Will i5s drop the prices of 720 BE or 955 BE next week or two?

[kwarde]

I was looking at the Phenom II 720 BE or the Phenom II 955 BE...
Should i wait a week to see if the i5 will drop the prices on these two?
Thanks

 

[jj463rd]

I think everybody has been wondering about that too.
It will depend a lot on the performance of i5 especially the 750 and how it compares to the Phenom II 955.It will probably outperform it though knocking down the price of the Phenom II 955 somewhat in a price war.

 

[fazers_on_stun]

If the i5's officially debut on the 6th or 8th, then I'd guess AMD will put in price cuts early next month, or sooner if the reviews of the i5 are positive here, Anand's, etc. That is, assuming AMD's priority is still maintaining marketshare.

 

[Wisecracker]

AMD is conducting an early (pre-preemptive) launch of Athon II x4s next week (before the 45w Propus the end of the month) to take some steam out of i5.

Rumahs say the early Propus are cut down Denebs and unlock to quad Phenoms. The way to tell is if the wattage is listed 65-95w.

All for the cool, cool price of $100 - $130.

 

[Scotteq]

The potential is certainly there for prices on existing parts to fall.


But if you want my opinion (...and many here probably won't. But that's OK, because the preceding phrase should be a clear indication I've already thought about that, don't particularly care, and therefore am going to tell you anyhow...) - AMD need to be charging more for their parts, not less. Undercutting the marketplace in order to gain/maintain market share is absolutely a viable near term strategy. But sooner or later, the corporation must be profitable. That'll never happen unless AMD charge enough to make money.

 

[seabreeze]

I've been checking three of my main suppliers at the distributor level and AMD prices are not moving, even though I'm seeing hundreds of i5-750 movements in stock levels. One supplier had 600 units come in and out with about 90 back ordered in the space of three hours.

Another supplier knocked usd55.00 off the price for i5-750.

No distributor seems to be pushing AMD or making price attractive AMD bundles. It's all very quiet....

One thing I'm still seeing is very strong movement of Pentium Dual-Cores, mainly E5300, and some other C2Ds. Who knows what's going on!

 

[invisik]

I believe amd will drop the price 10-15$ to compete.

 

[jj463rd]

AMD is conducting an early (pre-preemptive) launch of Athon II x4s next week (before the 45w Propus the end of the month) to take some steam out of i5.

Rumahs say the early Propus are cut down Denebs and unlock to quad Phenoms. The way to tell is if the wattage is listed 65-95w.

All for the cool, cool price of $100 - $130.

Interesting it looks like Intel will have the $170 priced (i5,i7) and above CPU market while AMD looks to rule the budget market a lot except when Core i3 comes out but then again with Intel's Integrated graphics i3 will probably be used by non gamers.

 

[redwine01]

just like jj463rd said i think it depends on which processors are the i5's going to compete with.. if it can compete with the 720be or beat it ( as far as i know it will )and priced very close to that then 720be price will be reduced to maintain a gap to judge the price/performance level.

@jj463rd why not i3 will be used for gaming? i dont know much about the processors all i know is it will be a mainstream entry in 32nm. but they have said that the integrated gfx will run alongside with ur other video cards and will support them. just wondering about it.. but i think the integrated gfx will not be a powerful one just for a support for ur video cards u still will require good cards to play games in good resolution...man intel is getting very aggressive i think it will create a lot of pressure on amd as amd provides simillar performance in less price and in mainstream market amd is a very good choice if u want performance in less price.. i hope amd have something mainstream to market with i3s and survive the storm nicely...amd actually got back in the game with their phenom II i m happy to see it.

 

[fazers_on_stun]

The potential is certainly there for prices on existing parts to fall.


But if you want my opinion (...and many here probably won't. But that's OK, because the preceding phrase should be a clear indication I've already thought about that, don't particularly care, and therefore am going to tell you anyhow...)

LOL - now that's a disclaimer if I ever saw one

AMD need to be charging more for their parts, not less. Undercutting the marketplace in order to gain/maintain market share is absolutely a viable near term strategy. But sooner or later, the corporation must be profitable. That'll never happen unless AMD charge enough to make money.

110% agreed. AMD just seems megalomaniacal about marketshare, not to alliterate too much . IIRC they stated in some antitrust hearing (probably EU) a couple years ago that they needed at least 30% to survive. So I suppose that if they cannot get to that figure via competition, they'll attempt it through gov't intervention. They did spend nearly $200K of their negative profits on gov't lobbying last year, according to some recent news link. I'm sure some of that was not anti-Intel lobbying, but then I'm also sure much of it was...

OTOH, Intel spend something like $750K on gov't lobbying. Let's hope none of that was for anti-Intel purposes .

 

[fazers_on_stun]

I've been checking three of my main suppliers at the distributor level and AMD prices are not moving, even though I'm seeing hundreds of i5-750 movements in stock levels. One supplier had 600 units come in and out with about 90 back ordered in the space of three hours.

