can load an EXE into memory along with it's own x86 based stubs for libraries, and tell the x86 coprocessor "here, run this". The x86 runs entirely independently from the primary ARM CPU, with carefully crafted overlap of resources.

 

[Trip]

Didn't Dell make a laptop with an x86 and an OMAP3 chip?

I know they were one of the companies on about doing it but I'm not too sure if they have or not?

 

[bzar]

I never said that they would be used together??
You can boot the laptop into using the ARM CPU and if you need more power for a task you can restart to use the X86 CPU.

Sssooo... You'd have two sets of binaries? One for each architecture? Sounds complicated.

The ARM CPU and a minimal install of Linux would offer an almost instant on for doing basic stuff like internet, email or messaging while offering much better battery life, but you would still be able to use the laptop like normal if you so wished.

Very useful for people who travel a lot or do business on the move and don't need to boot to the full OS everytime.

Now I get it. So it's like those small on-board linux distributions some motherboards have, but with its own low-power processor? Is this what you meant? I somehow misinterpreted your post to mean that they would run the same operating system and programs.

Actually, I first thought you were suggesting that the ARM cpu could be used during the boot-up process, and then switch to x86 for actual use. This is obviously not what you meant

 

[Trip]

Now I get it. So it's like those small on-board linux distributions some motherboards have, but with its own low-power processor? Is this what you meant? I somehow misinterpreted your post to mean that they would run the same operating system and programs.

Actually, I first thought you were suggesting that the ARM cpu could be used during the boot-up process, and then switch to x86 for actual use. This is obviously not what you meant

Yep that's it

Sorry but I suck at explaining stuff

 

[Pleng]

If it was a whole SOC that was added to the motherboard, rather than just a CPU couldn't some customized VM load boot either the ARM OS from within Windows on x86, or indeed boot Windows from within the ARM OS?

 

[lulzfish]

Via emulation??
I guess you could, but it would be incredibly slow either way..

I think I've misunderstood this "customized VM load boot either the ARM OS from within Windows .. boot Windows from within ARM OS"

 

[Pleng]

I mean something like VMWare. Except instead of booting a second OS on the SAME system, it boots the second OS on the alternate system.

So if you're in some kind of Linux OS which is running on the ARM core, you boot up the customized VM Application which would run Windows on the x86 part of the system. And vica versa.

 

[WizardStan]

Not emulation: virtualization. Except instead of virtualizing the guest OS on the same CPU as the host, it executes on the alternate CPU. The trick would be getting a set of drivers in place that could be synchronously updated from either CPU.

 

[darkblu]

apropos, nokia just announced their latest and greatest - a netbook running win7 and boasting a fantastical 12h of battery life.

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2009/08/nokias-new-wintel-netbook-what-happened-to-maemo-arm.ars

to say that i'm sceptical of the cited battery life would be an understatement ; )

 

[Exophase]

Maybe 12 hours when playing Solitaire.

With the screen off.

 

[ldesnogu]

Whatever good I thought of Nokia suddenly vanished.

 

[gruso]

"We can't compete in the smartphone sector. What should we do?"

"How about we make a netbook?"

"Brilliant! Give that man another line of coke."

 

[midna25]

Wouldn't it be awesome to see a handheld based on a PC? Maybe it could have an intel atom or something (assuming it can run dos) and we can run all the classic dos games, windows games and emulators all in a handheld format with good battery life and gaming controls. Is there any interest in something like that?

Chris

FAIL.

But to answer the question, no, I don't think that would be awesome.

 

[lulzfish]

"We can't compete in the smartphone sector. What should we do?"

"How about we make a netbook?"

"Brilliant! Give that man another line of coke."

1. Build consumer electronics
2. Fail slightly
3. Build a netbook
4. ???
5. ???

Looks like Dell, HP, Acer, Asus (Course these idiots started it), Nokia are all doing this, who have I forgotten? MSI?