Cyrix has been the dog of the computing world ever since the days of the
486DX/100MHz chip. It’s always been plagued by low yields, low profits,
and even lower performing processors. For what seems to be the past year,
Cyrix has been working on a Socket 370 chip that is pin for pin compatible with
the low cost Intel Celeron Processor. It’s called the MIII, or M3.
As you guessed, it’s third in the line of “M” series processors
from Cyrix. We’ve heard about it forever, but where is it. Even a
search on eBay for MIII, or even the chips codename, Joshua, reveals no chip to
be found. While a search for “MIII” yielded no results at all,
there were 10 results for “Joshua.” Those being SLot1->Socket
370 adapters that said they supported the Cyrix Joshua Processor.
Personally, I’d like to see a Socket 370 system powered by Cyrix. As
always, they will bring a little more competition to the low-end sector of PCs,
driving prices down, even if only by a little. Tests at Tomshardware.com
on both the new and old Joshua processors show that it’s under performs the
Celeron and Duron by large margins in many areas of CPU duties. Of course,
with the recent problems Cyrix has had, I logically don’t see Cyrix producing
x86 CPUs in mass quanity ever again. Their more recent flub-up was during
the infamous race to 1GHz. Intel and AMD were releasing higher and higher
frequency CPUs monthly. By the time AMD and Intel reached 800Mhz, Cyrix
was lagging behind with a processor that supposedly ran at the equivalent of a
Pentium II Chip clocked at 500Mhz, but actually preformed to that of a 350Mhz
Pentium II in some tests. Being behind in performance doesn’t mean squat
in the OEM world. When most people buy PCs, they look for MHz, or the MHz
rating (such as the PR rating Cyrix uses.) Hopefully, with Cyrix out of
the mix, I hope that a third CPU company will rise up and take the famed super
low end spot. I’m praying for IBM, or even Texas Interments…maybe even Motorola,
famous for their Macintosh Chips.
Innovation at it’s finest
Over the past years, Microsoft has wanted to to think that they are the
leaders when it comes to innovations. Of course they have done some
inovative things in the past, I feel they’ve lost their “golden”
touch. Ever since Windows 95, which was introduced 5 years ago, we’ve had
to deal with the same user interface (with tweaks of course.) After DOS,
Windows 3.1 was a breath of fresh air, and after that, Windows 95 was like pure
oxygen. Even Mac OS, which has virtually been the same, has dramatically
changed not only it’s base, but it’s user interface as well with Max OS X (Mac
Ten as I like to call it.) They’ve introduced a Unix Type Kernel base,
which is very nice. (That coming from a hardcore Win2K Man.)
Of course, I’d like to see Microsoft incorporate the same thing with their
high-end Operating Systems (Workstation Server) and Port current “New
Technology” Operating systems (New Technology standing for NT) over to the
normal User Operating System. Then again, I don’t wanna see Microsoft, or
ANYONE for that matter charge a great deal for a Unix Type Operating System
either. Ever since I’ve known it, the Unix Type has always been the Free
type. From Linux to Xnix to Qnix to Znix, it’s been free. It’s been
free for people to download, modify, sell, and give away in any form they wanted
to. I’d hate that for to change, as would most technogeeks. If a
Windows Style Operating system comes a long that’s cheap, stable and compatible,
they can look no further for their new poster boy! ^^^^^
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