Another supplier knocked usd55.00 off the price for i5-750.

No distributor seems to be pushing AMD or making price attractive AMD bundles. It's all very quiet....

One thing I'm still seeing is very strong movement of Pentium Dual-Cores, mainly E5300, and some other C2Ds. Who knows what's going on!

Interesting. I'd hope AMD is monitoring the situation as well, and won't get caught with their pants down. Again.

 

[darkvine]

The potential is certainly there for prices on existing parts to fall.


But if you want my opinion (...and many here probably won't. But that's OK, because the preceding phrase should be a clear indication I've already thought about that, don't particularly care, and therefore am going to tell you anyhow...) - AMD need to be charging more for their parts, not less. Undercutting the marketplace in order to gain/maintain market share is absolutely a viable near term strategy. But sooner or later, the corporation must be profitable. That'll never happen unless AMD charge enough to make money.

hey make profit by gaining that share of the market. If they raise the price more they will lose a large share of their buyers which won't make up for the incense in profits on what they do sell. AMD works hard for the image of "cheap but good" they aren't simply forced into low prices they are actually aiming for it and many people buy them because of it.

They have gained so much of a foot hold in the GPU world because they are very powerful cards but half the price of Nvidia. Raising prices is the last thing they want to do, not until they have something that can out right destroy the core i7 and GTX 285.



Anyways I am fairly sure that the price of the lower end AMD will drop though I can't say by how much because the 720 BE is already a very affordable CPU.

 

[Scotteq]

hey make profit by gaining that share of the market. If they raise the price more they will lose a large share of their buyers which won't make up for the incense in profits on what they do sell. AMD works hard for the image of "cheap but good" they aren't simply forced into low prices they are actually aiming for it and many people buy them because of it.

Understand this: According to their last financial results (and the ones before that, and the ones before that, and the ones before that...), AMD are not making a profit on a Per Chip Basis. About the best you can say is they are digging the hole much more slowly than they have in the past. They've been cutting people and services for quite some time. There's not a lot left internally for them to cut and still function effectively.

Like I said earlier: It's a perfectly viable business strategy to undercut the competition in order to gain/maintain market share. But you can NOT do it forever.

AMD are not running a charity. They are a publicly traded corporation and sooner or later need to turn a profit. The internal cuts are completed. The spin offs are completed. What's left is to charge more. Or at the *very* least, charge no less.

 

[darkvine]

Understand this: According to their last financial results (and the ones before that, and the ones before that, and the ones before that...), AMD are not making a profit on a Per Chip Basis. About the best you can say is they are digging the hole much more slowly than they have in the past. They've been cutting people and services for quite some time. There's not a lot left internally for them to cut and still function effectively.

Like I said earlier: It's a perfectly viable business strategy to undercut the competition in order to gain/maintain market share. But you can NOT do it forever.

AMD are not running a charity. They are a publicly traded corporation and sooner or later need to turn a profit. The internal cuts are completed. The spin offs are completed. What's left is to charge more. Or at the *very* least, charge no less.

And understand this, most people buy AMD because they are cheaper. If they raise their prices they will lose a large number of their customers, not enough to balance out the difference in profit on the new sales will make.

the only way they can raise their prices enough to make a difference in their bank accounts is to make something that can flat out beat the i7 920. There is no way in hell they will make any money if they are pricing at the same as Intel without the same or better performance, they will lose the very large chunk of their current sales which are people on a budget.

 

[darkvine]

What I am saying is they do NEED to raise the price but they NEED to raise the performance to justify it as well.

 

[Scotteq]

And understand this, most people buy AMD because they are cheaper. If they raise their prices they will lose a large number of their customers, not enough to balance out the difference in profit on the new sales will make.

the only way they can raise their prices enough to make a difference in their bank accounts is to make something that can flat out beat the i7 920. There is no way in hell they will make any money if they are pricing at the same as Intel without the same or better performance, they will lose the very large chunk of their current sales which are people on a budget.

Understand this: When you Sell at a Loss, Selling More = Losing More. If you sell one: you lose. If you sell a thousand, you lose what you lost on the one chip, except you did it a thousand times. There is no way in heaven or hell AMD (or anyone, for that matter) will make money - Volume sales or not - by selling at a loss. They *must* charge more.

Like I said above: It's a viable strategy for maintaining or gaining market share in the short term. There's even a business term for it: It's called 'Buying Market Share'. But sooner or later, you have to turn that market share into a profit.

And please note that I purposely left the base technology out - partly because so many around here get so butt~hurt over real or perceived slights towards the company they happen to be a fanboi of. But business is business,and I don't care if it's semiconductors, automobiles, vegetables, or the homeless guy selling pencils on a street corner: If you sell the goods at a loss, you still lose.

