[0x12]

The end of DEC was the end of an era.

Alpha was (and possibly still is) one of the most elegant cpu architectures ever designed.

It just arrived too late to save DEC and that's a real pity.

DEC pretty much pioneered interactive computing and for that alone we all owe them a great deal.

It's weird how the DEC legacy got passed from company to company, now HP owns it, like an old cupboard passed on through inheritance.

Engineers went to both Intel and AMD.

Being able to engineer CPUs at that lefl is probably not the kind of skill that will see you without a job from time to time, those must be very desirable people.

[InclinedPlane]

The DEC Alpha legacy actually wound up at AMD, in the form of the early generation Athlon processors. HP abandoned the Alpha but AMD snapped up the core ideas and a lot of the talent.

[0x12]

So, you got me curious. It turns out that the IP ended up with Intel: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DEC_Alpha , I can't seem to find out who owns the brand, but the DEC brand definitely ended up with HP.

[sliverstorm]

I don't think he's talking about the legaleese but the 'spirit'.

[0x12]

Apparently a chunk of engineering went to Intel, another to AMD.