Alpha vs. Intel

[smcdonald]

What is the difference between Alpha and Intel based systems?

Thanks

[iisbob]

Alpha is an entirely different cpu structure than the X86 intel platform.

You'll rarely see aplha based RISC systems anymore, intel has pretty much taken over the pc world. It's been quite awhile since i had to deal with any of DEC's digital alpha series.

The alpha ( and IBM's 6000 ) systems used to be pretty common in the business world, but with the growing simplisity and popularity of intel's X86 platform, they've pretty much died away.



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iisbob

The man who sets out to carry a cat by its tail learns something that will always be useful and which never will grow dim or doubtful. -- Mark Twain.

[RKBA]

A pity too, because from all the benchmarks I've read the Alpha can run circles around any Intel product ever produced. Of course the cost is outrageously high making it prohibitively expensive, so I guess it really doesn't matter much to us individual hobbyists. I was hoping that maybe the price tag on the Alpha would go down. Looks like instead it's just faded away.

-- Ron

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Centerfire (http://home.pacbell.net/rsdotson/) ‘‘The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground.’’ -- Thomas Jefferson