> The answer is obvious. You pick a fast processor (maybe a really hot
> Alpha, or perhaps a fast PowerPC) and treat as a microengine for your
> instruction set; i.e., you plunk it down with a ROM containing an
> emulator that the chip starts executing out of reset. Then when the
> commodity guys up the clock on their Alpha or PowerPC, voila! you've just
> had a performance bump. I suspect a really hot processor could handle
> (say) the Unibus in software, as well.
>
Actually, I think IBM does something like this with the AS/400.  The
PowerPC AS chip is really just a powerpc cpu, and some microcode that
makes it slightly different.  If you just hack the microcode on a
risc-based AS/400, you get a large and really expensive RS/6000.

Regards,
John Havard


> 
> Roger Ivie
> ivie@cc.usu.edu
>