Windows 8 to be 128 bit operating system

AFAICT, there aren't any COTS CPU's yet with 128-bit native GP register files, although it's common to concatenate registers implicitly for instructions that need it. E.g., 16-bit factors multiplied give a 32-bit product in DX:AX on the 8086 processor.

So unless someone has figured out how to use the 128-bit SSE registers as general-purpose, or Microsoft has 128-bit prototype CPU's from Intel, I'm going with a 128-bit filesystem for Windows 8 instead.

> AFAICT, there aren't any COTS CPU's yet with 128-bit native GP register files

AFAIK, you're correct.

Agreed. Also given the sorry state of win64 (particularly since most windows apps are still 32-bit), it will make little sense for MS to invest in a 128-bit port at this point.

When did a Microsoft marketing effort have to make technical sense?

Quoting:The discovery came to light after Microsoft Research employee, Robert Morgan, carelessly left details of his work on the social-networking site, LinkedIn.

Carelessly? How do you carelessly post something to your personal Social webpage?

This sounds more like a way of getting valpourware announced, without it being obvious that it's a vapourware announcement.

"Carelessly," as in "conveniently forgetting about your NDA, until the company's lawyers remind you."

"carelessly"? - it's most likely just another silly marketing ploy - "ooh, we discovered super secret microsoft plans!" (yawn)

Look, I love linux as much as the next guy, and I only boot into Vista to play games, but without 128-bit Enterprise Application Readiness, Linux is just not going to be adopted for the Business Desktop.

Linux will remain in the realm of Hobbyists and Fanboys, because going forward, Business people, despite their lack of technical polish, really really need 128-bit Excel spreadsheets to governance their service oriented architectures.

Besides, now that Win32 is virtually a commodity protocol, Microsoft needs to apply another layer of blatherto their products: without a sign-extended sign-extend, how will The Geniuses of Redmond cause their MVPs to make enough mistakes to need to buy another generation of fluffed-up "Win128" books?

phsolide:

Did you forget your /sarcasm tag?

gus...,

Quoting:Did you forget your /sarcasm tag?

Absolutely unneeded, it was dripping with it.

YBT

But who says it's Microsoft is the one willing to switch to 128 bit?

What I noticed, is that it's also Intel who has problems selling high-margin products.

Interesting, I didn't see anything sarcastic in Phsolide's post at all.

I think he's spot on.

Actually, real sarcasm existed: I don't even own a machine that can dual-boot Vista. I don't even have a dual-boot XP box right now, as I have roached the XP installation somehow. It's running Arch Linux pretty well, so I may reformat the XP disk, even.

Also, the Excel part: Excel mainly exists because "Word" can't do columnar data, and it can't do it so obviously that even Softies notice it. Excel is bunk, in that unique Microsoft way where only about one third of a page of data is visible, and you can't use their tools for significan't amounts of data without huge manual effort.

So, yeah, some sarcasm existed, but maybe not that much.

It's started. Read the comments on this "OSNews" article:

http://www.osnews.com/comments/22301

This guy hits some nails on the head:

http://www.osnews.com/thread?388199

You do need to iron out the pointer/int/long bitness conventions, otherwise you end up with the Mess that is Win32.

Which brings me to a small rant about Win32. When MSFT introduced it, Solaris, IRIX and HP-UX (at least) were going to 64-bitness, as was VMS only a little later.

I don't see a lack of address space as Windows most pressing problem, so this 128-bit thing seems really odd to me.