Intel’s Atom beats Via’s Isaiah – report
The battle of MIDway continues
THE MICROPROCESSOR REPORT reckons that Intel’s “Atom” architecture will outflank Via’s microarchitecture on the wattage stakes.
Basically, it’s all a matter of how long your little UMPC lasts without finding somewhere to plug it into, or before it burns a hole in your pocket.
And it is, as usual, to do with the operating system you are running, the size of the screen and the usual familiar notebook stuff. No change there, then.
In its latest report, MPR editor Tom H said: “Even the new Isiaiah microarchitecture from Via Technologies – formerly the low power X86 leaders – can’t match Atom’s TDPs.”
TDP stands for thermal design power, and MPR editor Tom Halfhill reckons the Atom will make the grade.
There could be a joker in the pack – and that’s a process shrink of Via’s chip. The Intel Atom apparently has a maximum power advantage over Isiaiah at 45 nanometres compared to 65 nanometres. Perhaps Via has plans to shrink its die. Most chip companies do.
Of course, the last thing any chip company is going to do is actually talk to people like us at the INQ. There’s too much at stake. MPR reckons Intel is going back to its roots by introducing the "Atom". Oh, come on, Tom. Next thing you'll be saying AMD has a "viable platform going forward." µ
L'INQ
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Comments
Apples and Oranges...
This might not be very relevant. I think we should wait until the benchmarks get out, and see just how well these two chips perform, and how high their power consumption is.There's a good chance that VIA's Isaiah will be significantly more powerful than Intel's Atom, so I wouldn't draw any conclusions from this.
Besides, we don't know how much will Isaiah cost, yet.
Of course I might be wrong, but anyway I still think we should wait and see on this one.
The old apples and orangutans argument
What's the point in comparing a chip meant for MIDs with clock for clock performance on par with a Willamette to a chip meant for small laptops and thin clients with clock for clock performance closer to Hammer? A 2.0 Ghz Isaiah will wipe the floor with any atom on any roadmap outside of multitasking. But then again, a dual core Isaiah will destroy any dual core atom. But the real issue, is that at those speeds, the Isaiah is too power hungry for the Eee, while Atom might still be shoehorned into the 2G iPhone.Isaiah should really put some pressure on AMD in the low end laptop arena if it can hit the promised power consumption and price levels.
AMD's Geode
I got a Jetway board about a week ago to run Windows Home Server. Included in the bundle was a socket A AMD Geode. This 1.4ghz chip really blows VIA chips out of the water in terms of performance, and it is very low power. I can't understand all the loyalty to the EPIA when this chip is faster, cheaper, and uses less power.No idea how it stacks up against the Atom.
Isaiah isn't as sucky as the old C7
Even though its probably not what Isaiah was meant for, it can run crysis after all. just google Isaiah+Crysis. So roger uh the Geode is seriously out.....the main problem with VIA is their availability and punctuality. They can never seem to get these 2 right.
VIA has much higher performance
The Via Isaiah core has a much higher performance (3 issue out of order core) vs a Silverthorne/Atom which is a 2 issue in order core. Also The Via core is in 65nm vs Atom at 45nm. At 45nm Via will cream the Silverthorne core in both power and performance.Equality
"I don't know how AMD's Geode stacks up against brandX"No worries, just have this equation jotted down on the back of yer hand and you'll be in harmony with the INQ every time:
AMD = bad.
Nvidia = bad.
Intel = good.
INQ = good.
INQ=Intel
Intel uses standard chipset
Intel is showing off just the CPU power use because Atom uses the existing chipset which sucks more power than the AMD and VIA solutions.It remains to be seen how total system power use compares.
Via kick ass ?
Oh yeh ?http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3273/2422399967_e501f6cd17.jpg?v=0