“AMD and SuSE are driving the convergence of two massive forces in computing – 64-bit computing platforms and the Linux operating system. These forces will create a new, ubiquitous information architecture.

An old adage says ‘programmers will use all available computer resources, and then some’. The unstated corollary is that software is limited by the available computing and human resources. AMD64 processors are removing the limitations of computing hardware, and in doing so will change the capabilities of every platform from massive enterprise database servers, to distributed scientific computing grids, to even home entertainment and gaming systems.

This is history repeating itself. Desktop software was severely constrained on 16-bit architectures just a decade ago. The advent of 32-bit CPUs and their extra capabilities unleashed a new wave of thinking about how applications could behave. We witnessed a rapid shift from cryptic and hostile applications, to painless GUI-based ones. From this we witnessed greater retention and sharing of knowledge.

But computing resources are only half of the story. Human resources must be optimized. The rapid adoption of Linux for enterprise, scientific, desktop and embedded systems is driving new levels of programmer intelligence. Software development is becoming streamlined as Linux becomes the defacto standard of nearly every platform. Since SuSE Linux ran natively on AMD64 from day-one, we are driving the software side of this new 64-bit ubiquity as AMD drives the hardware side.”