Rumor: More on Palm Choosing XScale
Recently, rumors have been circulating that the next generation of Palm models will use Intel microprocessors instead of Motorola ones. The Register is adding fuel to the fire by quoting unnamed Taiwanese industry sources who said that that Palm is indeed planning to switch to XScale.
Naturally, this is still at the rumor stage. It has been suggested by some that Palm itself is circulating these rumors to improve their negotiating position with Motorola.
All previous Palm models have used processors from Motorola. This includes all the Palm OS licensees, too. However, it has long been known that Palm's next operating system, OS 5.0, will run on chips using ARM technology and both Motorola and Intel make chips that fit that description.
The XScale chip is a strong contender. It is manufactured on Intel's 0.18-micron process technology. It offers low power operation ranging from one ten-thousandth of a watt to 1.6 watts, and performance that allows it to operate at clock speeds approaching 1 GHz. Naturally, the high end chips aren't likely to appear in handhelds without some major improvements in battery technology.
Intel is currently planning on releasing the first XScale chip in September. It will operate at between 300-400 MHz.
Motorola has made it clear that they want to keep Palm's business and have announced chips clearly intended to be used as Palm's upgrade path. The first of these, the Dragonball MX1, is the first ARM core-based chip from Motorola and offers speeds up to 200 MHz. It will have Sony's Memory Stick and an SD interface built in. According to Motorola,it will have best-in-class low power consumption in active, sleep and shutdown modes. It won't be available until the third quarter of this year.
At PalmSource in December, Palm executives demonstrated current Palm software in emulation mode on a development board built around an ARM processor. The ARM chip used on the development board was made by Cirrus Logic, but Palm said at the time that this didn't imply a commitment to any processor manufacturer.
Palm's CEO Carl Yankowski has said that OS 5.0 is going to be released in the second half of 2002.
Related Articles:
On the Web:Article Comments
(19 comments)
The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. PalmInfocenter is not responsible for them in any way.
Please Login or register here to add your comments.
Comments Closed
This article is no longer accepting new comments.
RE: What about AMD
AMD is a 2nd-tier company. Palm should go with best-INTEL.
RE: What about AMD
Yo Mr. Nibbit, one of my favorite parts of these discussions is the fact that the people who are the most rude and insulting are usually the ones who are wrong.
Ever hear of licencing? You don't have to own a company to use their technology. In fact, Motorola is also going to release some processors with ARM cores and these are the ones that they want Palm to use.
And the last time I checked, Intel was playing catch-up to AMD. While AMD was struggling for a while there they have got their act together and Intel is the one who is starting to look disorganized.
Intel lets AMD have the low-margin business.
RE: What about AMD
AMD cautioned it may report a third-quarter operating loss
Put a monkey in a cage with an 800lb Gorilla and see what
you nibbit
RE: What about AMD
RE: What about AMD
AriB
Developer impact?
JBH
RE: No Developer impact
So set your minds to rest, OS 5.0 won't require all applications to be rewritten.
---
News Editor
Palm Infocenter
RE: Developer impact?
"Palm executives demonstrated current Palm software in emulation mode on a development board built around an ARM processor"
If old Palm software is going to run in "emulation" mode, then what do you have to do to create software that doesn't run in emulation mode. Things like POSE and CodeWarrior for Palm were borrowed from the Mac development world because that system used the Motorola 68000 series chips -- same as the current Palms. I assume that when the change occurs I'll be purchasing a new version of Code Warrior. I also assume that POSE with be substantially changed.
JBH
RE: Yes Developer impact?
At PalmSource, many of the apps they ran on the ARM prototype wouldn't run. Palm revealed that the backwards compatibility system goes in and modifies various resources at run time for old M68k apps, so that the resources match the new revamped OS 5.0 layout.
The result was that any application that had a non-standard resource, or any application that modified UI structures directly would not function. That is why Palm has been begging developers to not access such things directly.
Now, it is safe to say that any application of significant complexity has to access UI and bitmap structures directly. There are very few API calls provided in Palm OS to access important fields of user interface structures - for example, if you have to change the font that a particular button is using, you have to modify the structure directly. Even something as simple as reading the width and height of a bitmap requires accessing the structure directly. Palm is trying to catch up by providing API calls to do these things, but most apps have to access structures directly today. Eventually one would hope that Palm thinks of every possible way a developer might need to modify the UI elements and provide API functions to do so. But software developed today (or last year) won't necessarily all be updated to use these functions.
The fact is that Palm could have handled all of this gracefully by fully emulating the current OS, but they are choosing to simulate it. It's smart for them, because they can move on with OS 5.0 and don't have to keep around an OS 4.0 image on the device to emulate the old software. But it is going to break a lot of software - and I don't just mean games or other software that pushes the limits.
This transition will be very hard on Palm and developers. The years when there is a huge installed base of M68k units, a small installed base of ARM units, and a small selection of software that functions correctly on the new ARM units will be the years that somebody else can step in with a fresh new platform without these legacy woes. If a Palm developer is faced with restructuring all of their Palm apps just to keep working on Palm OS, they might also look seriously at restructuring their apps to work on a different OS instead.
RE: Developer impact?
Im sure there will be some tools to help with recompilations. As it it is I think that the SuperVZ at 66mhz will be faster for running exisiting apps, and im sure we'll see some sort of SuperVZ device from a licencsee before Palm switch to ARM.
-
kHiTeDev
You need a new desktop when...
RE: You need a new desktop when...
OS 5
Latest Comments
- My comments -katana
- My comments -katana
- My comments -katana
- My comments -katana
- My comments -katana
- My comments -katana
- My comments -katana
- My comments -katana
What about AMD