[Info-vax] OT: IA-128 ???

[Arne Vajhøj]

JF Mezei wrote:
> Lets say they were to produce an 8086 with 64 bit addressing, and 128
> bit registers and data paths.
> 
> Are there many operations that were really benefit from that ?
> 
> Moving long strings from one location to another would be faster since
> half the fetch/strore operations would be needed to move data around.

I believe that some systems already have rather wide data paths.

> But for integer math, would it really make a difference ? How many
> applications need to process numbers greater than 2^64 ? I think that
> even Bill Gates's net worth fits comfortably within 64 bits.

Very few apps use 64 bit integer arithmetic today.

Extremely few would benefit from 128 bit integer arithmetic.

But a few things within cryptography may benefit.

Arne