AMD to stop producing performance cpu's?

[thepoomonger]

I just read an article that says that rumors report that AMD will stop producing performance cpu's (fx series) after piledriver and vishera. According to the article piledriver is not a big enough imporvement to compete wit ivybridge and upcoming haswell. It also said that AMD will focus their efforts on APU's which are doing alot better than bulldozer. What you guys think?

Article : ( http://wccftech.com/amd-rumored-discontinue-performance-cpus-piledriver-focus-apu-development/ )

 

[rolli59]

Yep but pretty old news since it was announced a few months ago.

 

[fazers_on_stun]

From the article:

We still can’t confirm how legitimate the source is since there has been no word on this by AMD themselves but for now it seems as if Steamroller and Excavator are just names to be remembered in the performance market, their core architecture would still be used in APU development. On AMD’s APU’s forefront, we would be looking at Trinity and later on Kaveri which would be the 3rd generation APU based on 28nm Richland architecture featuring new HSA improvements and Sea Islands

It would make sense for AMD to either cancel Piledriver or Steamroller, given their current financial outlook, and since much of the R&D on PD has been done already, it could very well be Steamroller than has run out of steam. Desktop is pretty much a leveled-off, saturated market anyway - it's mobile and server that are growth areas, at least outside of China (which I hear is emphasizing their Loongson homemade CPUs).

 

[thepoomonger]

From the article:

We still can’t confirm how legitimate the source is since there has been no word on this by AMD themselves but for now it seems as if Steamroller and Excavator are just names to be remembered in the performance market, their core architecture would still be used in APU development. On AMD’s APU’s forefront, we would be looking at Trinity and later on Kaveri which would be the 3rd generation APU based on 28nm Richland architecture featuring new HSA improvements and Sea Islands

It would make sense for AMD to either cancel Piledriver or Steamroller, given their current financial outlook, and since much of the R&D on PD has been done already, it could very well be Steamroller than has run out of steam. Desktop is pretty much a leveled-off, saturated market anyway - it's mobile and server that are growth areas, at least outside of China (which I hear is emphasizing their Loongson homemade CPUs).

If AMD drops out of the desktop market then who is gonna challenge intel? Maybe one of the ARM manufacturers will step up to the plate and challenge intel?

 

[rolli59]

As said before old news announced in Nov last year http://www.tomshardware.com/news/AMD-APU-Z-Series-ARM-Tegra-3,14114.html

 

[DJDeCiBeL]

If AMD drops out of the desktop market then who is gonna challenge intel? Maybe one of the ARM manufacturers will step up to the plate and challenge intel?

AMD's not dropping out of the desktop market, they're just focusing on APU's. APU's are now, and will still be used in desktops (Intel will probably go in that direction as well, at some point).

The main point is that AMD has stopped trying to beat Intel from a raw CPU performance perspective, but that doesn't mean that they're just giving up on the desktop market. They just won't compete in the high end anymore.

 

[jaguarskx]

It makes sense for AMD to drop their CPU lineup from the consumer level market. They need to cut costs and dropping socket AM3+ to focus solely on socket FMx in the consumer market will save them money (R&D as well as production).

 

[smorizio]

also smart too if there chip cost can come down then dell and hp may be using there apu in desktop pc for work and low end home units.

 

[fazers_on_stun]

If AMD drops out of the desktop market then who is gonna challenge intel? Maybe one of the ARM manufacturers will step up to the plate and challenge intel?

ARM has a LOOOONG way to go before challenging anybody on desktop ... They may find their hands full if Intel succeeds with the Atom SoC shrinks and Haswell or Bridgwell gets its power consumption down into tablet territory..

 

[fazers_on_stun]

AMD's not dropping out of the desktop market, they're just focusing on APU's. APU's are now, and will still be used in desktops (Intel will probably go in that direction as well, at some point).

The main point is that AMD has stopped trying to beat Intel from a raw CPU performance perspective, but that doesn't mean that they're just giving up on the desktop market. They just won't compete in the high end anymore.

Considering that SB and now IB have iGPUs on most desktop versions, Intel is already using "APUs" on desktop.

 

[thepoomonger]

Maybe bulldozer was the beginning of the end for AMD?

 

[DJDeCiBeL]

Considering that SB and now IB have iGPUs on most desktop versions, Intel is already using "APUs" on desktop.

Yeah, I realized after I made that comment that I probably should have clarified that by saying "Intel will probably start going "more" in that direction, with a stronger iGPU".

 

[jaguarskx]

also smart too if there chip cost can come down then dell and hp may be using there apu in desktop pc for work and low end home units.

And that can be a disadvantage as well which was reflected in AMD Q2 financial results. The pre-announcement of Trinity APU more or less cut into the sale of Llano APU. Since many people know the Trinity is supposed to be better Llano, then people would tend to postpone their purchase so that they can get a Trinity based APU.

