Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!rutgers!ucsd!ames!oliveb!sun!ember!dre From: dre%ember@Sun.COM (David Emberson) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac Subject: Re: MAC 88000 Summary: Low cost RISCs Keywords: 88000 SPARC Sun Apple Mac Macintosh UNIX Message-ID: <59913@sun.uucp> Date: 14 Jul 88 16:29:31 GMT References: <261@hodge.UUCP> <370STORKEL@RICE> <607@riddle.UUCP> Sender: news@sun.uucp Lines: 16 At this point, I would think that the high cost of the 88000 chipset would be prohibitive for a low cost machine. Also, the Harvard architecture, while allowing reduced CPI in the absence of an on-chip I cache, requires more external components. If Apple were to do a RISC machine now, the only processors that would meet the cost constraint would probably be the LSI Logic SPARC or Mips cpus which will be available as macros, the Fujitsu SPARC, or possibly the 29K. My guess is that they will stay with 68030/40/50 for some time. Dave Emberson (dre@sun.com) p.s. The only thing that Sun controls about SPARC is the trademark. Many licensees are already designing SPARCs of all flavors on their own. Obviously we have some clout, because at the moment we are the biggest consumer of SPARC chips. But we don't (and couldn't possibly) "control" the SPARC vendors.