 

[dirtmountain]

Neweggs pricelist for LGA1156 motherboards and CPUs.
http://img269.imageshack.us/img269/9513/1252106973761.png

i5 750 = $210
i7 860 = $300
i7 870 = $580

all motherboards $100+
crossfire gaming 8x/8x Biostar $135 is the lowest priced.

 

[redwine01]

from my knowledge what i will suggest to amd is to grab the market share and market attention as much as possible by having an excellent price/performance ratio. if they can build a brand image according to this then if they can pump out 2 high end processors that can compete head to head with intel's top end processor then they can charge higher for those processor making some profit from those processor. but as they build their brand image as a "PRICE/PERFORMANCE" brand it will be hard for them to charge more than intel even with an excellent processor. becoz people already make a brand association in their mind they already perceive "AMD" to be a "low price good performance" brand. So this is a key brand insight for "AMD" and if AMD changes it lots of people will be disappointed. People's general perception is "AMD charges LOWER than intel but gives GOOD performance". Think about the general market not the enthusiast one. Enthusiast people search info before they buy so they are more dynamic than the general people. As they change their knowledge continuosly enthusiast people's brand perception "Changes" more than general people. The only way they can do profit IMO is
-getting 2 high end processors in the market for enthusiast people selling them in high price.
- Trying to reduce the cost of processor and make midrange processors for general people and sell it at a price a bit lower than intel
- Getting the brand much well known in the market and making the general people believe that intel is not the only choice they have got. amd is there to give them a better solution in the same price they are paying. Brand awarness and knowledge is a big issue here. They need to expose the name "AMD" more and more to the people making it more visible and having a greater shelf space(and that can be done by sponsering events or paying some big companies like dell)

if they can do this i think they will be much more profitable in the market. Simply by charging higher or lower doesnt do any good. It all about handling consumers' mind and their perception. U have to think how consumers will react if u do something.

 

[fazers_on_stun]

^ Unfortunately all of the above takes $$, and lots of it. As I pointed out in some other threads here, AMD is currently spending something like 35% of its income on R&D, Intel < 15%. Since Intel's income is around 10x that of AMD's, Intel still spends far more on R&D than AMD does. Given the complexity of designing modern-day CPUs, there's generally a direct correlation between the R&D funds spent and how well the ensuing designs work. Granted it's not a perfect correspondence - just look at Prescott-Netburst & Barcelona's initial release for example. However if you look at the overall trend lines you'll see the relationship.

Of course, AMD likes to form consortiums (HTT, SOI process with IBM et al) so you really have to take those R&D dollars into account as well since the results are shared between the partners. And Intel of course spends R&D dollars on SSDs, graphics, process, etc besides CPU designs. However I'd bet a donut that Intel spends more on x86 CPU design than AMD and its partners do.

If AMD could have brought Bulldozer forward to next year, instead of sometime in 2011 which is what AMD is saying, then they would stand a better chance of regaining the top end. But the longer they wait, the more advances Intel makes and with Intel's tick-tock schedule, AMD is hard pressed to keep up let alone cut down the gap.

That's not to say that game-changers are not possible - somebody working in Santa Clara might discover a new super-duper veeblefeltzer transistor tomorrow (well maybe Tuesday since tomorrow & Monday are days off from work ). But CPU & silicon semiconductor tech is mature now, and the chances of such "eureka" discoveries are correspondingly more remote.

Ditto for process tech - Intel is, and is likely to remain, a full year ahead of AMD or GF. AMD has confirmed BD will be the first 32nm CPU for them, so that means 32nm SOI is probably at least a full year or maybe 18 months behind Intel. The die shrink & process maturity yield increases mean that it becomes cheaper to make CPUs.

 

[redwine01]

still even after bulldozer AMD will do just a bit without the marketing effort believe it or not. Still general people will buy intel. in my country i will bet my ass there is only 1% pc user who uses AMD. becoz in our market there is no latest AMD cpus after athlon its really hard to find AMD motherboards. So intel is the only choice here. if u tell them do u want to go with AMD they will probably tell u is it in a dvd or a cd? lol...but yes getting bulldozer earlier will make AMD much more highlighted in the websites and in the retail shops. so yes getting it out earlier is the next big thing AMD want to do if they want to be in the game of processor

u r right about the processor market getting into the maturity stage. and in mature market its more tough to make profit intel said that they can go upto 10nm die maybe a little bit lesser than that also but after that it will be real hard for any of the manufacturer to come out with newer version of die. Intel has foreseen this thing and thats why coming out with processors with integrated gfx to differentiate the product in the market. Intel's step in I3 with IGP i think is a very good one if not the best it will make intel more credible and well known in the market and at the time giving intel more headroom for charging for a "differentiated processor". AMD NEED to get more money out at this moment or they are going to see flying stars over their head in the future. i just hope AMD can do something magical to take the performance crown from intel with their new cpu. i m not an AMD fan btw in my whole life i never used AMD all intel i just want them to compete with intel