http://hothardware.com/News/AMD_no [...] d_for_ATI/  Here is a nice article for us Intel fans.

Don't much care about the rest except this quote couldn't be more true:

I like Intel and have never owned and probably never will own an AMD system unless AMD makes a product that is considerably better than anything Intel has to offer. But, I realize that consumers NEED AMD because if they go under, guess who is going to pay ridiculous prices when it comes to CPUs, video cards, mobos, etc. There has to be competition or they will be able to rape us for every penny they can. I really hope that AMD can recover and improve to give Intel something to compete against. After all, competition is one thing that improves technology.

I agree also that we need AMD,at least to keep Intel in check.I look at the AMD/Intel war,like the old Chevy vs Ford war.You like one or the other,but not both.Nothing against AMD,but Ive always preferred Intel(just like Ive always driven Fords).I hope AMD will come around,so the average working class people can still afford Intels best CPU's.

I was under the impression that this has been going on for years.

AMD's K8 WAS quite a bit better than Intel's offering at the time of release, the Pentium 4 Prescott. AMD also beat Intel to dual core.  
AMD's K7 was also a competitive processor at much lower prices.  
 

where were you for 2-3 years???

Read my post again. I NEVER said that AMD wasn't better than Intel at some point in time. Certainly they WERE, but NOW they are not. I was referring to what I would own in the FUTURE. I will only own Intel CPU's unless AMD comes up with something that is too good to pass up, however I don't see this happening any time in the near future. Hopefully they WILL come out with something because it will drive Intel prices down because they will have to be competitive if they want to sell their product.

 
I've owned both AMD and Intel powered computers, so don't consider myself a fan of either. That said, the article should be considered very bad news for Intel fans. Right now, Intel fans are getting very powerful chips for very cheap prices. Without AMD to provide some competition, I think Intel would jack its prices through the roof and have little reason to introduce even better chips.  
 
The same would go for fans of Nvidia cards. Nvidia has done very little over the past year since the 8800 series came out. Even the G92 cards so far haven't been all that exciting, as they still don't beat the year old 8800 GTX. If the ATI 3870 wasn't there to provide some heat on the 8800's, would Nvidia be working to give us better stuff, or keep the prices down?
 
I hope that AMD/ATI survives, and I know they have to offer some decent products to to that, but I really fear what might happen if the company dies.  

Even if AMD does end up going out they will be bought and survive. Most likely via IBM as IBM has always helped AMD out with their products.  
 
Thats not too bad of an idea but I don't think IBM is going to be much in terms of "life" changing for AMD. Just they will have more life infused into them.
 
Right now even without AMD Intel is pushing to have the superior product with their tick tock strategy. AMD might only play second fiddle even as a sub of IBM or Samsung or whoever but will always be around to keep Intel in check.
 
But even without AMD I think Intel has changed quite a bit and will still provide a good CPU for a good price for everyone in every and not crazy prices as 45nm and 32nm will cut costs and they have become much more efficient and have more good CPUs per wafer than back in the old P1/P2II days especially since there are more per wafer.
 
But if AMD want to survive they have to do something I like to call walking. No more talking or paper this and paper that. In fact they need to let ATI do what they do best and focus on only GPUs and everything else be done seperately. I think they also need to oust Hector and get a real CEO who knows what he is doing.

 
So true....let's just hope AMD can recover.

if AMD goes down, I'm switching over to IBM G5 or Sun Sparc . Descent Intels are too expensive for me

 
Sorry at the off-topic comment, but you have to first grant that the G92 GTS beats the GTX in half the games, as well as 3dMark06. Secondly, performance isn't the only thing to consider. The G92 beats the GTX in size, power consumption, overclockability, heat (on the GTS), and price at time of release. These are all positive as well.

 
The assumption that IBM or some other company will by AMD is just hot air being blown around or false hopes. No successfull company who could afford to buy AMD would. AMD isn't worth a nickel right now, they are in debt for more than what they could be liquidated for, and if you buy the company you buy the debt. It will take years for AMD to recover unless they can kill the surge Intel is having which is not going to happen. AMD cannot make enough money right now to operate a break even pace much less make enough money to pay their debts and turn a profit. Why would any company in their right mind think they could do any better with a competitor who is aggresivly firing on all 8 cylinders.  
 
There is not enough of a profitable marketplace to allow AMD to turn things around when Intel is breathing in almost all of the available air unless they can find a niche and capitalize on it.
 
If you consider that AMD's recent releases are somewhat dismal failures and it will more than likely take a partial if not total redesign for them to be able to compete and turn a good profit at the same time. This could take years to overcome if ever.  
 
All of the talk of tri core processors and continuing mass production of k8 products speaks volumes of the problems AMD is having.  
 
IBM, Samsung, Sony and so forth are in buisness to turn a profit, why would they buy a buisness which is bleeding cash and whose products are second rate in performance and yet more than likly cost half again more to produce than what it costs their main competitor?    
 
It's not good for the economy or any industry to see a succesfull company go under and leave little or no competition. We had that for years with Bell and if something wasn't done years ago to break up Ma Bell we might still all be using a rotary phone. So lets all hope that AMD can tighten their belt and suck it up. I am afraid that they may have to do somthing first which all drug addicts need to do before they can turn things around and that is first admit you have a problem, denial and pride has brought more companies down than the mistakes they may make.      
 
 

 
I think Sony are in enough trouble with the PS3 and handing over production of The Cell to buy AMD!

I hate to pile the bad news but Dirk Meyer all but confirmed in the analyst meeting that there is a STOP SHIP when he said all Barcelona and Phenom chips will be delayed till Q1 2008.

 
No, they did not beat Intel to dual core.  The Smithfield-based Pentium Extreme Edition 840 was the first x86 dual core, beating the launch of AMD's dual core Opteron by a week.  Also, the regular Pentium D series launch a couple weeks before AMD's X2 line.  The only AMD first in the race to dual core was that it was first to make a dual core for the server space, as Intel didn't specifically make a Xeon smithfield processor until November 2005.

Let's have one company suffering severely against it's competition buy another company that shares an even worse fate.