NVIDIA announced today that it is developing high-performance ARM-based CPUs
 

Known under the internal codename “Project Denver,” this initiative features an NVIDIA CPU running the ARM instruction set, which will be fully integrated on the same chip as the NVIDIA GPU. This initiative is extremely important for NVIDIA and the computing industry for several reasons.

NVIDIA’s project Denver will usher in a new era for computing by extending the performance range of the ARM instruction-set architecture, enabling the ARM architecture to cover a larger portion of the computing space. Coupled with an NVIDIA GPU, it will provide the heterogeneous computing platform of the future by combining a standard architecture with awesome performance and energy efficiency.

http://blogs.nvidia.com/2011/01/proj...-of-computing/

Didn't catch this earlier, some very interesting news. But to be honest, ARM/NV for desktop... I don't see this happening anywhere soon. RISC processors are no where near the computing power of current x86 series, even if they can produce a 2GHz unit which can offer smooth x264 playback, I believe it won't get you the gaming performance you'd want and neither will it be the fast office setup you're currently saving up for. Desktop and mobile are of different kind.

That does however not mean we should not care, ARM sure has proven its strength and I only wish they actually could be a desktop x86 replacement, we'll see in what direction the mobile market tends to evolve...

Microsoft announced Windows ARM version too at CES FYI ;)

I know but look at the other arguments :)

you are wrong about the speed of video playback, office files and even gaming; current handhelds are almost all RISC/ARM and they are quite good at almost all mainstream stuff, email , surfing, docs, facebook, twitter, pics, movies, music.
put an iPad into a 22" screen with faster ARM CPU and more memory, and you'll have a perfect mom&pop family PC;
Gaming wise, you must not have seen the Unreal and IDSoftware games? They look awesome for handheld, and with more horsepower available on a desktop model, won't look bad on a large screen either.

if anything, it makes for some healthy competition for x86, and let's hope Intel and AMD step up the CPU power race once again, so we can get rid of this stagnation of the last 5 years; we don't need more cores, we need better performance overall, not just with specific software;

ARM gives you a coding kit with what code the CPU can handle, and if you stick to those commands, your program will run as fast as it can go,
upside is better performance, downside is less diversity or going outside the bounds set by the hardware;
in the past RISC was maybe not that interesting for mainstream all-in-one PCs, but it's clear that the instruction set has evolved a lot to cover all facets of what a family PC should be capable of:
- voice/video calls
- chat IM
- facebook
- surfing
- gaming
- music
- movies

We all know the average mom/dad pc doesn't demand much, you can easily go with 2nd hand hardware and make a smooth pc experience out of it. But what if you go combine stuff, larger files, multiple apps, etc etc. You want a fast pc because you know the 2GHz unit will keep you waiting from time to time. I must confess I haven't seen these handheld games yet, but I'm not sure how these compare with the many console ports we'll find in the future for pc. Please don't forget x86 has come a long way since P4 era in terms of IPC and efficiency.

mom&pop also buy from ALDI, and that's where these family PCs will be promoted:)

no longer mainstream and thus you go to the top-end, which is most likely still the X86 era if you want lots of different stuff

C2D was introduced 5 years ago, and since then not much IPC improvment clock for clock has been seen, it should be 4-5x faster, however as you can see that's not the case, after 5 years we get:

Sysmark 2007; points per Ghz
- Intel 2500K (SandyB 2011): 80.3 (~30% faster than Conroe)
- Intel E8600 (Wolfdale 2008) : 63.1 (~2% faster than Conroe)
- Intel E6850 (Conroe 2006): 62
src: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/CPU/2...04.91.79 .103

30% faster since 2006.
compare CPUs from 2000 with those from 2002 and you'll see a higher speedboost.