September 10th, 2004
Transmeta ships Efficeon, gives NX-tech a 6th name
Transmeta has shipped its Pentium-compatible Efficeon TM8800 processor. The TM8800 is big news for Transmeta because it represents at least two first for the company. At 90 nanometers, it’s the company’s first processor to dive into the two-digit CMOS production range (the TM8600 was a 130 nm part). It’s also the company’s first processor to support the defacto x86 no-execute (NX) standard for hardware-enforced buffer overflow protection. Under the brand-name "Enhanced Virus Protection (EVP)," AMD is already shipping the same technology in its AMD64-based processors (Opteron, Athlon 64, and some Semprons) and Intel says the feature, which it has branded "Execute Disable (XD)" will arrive in its Pentium 4’s later this year.
Apparently, Transmeta couldn’t resist and gave the technology its own brand name: AntiVirusNX. Bummer. Such NX-enabled chips from the three processor companies respond to precisely the same instructions from Windows XP SP2 and, now, Red Hat Enterprise Linux. So, it seems silly that all these companies (including Microsoft and Red Hat) have a different name for the same hardware-enforced buffer-overflow protection technology (oh yeah, there are software versions too). Six different names (and acronyms to go with some of them) to be exact. So, just to rehash, those names are:
- The generic, non-vendor specific No-Execute (NX)
- AMD’s Enhanced Virus Protection (EVP)
- Intel’s Execute Disable (XD)
- Transmeta’s AntiVirusNX (there’s no acronym, but how about "AVNX"?)
- Microsoft’s Data Execution Prevention (DEP)
- Red Hat’s ExecShield (perhaps "ES" for short?)
For operating vendors such as Microsoft, Red Hat and other distributors of Linux, my expectation is the branding of NX technology will play a supporting role in how their products are marketed. But, when the capability shows up in volume next year (in other words, when Intel rolls it out), don’t be surprised if you see system vendors making hay over the capability in hopes of getting non-NX system users to upgrade.
