<From CLASSICCMP-owner_at_u.washington.edu Thu Jan 8 15:08:02 1998
^^^^^
<Do you mean a National Semi 32000 class cpu? Kewl. Boy, those were
<hot, hot, hot when they hit the market in the early 80's. National
<did everything right on this one: Full object code compatibility
<between the 8,16 and 32 bit versions of the device; truly orthogonal
<instruction set, and so on. Mondo cool. It also was THE FIRST true
<32-bit cpu on the market (according to an EDN magazine article).
Look at that one and then look at VAX... the similarity is very strong.
<Did I say National did everything right? Yes. Well, depends on how
<you look at it. You couldn't run dos or CP/M on it. This, I
<suppose, was it's fatal 'flaw' (although I am of the opinion that
<that such compatibility would be a major DEFECT, but never mind).
The problem was it was late and only the slow ones with no second source.
<That and National didn't market the device very well, although
<it was used in alot of embedded applications. I wonder how much
<further it would have gone, had the free Unices we have today been
<available back then . . . .
The lack of OS support, lack of a perceived need for 32bits, late entry
into the market, poor marketing and the 808x and 68k being both well
embedded in the market were factors that could not be missed.
Allison
Received on Thu Jan 08 1998 - 10:43:17 GMT