The Hindu Business Line : Evenly matched

WHEN the small take on the mighty, it makes news for sure. For instance when proponents of Linux, users of AMD processors, and champions of Firefox browser are up in arms against the likes of Microsoft and Intel.

Another battle is in the brewing, although this time around the contestants seem to be more evenly matched in terms of size and might.Welcome `Cell', the new microprocessor being developed by IBM in association with Sony and Toshiba. The companies recently released details about the Cell, which has been in development for four years.

Industry watchers expect an interesting battle to unfold in the coming years between Intel's chips and the new one, especially in the area of digital entertainment.

Cell is much more powerful than the most powerful chip available for desktop machines today. At 256 gigaflops, Cell can theoretically have a peak performance of 256 billion mathematical operations a second, which is about 10 times faster than the fastest PC processor now available. In fact, that kind of power would have put a Cell-powered machine on par with a supercomputer of two-threeyears ago.

The Cell chip is different in that it can have up to nine processing units running as many as 10 software applications simultaneously.

What IBM has done here is to use the refined version of a technology called virtualisation that can isolate applications.

So a software program can be split into small chunks that will be assigned to different processing units within the Cell. At the same time, they can access the shared main memory.

The Cell's architecture makes it possible for the software chunks to look for processors, whether they are available in a single chip, or in multiple chips in a machine or even in machines that are networked locally or globally.

The Cell, says IBM, will support multiple operating systems such as Windows, Linux and Unix and also handle multi-channel high-definition programs.

So has a new war in the microprocessor world begun? Not yet, say experts, as Cell, at least ini<147,1,7>tially, will be used for video game consoles and consumer electronics devices such as high-definition televisions (HDTV).

Sony has announced that it will use Cell in PlayStation 3, likely to be launched next year. Toshiba has said it will use Cell in its HDTV slated to hit the market in 2006. One reason why Cell may not debut in desktops immediately is that existing software applications are not designed to be processed in chunks. Instead, IBM may use Cell for its own supercomputers.

Sceptics also point to previous extravagant experiments with new processors that have not achieved the desired results. One example is the Itanium, for which Intel and Hewlett-Packard together spent years and hundreds of millions.

Despite the might of Intel and HP behind it, Itanium is not yet a big success.

Sony and Toshiba had earlier come out with a chip called Emotion Engine that powered the PlayStation 2. This chip was also to be used for non-gaming purposes, but nothing really happened. Other chip designs such as RISC and POWER have also not challenged Intel in the general computing arena.

But given the strengths of IBM, Sony and Toshiba and their respective areas, Intel could face some serious contention in the digital entertainment area from Cell. The fight is sure to intensify as the line between home computing and entertainment increasingly blurs.

vipin@thehindu.co.in

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