everyone keeps asking me why x86 uses an 8-bit byte, but I'm struggling to find an explanation that makes sense to me. Can any of you help?
what I've found so far
- it looks like x86 evolved from the intel 8008 (from 1972), which was an 8-bit CPU
- the 8008 came after the 4004, which was 4-bit
some questions I have:
- was the reason to build an 8-bit CPU to increase the size of the instruction set? or something else?
- did x86 really directly evolve from the intel 8008?
would love any links!
or maybe the reason was that the 8008 was a popular microprocessor, and it happened to use an 8-bit byte so it became the foundation for all of intel’s future microprocessors, but in theory they could have also built a microprocessor with a 10-bit byte instead and that would have been fine too?
@b0rk I really doubt it.
I mean, I'm sure we could have standardized it at other sizes, but whatever size we picked would have had to have been a power of two, right? Just due to the nature of binary storage, it makes things way easier.
