funny thing is that x86 has had so much development to compinsate for those deficincies, take alook at the benchmaarks for gcc compilers and you tend to see that x86 code runs faster, smaller and compiles quicker. its sad but true people are just a bit to familliar with it (i balme windows , personally i would lave to see miicrosoft move into other processor markets, specifically sparc and power PC. and im not ttalking about winece)
i did look at the via chipss awhile ago but when it comes to low power x86 chips arenot your best friend, it may be nice thaat the new AMD chips idlee at 6W however a fully loaded ARM chip runs at about 1W max
i wish i new x86 asm better (and more specifically thhe amd64 extensions) as from what i can see the processor exsists in "modes" each with a compleattly new instruction set. if this is the case then i imagine the microcode would be huge (andtherefore consume alot of power)
i also connsidered power PC but in terms of power they are more for "wall connected" devices, there is a reason why nearlly all wifi cards have an arm7 processor and why nearrly all mobiles are an arm processor, they are just so light on thepower usage compared to most other chips. but then again its thier primary drive unlike the other guys who add it on as a "feature" rather than an "architecule desiign requierment"
arm is nicce but i think that x86 is starting to cllean up after itself, as i said earlier performance is secondary, they only add features if it gives a good performance boost, has few tranisitors and a low power reqquiremnt. aand even then i think they would only make it optional (ARM only sells designs not actual chips, you get the code, plugin a few varibles and it spits out a design)
i would still love to get a quad core chipset however it seems like no one is offering them except as an ASIC, now if i had the case i would get a custom built ASIC with nearlly everything on board (huge power savingss) howerver i dont have the time or money
