The Progeny of Intel and Alpha

The time has come, the walrus said, to talk of many things. We were talking last week about Compaq ditching the Alpha platform and sending it over to Intel where it would be absorbed into that company's IA-64 architecture. The news was pitched onto the wires by Mike "Don't Call me Mister" Magee. Well Magee's moles are ever active, and today he's got the skinny on how the two technologies will eventually merge . Apparently, the "architectural transition" won't get going until mid-2004 for the chips currently code-named "Deerfield." Mike's got quotes, graphics, and probably the T-shirt. We're still not entirely sure who works for whom in the whole Compaq/Intel swap. If you're an engineer now sitting in a different office, please clue us in, and we hope you were able to take along your 401K.