Simon Farnsworth (simon.delete@this.farnz.org.uk) on January 16, 2020 1:30 am wrote:
> The later XT/370 used a Motorola 68000 as the CPU chip, with modifications to make it work as
> a S/370 ISA CPU; it also had a modified 8087 as the S/370 ISA floating point unit. To keep the
> cost down, I'd expect IBM to go down that route for this hypothetical micro-mainframe.

The XT/370 was a couple of years later and several times the price.

>
> And IBM never meant the PC to be successfully cloned - it tried both legal routes and the later MCA bus to
> try and repair the "damage" from IBM's point of view. I agree that it would have been less successful had
> the IBM PC not been so easily cloned, but I also think that IBM would have been happier selling S/370-115
> level (and lower) performance in cloned PCs, giving IBM sales an easy route to selling bigger iron than the
> place it has ended up in, where the "IBM-compatible" market completely pushed IBM out of the PC game.

What IBM meant is not relevant.
Had the IBM PC not been cloned (against IBM's) wishes it would have not become the industry standard it did.
And we would not be having this conversation.