I have two ways of looking at processors. If I'm in geeky-engi- neer mode, I'm thrilled to learn about the hard-core technical details, like how the branch prediction works, why the DMA engine is breathtaking in its sophistication and complexity, how the chip uses a revolutionary new method for implementing . . . whatever.

But if I'm in product development mode, and I have to choose a processor, the last thing I want to hear is how complicated it is. I'd rather hear how straightforward it is. I want to be able to visualize how I'm going to use the chip, from early design through final testing. I want to be assured that the underlying complexity will not create obstacles for me. My geeky engineer side may appreciate the processor's sophisticated architecture, but that's not the side that's going to buy the chip.

Unfortunately, many processor vendors gear their product pitches to geeky engineers. Maybe they think they need to explain the gory technical details to differentiate themselves from competitors. Or maybe it's just easier to make a complicated technology sound complicated than it is to make it sound simple. Whatever the reason, it's a bad strategy.

It's especially bad for marketing multicore chips. These chips are inherently more complicated than single-core chips. Everyone knows this. Engineers may be attracted to the idea of using the latest, most-powerful technology, but they aren't going to buy it if they think they'll go insane from the complexity. The multicore-chip vendors need to convince them otherwise.

I'm not proposing that vendors snow their customers. If a chip is confusing or difficult to use, no amount of marketing can fix that. But too often, multicore-chip vendors that could provide credible explanations of why their chip is straightforward to use choose instead to focus on its complicated technical underpinnings.

Whether a multicore chip is successful in the market will depend as much on the vendor's ability to make it look (and be) unintimidating as on the chip's architectural bling.

By Jeff Bier, president of Berkeley Design Technology, Inc. (www.BDTI.com), a consulting firm providing analysis and advice on DSP technology.Jennifer Eyre of BDTI contributed to this column.