Each hardware platform, or CPU family, has a unique machine language. All software presented to the computer for execution must be in the binary coded machine language of that CPU. Following is a list of the major hardware platforms in existence today. See platform.
CISC chips
Platform Developed by and usage
x86 Intel, AMD, Cyrix (all PCs)
IA-64 Intel
68K Motorola, mostly earlier Macintoshes
VAX Digital's mini series, VMS OS
S/370 IBM mainframes
S/390 IBM mainframes
AS/400 IBM midrange, formerly System/38
S/36 old IBM mini, System/36
Tandem fault tolerant systems, Non-Stop
Unisys Unisys mainframes
PDP/11 Digital's 1st mini
RISC chips
Platform Developed by and usage
88000 Motorola, DG, Encore
MIPS SGI, Pyramid, Tandem, NEC, Siemens
SPARC Sun and SPARC-licensed clones
PA-RISC HP workstations, servers
Alpha HP servers (originally from DEC)
PowerPC Apple, IBM, Motorola
i860 Intel, Stratus systems
ARM Arm, Ltd., embedded systems, NCs
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