More importantly system builder like Dell and HP knows more about computer components than the average user. They ordered less Llano OEM products in the anticipation of lower sales due to the release of Trinity. Dell and HP did not want to be stuck with "obsolete" APUs that would need to be either written off as an expense or sell them at a loss just to get rid of the inventory. Selling them at a loss also means they would potentially need to also provide tech support to these Llano desktops / laptops. So Dell / HP are loosing money on those obsolete Llano products and they have to spend money to provide tech support for those money loosing products. That in turn means more money lost. With less sales in Q2 AMD made less money.

 

[DJDeCiBeL]

I dunno about you, but that smells something reminiscent of fecal matter from hoofed animals.

:lol: I quite literally LOL'd at that...

 

[nekulturny]

I just read an article that says that rumors report that AMD will stop producing performance cpu's (fx series) after piledriver and vishera. According to the article piledriver is not a big enough imporvement to compete wit ivybridge and upcoming haswell. It also said that AMD will focus their efforts on APU's which are doing alot better than bulldozer. What you guys think?

Article : ( http://wccftech.com/amd-rumored-discontinue-performance-cpus-piledriver-focus-apu-development/ )

What do I think? Have you seen the original article from OBR? Its linked to in that site...
http://www.obr-hardware.com/2012/08/amd-fx2-piledriver-is-here-last-amd.html

Some guy with no name claims to have a super secret document probably smuggled out in a very Sandy Berger style move (hidden in underwear) that claims that x, y, z. I dunno about you, but that smells something reminiscent of fecal matter from hoofed animals.

 

[nekulturny]

lol, you should check out the link from OBR, btw, has anyone actually heard of OBR hardware before? I mean, maybe I've just been living under a rock or something, but where does this website stand in the scheme of well known tech sites like this one, HardOCP, and Aandntech?

Hell I could make a site in 5 minutes and claim I have secret documents that prove the Loch Ness Monster has been confirmed real by thermal imaging satellites owned by the Russian Federation, that doesn't really make it true does it?

 

[amuffin]

AMD just can't compete

 

[sarinaide]

AMD are focusing on HSA/Fusion and cloud computing, they don't have the resources to compete on x86 platform which Intel basically own.

 

[Uther39]

lol, you should check out the link from OBR, btw, has anyone actually heard of OBR hardware before? I mean, maybe I've just been living under a rock or something, but where does this website stand in the scheme of well known tech sites like this one, HardOCP, and Aandntech?

Hell I could make a site in 5 minutes and claim I have secret documents that prove the Loch Ness Monster has been confirmed real by thermal imaging satellites owned by the Russian Federation, that doesn't really make it true does it?

AWE come on man ! Everybody knows Nessy is real.

 

[womble]

Well I don't see them competing at the high end for a while, that will require some creative core redesign. Intel have always and will maintain the process technology for a while yet, though you have to wonder getting smaller is going to be more difficult).

Hope they aren't done for yet though, they do have some good ideas and the whole APU thing has some great potential. The gpu compute side of things seems to be coming along quite nicely and if openCl continues to improve and they continue to aid developers with it, who knows. The APU side of things is pretty neat and if they can engineer things so that the cpu can seamlessly grab some gpu muscle Trouble is what they are attempting is fiendishly complicated.

AMD seem to have some great ideas but their execution struggles. After all this time they still don't seem to have enabled the video hardware encoding in their videocard drivers and I imagine that even the older llano chips can get boost here.

They are doing the right thing I guess, the current x86 cores they have, whilst not bad by any means won't be stealing any speed crowns any time soon. Barring some floating point intensive workloads I'd be more than happy enough with the 8150, just not keen on the power draw for the performance on offer

At the end of the day, hope they do what they need to survive and innovate. Would be a sadder place without them and the forums would be quieter too lol

 

[manofchalk]

I hope AMD stay's in the desktop market, someone needs to keep Intel honest, even if they can only compete on the budget end on the market.

Who knows though, maybe Haswell will flop and Piledriver will be a new renaissance of AMD CPU's. I can imagine an early Quad core situation happening with 8 Core CPU's (which by all account Intel wont touch for a while, even in the premium X79 like platforms). An 8 Core with Hyperthread-like technology and optimizations to improve single threaded performance would be a significant piece of hardware, especially at the top end (So the number cruncher's and video editors).

 

[InvalidError]

Yeah, I realized after I made that comment that I probably should have clarified that by saying "Intel will probably start going "more" in that direction, with a stronger iGPU".

With some luck, OpenCL will catch on and programmers will start using it for iGPGPU so enthusiasts will not feel like their high-end CPUs come with worthless IGP.

 

[Regor245]

Hey, AMD just give Phenom II a Die-Shrink to 32/28nm. It will be more efficient, runs cooler and will overclock higher.

If you can make an 8-Core CPU with Phenom II Architecture, That would be awesome.

 

[InvalidError]

Hey, AMD just give Phenom II a Die-Shrink to 32/28nm. It will be more efficient, runs cooler and will overclock higher.

AFAIK, AMD's CPUs are still manufactured by GlobalFoundries and their 28nm plant is not ready yet.

 

[thepoomonger]

New article popped up AMD is not canceling steamroller and everything after that. They are committed to the high end market and do not respond to rumors.