> Interesting that ARM1 was only 25,000 transistors. Did the i386 really have additional features that justify an order of magnitude?
Feature wise, the ARM1 is probably more comparable to the Motorola 68000 from 1979, both have ~16 32bit registers, no MMU and no instruction prefect queue. The ARM1 does have a full 32bit ALU compared to the 68000's 16 bit ALU, and a full 32bit barrel shifter, compared to the 68000's 1 bit shifter.
But the 68000 is still 68,000 transistors (hence the name). So not only is the ARM1 achieving about the same level of functionality with under half the transistors, but it can execute instructions significations faster.
Feature wise, the ARM1 is probably more comparable to the Motorola 68000 from 1979, both have ~16 32bit registers, no MMU and no instruction prefect queue. The ARM1 does have a full 32bit ALU compared to the 68000's 16 bit ALU, and a full 32bit barrel shifter, compared to the 68000's 1 bit shifter.
But the 68000 is still 68,000 transistors (hence the name). So not only is the ARM1 achieving about the same level of functionality with under half the transistors, but it can execute instructions significations faster.