How to fix AMD

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TechnologyCoordinator

TechnologyCoordinator

Splendid
Feb 22, 2006
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LOL

Well, first off, if Phenom was going to be such a failure they should have at least launched 10 months ago instead of delaying it. Recalling your processors the day they launch isn't good either.

At my workplace I always underpromise and overdeliver. AMD takes the opposite approach, they overpromise, underdeliver, and NDA the hell out of the press.
 
zenmaster

zenmaster

Splendid
Feb 21, 2006
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AMD yanked the 2.4Ghz version of the Phenom.
The 2.3Ghz version is now the fastest they are going to deliver initially.

Basically, corruption in the L3 cache as you increase the clock speeds.

AMD said it was rare, but I suspect it's fairly common.

I was reading one reviewer who went to AMD's press show were the press was allowed to test the devices, apparently they were not allowed to OC any of the computers they had for running their tests.
They only Computer they could OC was a specially designated one, and on that one they were not allowed to have any Benchmarking software. Probably since that could lead to stability issues.

THG review is an example - There are 0 OC benchmarks.
However, the poster claimed they were able to OC stable at 3.0Ghz.
How can you make that claim w/o running software?
I guess he meant it booted :>>>

A few of the sites actually did try to OC their test boxes despite being told not to and claimed serious boot failure at much lower speeds than that and the inability of the benchmark software to run after even moderate OCs.

It looks like whoever is getting the first revisions of the Phenoms are going to have some serious issues with stability.

I heard someplace that AMD is going to patch some of the existing BIOS machines to simply disable L3 cache to correct the stability issues.
However, this is going to hurt performance by another 10%.

AMD hopes to have the L3 cache bug fixed in the next stepping, but we will have to wait to see if they can. Apparently this bug is why they kept lowering the speeds at which they were going to ship. They kept lowering the clocks until they found a speed that did not break L3.

They thought they were good at 2.4Ghz, but apparently not.
If you buy a 2.3Ghz, cross your fingers that yet another drop of 100mhz will finally solve the problem.
 
S

San Pedro

Distinguished
Jul 16, 2007
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Hold on, and cater more to gaming market with quad fire and Fusion technologies. AMD does not have the cash to beat Intel at Intel's game so they have to do different things to win market share.
 
sailer

sailer

Splendid
Apr 9, 2006
4,970
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That would be a good start, as well as hiring Lee Iacoca or someone of equal ability and vision. Then they might try not lying about the products and getting them out the door in sufficient quantity to sell. Phenom, as well as the HD 2900, was first supposed to come out last winter. That was when it should have been released. Were there problems with Phenom? Sure, but there still are, so what did waiting until now accomplish? Also, if the problems are not able to be fixed, then they should have abandoned the design and go to another rather than to lie about it and make a fool of themselves.

Another thing would be to ask some serious questions of themselves. What made them great, what did they come out with and how did they do it? If the 939 platform and chips were just an accident, then trying to dulicate the accident is a fool's game.

The QFX from last year had some real possibilities. Sure, it used too much power, put out too much heat, and wasn't able to be clocked very high. But we've seen the 5000+ Black Edition come out and it doesn't use too much power, doesn't put out too much heat, and from what I've read can be overclocked to 3.5 ghz. How well might the QFX done if the 5000+ BE had been adapted for the it? It might not have beaten Conroe, etc, but it sure would have been better than anything else they have done. Add with that the using DDR2 1066 ram, or DDR2 533 that was doubled, along with having all the ram addressed by both chips instead of splitting the ram with 2 slots per CPU and the platform may have really taken off. But we'll never know, because it wasn't done.

Just some thoughts.
 
M

morg

Distinguished
Dec 21, 2005
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Intel and AMD are both good companies.

Intel actually has a serious advantage with the core 2. Intel MUST keep the same tempo for two entire year and AMD will be nearly dead.

Intel's last mistake was to try luring consumers into buying bad products pretending it will be better. prescott had nothing new, AMD got A64 out. intel tried to make it better, AMD did X2. Intel tried to follow amd's way, they burned themselfves with the Pentium D.

then, they started being good. i guess it's harder to change for intel than it is for AMD as a smaller company but...

right now is a straight foward race... Intel must not look back and get as fast as they can
 
S

sedaine

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Sep 10, 2007
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Intel can bury AMD if it wants to, but it won't. It needs AMD to succeed so that it's own engineers continues to be innovative and to keep anti-trust suits away from its front door.
 
Grimmy

Grimmy

Splendid
Feb 20, 2006
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Naaa.. that would be a terrible idea.. why? Cause then the AMD guys would complain about getting another chipset/MB. :lol:. o O (wonder what the chipset name would be... fab? Short for Fabulous?)
 
erocker

erocker

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Jul 2, 2006
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Well... Apparently Nvidia is going to be using AMD chipsets on thier motherboards now! They have to be doing something right. I also remember the same damn problem with AMD chips, when the AMD64 line was introduced, heck I still have one of those crappy chips! With a new stepping, and revision the Phenom will be a fine chip, esspecially when hooked up with other AMD stuff. As long as the price is competitive.
 
sailer

sailer

Splendid
Apr 9, 2006
4,970
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22,810
My cat just walked by and I thought of another way to fix AMD. It would be a real challenge for the Vet. You think Hector and company would go along with the idea?
 
killer_roach

killer_roach

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Aug 11, 2006
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Basically AMD has to own up to the reality of the situation, which is that they have zero room for error. They need to establish better rapport with the press, which means less sleight of hand and more candor about the situation; if they're having process issues, say it. If they have to respin their design, they need to say it. Just because Intel can absorb mistakes doesn't mean they can as well, and acting like everything is going well does nothing more than engender ill will amongst the buying public.

Another thing that they need to look into more is the ability to market a unified platform that can be readily tweaked and reconfigured. They are in a unique position to offer such a product, and I'm sure a high-performing (even if not top-performing), flexible, highly reliable complete system package would be something that would be easy enough to market. Also, the ability to use HyperTransport for drop-in co-processors would have the potential to appeal to gamers, workstation operators, or corporate IT people looking for a low-profile server.

What they need to do is stop pretending to be Intel Jr. and focus on a cost-competitive product that can do things that, at the present time, Intel cannot yet offer. Tomorrow's another day in the semiconductor industry, but sometimes learning how to survive until then is the important part.
 
Grimmy

Grimmy

Splendid
Feb 20, 2006
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:lol:. o O (Intel Jr.)

Reminds me of that Burger King commercial:

Whopper: Here, takes this..
Whopper Jr.: What is it?
Whopper: Its just an extra napkin.
Whopper Jr.: Oh.. gee.. Thanks Dr. Love.

Soo.... Amd just needs.. extra napkins?? :oops:
 
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