Wired article says Xbox 2 will be backwards compatible

[Eco-Logic]

The link to the article is here...
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,64914,00.html

Main Quotes

" A Silicon Valley startup claims to have cracked one of most elusive goals of the software industry: a near-universal emulator that allows software developed for one platform to run on any other, with almost no performance hit.

Transitive Corp. of Los Gatos, California, claims its QuickTransit software allows applications to run "transparently" on multiple hardware platforms, including Macs, PCs, and numerous servers and mainframes."

"For example, Wiederhold said QuickTransit will allow the next-generation Xbox (which will have a Mac-like PowerPC chip) to run first-generation Xbox software (which was written for an Intel chip).

In demonstrations to press and analysts, the company has shown a graphically demanding game -- a Linux version of Quake III -- running on an Apple PowerBook.

"One of the key breakthroughs is performance," Wiederhold said. "You can't tell the difference between a translated application and a native application."

Very good news if true.

Can you CG guys confirm?

[farley2k]

Anyone else's bullshit meter go off the charts?

I mean this would be the greatest piece of software ever created.

 "a near-universal emulator that allows software developed for one platform to run on any other, with almost no performance hit."  So I can run Windows XP on my Mac?  I can run my Mac software on the PC?  Hell I can run my Dreamcast games on my PC at the same performance as they ran on the Dreamcast?  How about N64 games?

Everyone would simply buy the cheapest computer and then use this to run whatever they wanted.....glorious if true but come on.


And their "demonstrations" don't do much to convince me.  "In demonstrations to press and analysts, the company has shown a graphically demanding game -- a Linux version of Quake III -- running on an Apple PowerBook."  Umm what OS?  Because OS X is basically Linux so that isn't exactly a big woop.  


Show me the Windows Server 2003 running on an Imac and you will convince me.

[AgtFox]

Can you CG guys confirm?

I personally don't know anything and no one else outside of the Xbox group at Microsoft probably knows for sure.  Even if we did know we'd probably be bound by an NDA (non-disclosure agreement) so we wouldn't be able to say anything anyway.

[Knightshade Dragon]

I'll see what my unofficial contacts have to say....

[Andrew Mallon]

Umm what OS? Because OS X is basically Linux so that isn't exactly a big woop.

It actually is big whoop, if they're running the Intel binaries of Linux and Quake III on a PowerBook. Apple runs on a PowerPC architecture. We're talking about translating machine instructions for one type of processor to a different processor, not operating system function calls.

I have my doubts about these claims, but, if the demo is legit, it actually would be very impressive.

[Knightshade Dragon]

The unofficial comment is "HAHAHHAHAHHAHAA.....no way, no day"

Another comment from a seperate source was similar to that.

[Destructor]

The unofficial comment is "HAHAHHAHAHHAHAA.....no way, no day"

Another comment from a seperate source was similar to that.

Nice.

Personally, I think the comment of:
"For example, Wiederhold said QuickTransit will allow the next-generation Xbox (which will have a Mac-like PowerPC chip) to run first-generation Xbox software (which was written for an Intel chip)."

basically translates into:
"The Xbox 2 COULD do this if they contacted us and licenced our software/hardware/whatever. It currently doesn't do it though."

Just a slight difference in meaning.

[whiteboyskim]

Well, if someone waved their magic wand and made it so that any piece of software could run on any computer configuration any where ever, then hail and hello would that be the Miracle of the Week. That'd be nice, but really, what are the odds of it ever happening?

Microsoft alone would freak out due to losing their monopoly in an afternoon. I think Bill Gates' Black Ops hit squad would have "cleaned" this studio out long before they could make their announcement.

[Andrew Mallon]

Microsoft alone would freak out due to losing their monopoly in an afternoon. I think Bill Gates' Black Ops hit squad would have "cleaned" this studio out long before they could make their announcement.

Just to clarify, because I don't think the article is very well-written, this software wouldn't allow you to run any application for any operating system anywhere. It emulates CPUs, not operating systems. You'd still need Windows (or Linux and WINE) to run a Windows app. You'd just be able to run Windows on a paltform it wasn't specifically compiled for.

But, as everyone says, that's IF it truly does what it claims at an acceptable speed.

[Andrew Mallon]

Never mind; I am wrong. They are claiming to replace the operating system. I did a search on the web and found this:

It’s sort of a plug-in approach where companies will be able to mix and match starting and target operating systems, explained vice president of marketing Ed McKernan. “We have a different front end and back end,” he said. “The front end is our decoder. The back end is the encoder part that encodes the optimized block code to the target CPU.”

The QuickTransit software, based on technology from the University of Manchester, differs from other kinds of emulation, such as Microsoft’s Virtual PC software, acquired from Connectix, in that it doesn’t bring up an emulation of the target system’s operating system.

“We’re replacing the system virtualization layer and the operating-system layer,” McKernan said.

This does sound really pie-in-the-sky.

[Knightshade Dragon]

Ah yes, the "Operating System Layer" .  That must go right next to the "cream-filled layer" and "magic brownie" layer in the OSI model.  I'm calling shenannigans.

[Bullwinkle]

The unofficial comment is "HAHAHHAHAHHAHAA.....no way, no day"

KD, is that unofficial comment regarding this crazy scheme (so crazy, it just might work) or the idea of backward compatability in general?