• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Virtualization.com

Virtualization.com

News and insights from the vibrant world of virtualization and cloud computing

  • News
  • Featured
  • Partnerships
  • People
  • Acquisitions
  • Guest Posts
  • Interviews
  • Videos
  • Funding

Multicore Expo

The Gap Between Hardware and Software

April 7, 2008 by Robin Wauters 1 Comment

Interesting read over at EE Times Asia, titled “IC industry addresses multicore, programming software gap“.

An excerpt:

“The semiconductor industry is starting to address what’s being called a software gap between a rising tide of multicore processors and a lack of parallel programming tools and techniques to make use of them.

The gap came into stark focus in the embedded world at the Multicore Expo, where chipmakers Freescale Semiconductor, Intel Corp., MIPS and a handful of silicon startups sketched out directions for their multicore products. Others warned that the industry has its work cut out for it delivering the software that will harness the next-generation chips.”

“There is a major gap between the hardware and the software,” said Eric Heikkila, director of embedded hardware research at Venture Development Corp. (VDC).

About 55 % of embedded system developers surveyed by VDC said they are using or will use multicore processors in the next 12 months. That fact is fueling the company’s projections that the market for embedded multicore processors will grow from about $372 million in 2007 to $2.47 billion in 2011.

In the PC market, the figures are even more dramatic. About 40 % of all processors Intel shipped in 2007 used multiple cores, but that will rise to 95 % in 2011, said Doug Davis, general manager of Intel’s embedded group.

But on the software side, vendors reported that only about 6 % of their tools were ready for parallel chips in 2007, a figure that will only rise to 40 % in 2011, VDC said. As much as 85 % of all embedded programming is now done in C or C++, languages that are “difficult to optimize for multicore,” said Heikkila.

Standardization

The Multicore Association announced at the Multicore Expo it has completed work on an applications programming interface for communications between cores, and is now working to define a standard for embedded virtualization.

“The ultimate goal of every computer scientist is to create a new language, but my personal view is we should not do it this time around,” said Wen-mei Hwu, a veteran researcher in parallel programming and professor of engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, referring to a flowering of languages developed for big parallel computers two decades ago, many of which never gained traction. I believe there will be new language constructs in C/C++ to support some of the new frameworks people will develop, but even these constructs, if we are not careful, will not be widely adopted,” Hwu said. “Ultimately, I think we will make a small amount of extensions to C, but I think it’s too early.”

On-chip fabric

For their part, Freescale and Intel sketched out design trends they see on the horizon for their multicore chips.

“Freescale is now sampling the first dual-core versions of its PowerQuicc processors, aimed at telecom OEMs. The chips are part of a family that will eventually scale to 32-core devices”, said Dan Cronin, VP of R&D for Freescale’s networking division.

The processors will use a new on-chip interconnect fabric. They will also embed in hardware a hypervisor, a kind of low-level scheduling unit, co-developed with IBM according to specs set in the Power.org group. “Freescale will release an open source reference design for companies that want to build virtualization software that taps into the hypervisor”, Cronin said.

[Source: VMBlog]

Filed Under: News Tagged With: embedded hypervisors, Freescale, gap, hardware, intel, Mips, Multicore Expo, software, virtualisation, virtualization

VirtualLogix Adds Support For Intel VT-d, Now Fit For Windows Environments

April 1, 2008 by Robin Wauters Leave a Comment

VirtualLogix has updated the Intel Architecture (IA) version of its embedded virtualization stack, which targets performance-critical telecom and datacom applications. VLX for Network Infrastructure (VLX-NI) 3.0 adds support for Intel VT-d (virtualization technology for directed I/O), Microsoft Windows guests, and Core Microarchitecture 3.0, while adding new Eclipse-based set-up tools.

virtualization-virtuallogix.jpg

VirtualLogix made the announcement at the Multicore Expo today in Santa Clara, where it also announced having joined the Multicore Association. From the press release:

VirtualLogix’s new release blends the rich Microsoft Windows operating system environment with the existing capabilities of real-time operating systems (RTOS) or Linux by applying real-time virtualization technology on platforms using multicore processors.

Communications applications often require separate hardware to handle Windows interfaces and mission-critical portions of the equipment. VirtualLogix’s real-time virtualization software simplifies the design by allowing all software to share a common hardware platform. With VLX for Network Infrastructure v3.0, networking and telecommunication equipment makers can quickly develop next-generation products, reduce development and bill-of-material costs and lower power consumption. In the industrial and automation markets, where Windows is also widely used to provide user friendly interfaces to machinery, VLX is able to support the time-sensitive control and signal processing functions these areas demand.

[Source: LinuxDevices – who also interviewed VirtualLogix’s VP of Marketing, Mark Milligan]

Filed Under: News, Partnerships Tagged With: Core Microarchitecture 3.0, intel, Intel Architecture, Intel VT-d, Mark Milligan, Multicore Expo, virtualisation, virtualization, VirtualLogix, VLX for Network, VLX for Network Infrastructure, VLX-NI 3.0, VT-d

Primary Sidebar

Tags

acquisition application virtualization Cisco citrix Citrix Systems citrix xenserver cloud computing Dell desktop virtualization EMC financing Funding Hewlett Packard HP Hyper-V IBM industry moves intel interview kvm linux microsoft Microsoft Hyper-V Novell oracle Parallels red hat research server virtualization sun sun microsystems VDI video virtual desktop Virtual Iron virtualisation virtualization vmware VMware ESX VMWorld VMWorld 2008 VMWorld Europe 2008 Xen xenserver xensource

Recent Comments

  • C program on Red Hat Launches Virtual Storage Appliance For Amazon Web Services
  • Hamzaoui on $500 Million For XenSource, Where Did All The Money Go?
  • vijay kumar on NComputing Debuts X350
  • Samar on VMware / SpringSource Acquires GemStone Systems
  • Meo on Cisco, Citrix Join Forces To Deliver Rich Media-Enabled Virtual Desktops

Copyright © 2025 · Genesis Sample on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

  • Newsletter
  • Advertise
  • Contact
  • About