21 Jul
2016
21 Jul
'16
7:12 a.m.
On 21 July 2016 at 15:24, Pete Turnbull <pete at dunnington.plus.com> wrote:
Yes and no. StrongARM was even lower power as well as faster. If you're
suggesting that that's just evolution due to things like reduced process
size, I possibly agree. But a StrongARM has many times as many transistors
as an ARM3 (for example) let alone an ARM2, and initially ran 3 times as
fast (100MHz vs 33MHz - the earliest ARM3s were 20MHz, but production runs
were 25MHz and later 33MHz, and eventually SA-110 ran to over 200MHz) yet
uses less power. I don't have the data sheets for ARM6 and ARM7 so I can't
compare, though.
OK. I think the first announced StrongARM, the SA110, was announced as
running at 100, 133 and 200, mind you.
But the point about transistor count is well made. For the casual, it
was displayed by the packaging. The SA110 came in a plastic QFP, and
it came from the same company and around the same time as the Alpha,
with threaded shanks on the packaging for screwing a heatsink into
place. Spoke volumes. :-)
As for the marketing, I recently came across an Acorn
press release
announcing ARM, in which Sam Wauchope (CEO) was quoted saying it delivered
100MIPS per watt, so power was indeed a selling point. I worked for Sam at
the time[1], so I remember that. OK that's for one of the Acorn ARM chips,
not StrongARM, but the point is still made. Not all the marketing was
directed at the Acorn community.
Fair dos!
[1] and I still have my Archimedes A310 Serial No.
0000002 (and the box with
all the bits and pieces :-)) as well as my A410 and R260, both from the
first batches. I wish I'd kept an A500, though. All I have now is the
podule to connect it to a Beeb. Anybody got the machine to put it in?
I have an A5000, near-new in box. But it's not been removed for about
15y and I've no idea what working condition it's in. I could post it
to you when I'm next in the UK -- probably early next month. If you're
interested, make drop me a line off-list. It's in my storage unit in
South Wimbledon, where I have no power or anything, so I can't
plausibly get it out and test it.
I am planning to move the rest of my stuff here to Czechia next month,
mainly for cost reasons due to the falling GBP. If you wished you
could come and meet me and inspect it in person?
--
Liam Proven ? Profile: http://lproven.livejournal.com/profile
Email: lproven at cix.co.uk ? GMail/G+/Twitter/Flickr/Facebook: lproven
MSN: lproven at hotmail.com ? Skype/AIM/Yahoo/LinkedIn: liamproven
Cell/Mobiles: +44 7939-087884 (UK) ? +420 702 829 053 (?R)