alt Hacker News> baffled that Intel seriously thought they would've been able to persuade anyone to switch to it from x86
They did persuade SGI, DEC and HP to switch from their RISCs to it though. Which turned out to be rather good for business.
Replies
zinekeller • today at 7:02 AM
SGI and DEC, yes, but HP? Itanium was HP's idea all along! [1]
I suspect SGI and DEC / Compaq could look at a chart and see that with P6 Intel was getting very close to their RISC chips, through the power of MONEY (simplification). They weren't hitting a CISC wall, and the main moat custom RISC had left was 64 bit. Intel's 64 bit chip would inevitably become the standard chip for PCs, and therefore Intel would be able to turn its money cannon onto overpowering all 64 bit RISCs in short order. May as well get aboard the 64 bit Intel train early.
Which is nearly true 64 bit Intel chips did (mostly) kill RISC. But not their (and HP's) fun science project IA64, they had to copy AMD's "what if x86, but 64 bit?" idea instead.