Prediction for 2030: Still PowerPC instruction set?

[asian1]

25 years ago, IBM released the first IBM PC with 16 bit 8088 CPU (x86).

On a forum there is a prediction on future CPU that x86 instruction set/applications will survive into 2030. Will the same thing happen with PowerPC instruction set/applications?

"Regardless of whether it's quantum, light, or whatever doesn't have anything to do with whether it's x86 or not. I'd say yes, 24 years from now we'll still be using x86. Our dependency on it has simply grown too large to get away from it. However, it's not as though this is all bad. Modern x86 CPUs have very little in common with the original 8088, the true "x86" part is almost completely gone. Old x86 code is now translated into the CPU's native languange, then processed. This allows future CPUs to continue to move more and more towards a RISC based system, while still supporting the CISC x86 codebase, through translations."

[bloodline]

asian1 wrote:
25 years ago, IBM released the first IBM PC with 16 bit 8088 CPU (x86).

On a forum there is a prediction on future CPU that x86 instruction set/applications will survive into 2030. Will the same thing happen with PowerPC instruction set/applications?

I doubt the PPC will be arround by then. ARM and MIPS are better suited to embedded applications, Once the current generation of PPC chips have reache the end of thier usefull life and made enough money back they will probably be quietly dropped... The only thing keeping the PPC alive is the fact that IBM and Freescale can use the ISA royalty free (now that implementations of ISA can be patented, read up about MIPS and their byteswap instruction!!!)

"Regardless of whether it's quantum, light, or whatever doesn't have anything to do with whether it's x86 or not. I'd say yes, 24 years from now we'll still be using x86. Our dependency on it has simply grown too large to get away from it. However, it's not as though this is all bad. Modern x86 CPUs have very little in common with the original 8088, the true "x86" part is almost completely gone. Old x86 code is now translated into the CPU's native languange, then processed. This allows future CPUs to continue to move more and more towards a RISC based system, while still supporting the CISC x86 codebase, through translations."

Well it's gone further than that now... as of next month all the major x86 vendors will switch over to x86-64 (AMD64, EMT64, whatever), which although derived from the original x86 set, is actually a new architecture. After a period of time, I doubt CPUs will support the x86 instruction set at all! :-o

On a forum there is a prediction on future CPU that x86 instruction set/applications will survive into 2030. Will the same thing happen with PowerPC instruction set/applications?

Do you honestly think there will still be humans on this planet to use *any* ISA in 2030?

[Louis Dias]

instruction sets can be supported by different architectures

architectures on the Pentium line have changed but the instruction set has remained...

[Tigger]

nicholas wrote:

Do you honestly think there will still be humans on this planet to use *any* ISA in 2030?

Yes I do, in fact 24 years ago when I was graduating one of my friends who seemed to always a pessimist (which you seem to be as well) went on a big rant about how man wouldnt survive till our 20th reunion, etc.  I'm guessing in 24 years the Huntsville Mafia will be laughing about Nicholas who thought man would be extinct in 24 years while discussing our latest vacation to the moon.  Oh yeah, the morale of the story, jack was a stressed out workaholic at the 10 year reunion and died from a heart attack before the 20th so man survived, but he didnt.  
     -Tig

[Karlos]

2030?

I hardly think it will matter by then, all coders to whom the very idea of what a CPU actually is let alone what instructions it executes will be long gone.

The future is pretty grim to old school coders like myself. The science and art of real coding will be the domain of precious few, those people whose job it is to implement the back end of high level compiler systems and the like.

Everything else that actually still requires any human input by then will probably be written in ultra dipsh*t high level RAD tools. No doubt people will call whatever flavour of the month XML-like system that is in use by then "code" and "coding" will be using it to describe some behaviour you want to implement. In the worst case scenario, this will even impress people by then.

[asian1]

Is it possible that in the future, people will use FPGA for running PowerPC, ARM, MIPS applications?
Or is it better to use software emulator than FPGA?
Is it possible to emulate MAI Logic/MPC-5200 chipset using FPGA in the future?

Why Intel sell its Xscale / Arm CPU division to Marvell and focus its business to x86 CPUs?

[Karlos]

No.