IBM announced a newly-developed, high-performance PowerPC microprocessor for use in a variety of applications, including desktops, workstations, servers and communications products. The new chip called the IBM PowerPC 970 is derived from IBM's award-winning POWER4 server processor to provide high performance and additional function for users. As the first in a new family of high-end PowerPC processors, the chip is designed for initial speeds of up to 1.8 gigahertz, manipulating data in larger, 64-bit chunks and accelerating compute-intensive workloads like multimedia and graphics through specialized circuitry known as a single instruction multiple data (SIMD) unit. Read more... IBM plans to pack performance and new features into the chip using ultra-thin 0.13-micron circuitry (nearly 800 times thinner than a human hair), constructed of copper wiring and about 52 million transistors based on IBM's efficient silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technology. "IBM's new PowerPC 970 64-bit chip is all about bringing high-end server processing power to the desktop, low-end server and pervasive space," said Michel Mayer, general manager, IBM Microelectronics Division. "IBM is committed to helping more customers put our expertise in advanced chip design and manufacturing technology to work for them." The chip incorporates an innovative communications link, or "bus," specially developed to speed information between the processor and memory. Running at a speed of up to 900 megahertz, the bus can deliver information to the processor at up to 6.4 gigabytes per second, to help ensure that the high-performance processor is fed data at sufficient speeds. While supporting 64-bit computing for emerging applications, the PowerPC 970 also provides native support for traditional 32-bit applications, which can help preserve users' and developers' software investments. The design also supports symmetric multi-processing (SMP), allowing systems to be created that link multiple processors to work in tandem for additional processing power. IBM plans to make the PowerPC 970 chip available next year. "They can't say Apple, but we can, speculatively, of course," said Tom Halfhill, an analyst with MDR/In-Stat. Source: IBM