Does AMD have a next gen performance CPU planned?

hopefully amds new piledrivers cpus in 2015 are going to turn things around

I think it depends what you're doing with the processor. For a lot of people, gaming is important and an i3 has the same cpu performance in games as the fx 8xxx series, even the fx 9xxx series in some games. (strictly cpu performance, gpu out of the equation). Intel's are more power efficient the way things stand and an i3 is a little cheaper than an fx 8xxx. If the fx has better value based on price than the i5 4690k, the same could be said of the g3258 over the fx 8350. Doesn't quite perform as well, but it's cheaper.

Amd hasn't abandoned the desktop cpu market entirely, but it's definitely on the back burner while the work on mobile apu's and efficient server chips as well as gpu's. For right now thing have been and will probably continue to be fairly stale over the next year. Looking forward to them competing again, it pushes everyone and makes for a win/win for both amd and intel fans.

Just a heads-up, Soul Man.

Intel introduced Sandy Bridge in January, 2011. Ivy Bridge and Haswell are rooted in SB, and simply variations of the 'theme'. The only major revision in the ISA was the AVX2 instruction set brought forth in Haswell (and AMD FMA3 support, of all things ...), and placing voltage regulation on-chip (which will be removed in Skylake ).

Both AMD and Intel are generally on 4-year development cycles for 'major' changes in architecture. Broadwell was supposed to be released this year by Intel as a 'refresh' of Haswell but will not be seen until June or so, along with Skylake, the next big leap.

Intel. of course, spends lots of dough on node-shrinks. This bit them on the butt last year when they had to idle a good bit of their 22nm capacity, and delay 14nm for a year.

No worries, though. They have lots of cash to see them through.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-cpu-review-overclock,3106-5.html

Other than a couple older first gen i7's, the fx series isn't on the same tier as i5 or i7. It's a couple of first gen i7's and the rest i3's.

In many of these, either the cpu's were all close across the entire spectrum or where they differed, even the i3's often outperformed the fx 8350.
http://www.hardwarepal.com/2014/09/28/best-cpu-gaming-9-processors-8-games-tested/

http://wccftech.com/the-ultimate-cpu-benchmark-showdown-intel-haswell-refresh-vs-amd-vs-your-wallet/

The upper end i5's reside in tier 1 while even the fx 9xxx stays in tier 2 in this comparison. Slightly different from tom's assessment, but for the most part pretty similar.
http://elitegamingcomputers.com/the-best-gaming-cpus/

It's not just in gaming, here's an overview of cpu comparisons for workstation builds where again even when the fx 8350 is placed against the lower end i5, the i5 is still preferred for performance/efficiency.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/6492/workstation-buyers-guide/2

Granted that article is 2yrs old, but it's relevant since the fx 8350 was around in dec 2012. It was having difficulty competing with i5's from 2yrs ago. It's still the same 2yr old chip trying to compete against i5's that came out 7mo or so ago.

Other than a small handful of memory intensive multithreading scenarios where the fx 8350 comes out ahead, the older i5 4670k handles it and then some. Keeping in mind, the i5 is just a flat quad core - no ht. The fx is 8 core so should vastly outperform a processor with half the cores in multithreaded comparisons. Forget single threaded.
http://www.cpu-world.com/Compare/446/AMD_FX-Series_FX-8350_vs_Intel_Core_i5_i5-4670K.html

Not saying amd is a bad processor, just being realistic. Everyone's gripe is that the i5 costs more. It performs better, why shouldn't it? No one complains that an i5 costs more than an i3.

In very few specific conditions, the 8 cores of the amd will actually prove useful. In the other majority from workstation, graphics, gaming etc the intel overruns it. Amd needs to come out with something newer and hopefully competitive in performance, not just because they cut price way down. If amd had left the original prices where they were, they wouldn't sell. Intel hasn't had to lower prices and over the course of 12mo+ intel cpu prices remain rock solid. In a way I'm glad intel hasn't decided to price cut their cpu's, if they did they'd all but run amd completely out of the desktop cpu game for good. The current situation already is gloomy, from both sides. Amd hasn't put anything new out in what, 2yrs for the fx line? The a8's and a10's weren't designed to compete with i5's and i7's. Intel in turn has somewhat stagnated because there's no pressure.

The FX-83xx processors thump i5s in well-threaded applications and games...

But, please, keep whistling past your fan boy graveyard.

Here's a benchmark that test your well threaded applications, and the Intel CPU's are on top.

http://www.headline-benchmark.com/cpu-list/x/

Yah notice how the Intel fan-boy propaganda uses obscure subjective 'charts' 'synthetics' and 'rankings'?

They're no more synthetic than the blender or 3ds max charts. You did see where tom's ranked the fx 8xxx and 9xxx second tier right? All benchmarks are synthetic in one form or another. Even when using real programs they're set to specific operations for a fixed duration with xyz capabilities enabled or disabled in an attempt to regulate the benchmark and to make sure the task is equal for both cpu's. There's not some bloke sitting there mousing around in 3ds max with a stopwatch. lol. Those are also old benchmarks. Just because amd hasn't put anything new out in years, doesn't mean ivy bridge was intel's last chip. Amd advertises 8 cores - and managed not even a 20sec lead over an old 4 core intel half its' size in 3ds max? pfft. Keeping in mind, the i5 is intel's middle of the road and aside from two thread heavy benchmarks puts the whoop on the best amd has to offer. The 4 core i7 beat out the 8 core amd as well, in both tests.

At the end of the day, intel costs more and provides stronger performance. You get what you pay for, and it depends on what the application is. If you're serious about 3ds max or blender, you're probably running an intel to begin with. There's nothing wrong with charging more for better performance. Ferrari does it all the time.

The original question was whether amd had anything in the works and the answer is a bit dubious at this point. Amd's own speculation is uncertain and while we're about to head into 2015 they're talking about 2016 some time. Not only has intel released new chips since the fx series, their next chips are scheduled for 2015 and likely again in 2016. Although it's not like they're in a hurry with no serious competition nipping at their heels. Not sure how it would pan out if amd got out of the desktop market entirely, that would leave intel as the only option for cpu's (for desktop) and likely raise an odd question about running a monopoly. It's not even like people could opt for a mac and get something different since apple have been using intel for years under their hoods too.

Here's AMD best CPU money can buy against the new i5 4690k

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/1289?vs=1261