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AMD CPU speculation... and expert conjecture - Page 6

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November 24, 2012 10:16:48 AM

mayankleoboy1 said:
since there is no GPU thread:



https://d24w6bsrhbeh9d.cloudfront.net/photo/5911191_700...



Hahhaa, I remember that with the 4200ti a friend gave to me. The card was bathed in liquor and busted the ram. I cleaned it up and worked fine after that.

Fun times.

Cheers!
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November 24, 2012 12:26:01 PM

The HD 4890 I'm using right now a friend threw away (at me). I picked it up and saved myself the $229 it would have cost to get a GTX 660 :) . It had "RGB sand". One application of the fridge trick and it was fine.
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November 24, 2012 12:32:58 PM

amdfangirl said:
They might get Thunderman as the jury :) 

AMD4LIFE?


Thunderpants couldn't find his trousers with both hands, let alone a courthouse :kaola: 

Besides, unless he sproinged a new alias in the last 2-3 years, he hasn't been on THG with one of his drive-by flamethreads :D ..
Related resources
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November 24, 2012 12:44:37 PM

mayankleoboy1 said:
isnt this how antittrust/ monopoly laws work ?
Was it MS fault that its OS is so popular in europe, and that customers demand a web browser if they pay for a OS ? But MS got hit by antitrust laws.


Heh, I wouldn't base US anti-trust law on what the EC does - they are pretty much in the 'fine the big US corporations' to max out their funding, plus encourage Euro companies to compete by discouraging US companies..
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November 24, 2012 12:54:08 PM

de5_Roy said:
xbitlabs said 'amd cancelled/delayed steamroller excavator as we know it'. so it's possible that amd might redesign them... may be for tsmc. as for hsa, since both arm and amd are members, amd might even (re)design future apus as arm cpus cores with hsa igpus....

slightly off topic but related to the topic:
something has been bugging me. i read the earlier articles on how nvidia ended up making much more money than amd (in dgpu sector) by designing their flagship asic smaller than amd's - this was attributed as a big factor. does this mean that implementing a smaller-but-similar-or-higher-perf design helped them offset yield issues and cost? then.. what about 32 nm llano, bd and pd cpus vs sandy bridge, did intel make more money partly because of smaller die? iirc sb dies were smaller than bd dies.


As far as AMD CPUs go, to start with - back in 2005 SOI wafers cost around 3X what strained silicon wafers went for, at least at 300mm size: http://www.forbes.com/home/free_forbes/2005/0919/072.ht...

Of course that is just the starting material, but my understanding is that the processing steps are somewhat different for SOI than strained silicon, not to mention the design. And AMD or GloFlo was unable to find any other customers for SOI, which meant AMD had to bear the fab costs all alone.

2nd, lower yields as a result of a bigger die size means that an already more expensive fab cost gets magnified even further. So Intel has a lower production cost than AMD does, also GF has to make some sort of profit which means another expense to AMD..
November 24, 2012 1:04:11 PM

Does that part of Intel called "fabrication and Foundry" has to make a profit when doing business for that part of intel called "CPU business"
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November 24, 2012 7:40:27 PM

mayankleoboy1 said:
Does that part of Intel called "fabrication and Foundry" has to make a profit when doing business for that part of intel called "CPU business"


It really depends on how Intel accounts each department of the company, but if they use the "internal partners" ideology (one sells a product or service to the other), then yes. Experian uses this model/way, but I don't know the exact name for this way of doing it. Maybe its just "business", hahaha.

Each dept has its own budget and income, etc; but in the big picture, I'd say they don't need to "make a profit", just cover costs when selling internally.

Cheers!
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November 25, 2012 7:31:29 AM

mayankleoboy1 said:
isnt this how antittrust/ monopoly laws work ?
Was it MS fault that its OS is so popular in europe, and that customers demand a web browser if they pay for a OS ? But MS got hit by antitrust laws.


Only if they INTENTIONALLY abused their market position. Monoplies based on TECHNICAL advantages (EG: Simply being better) are still legal under the Sherman/Clayton Anti-trust acts anyway.

Now, if Intel actually took a loss to undercut AMD, THEN AMD would have a case.

Secondly, Intel makes CPU's. Microsoft makes OS's. If the fact Windows/OSX 98% share benefits the X86 architecture, well, good for X86 as far as the law is concerned. Feel free to drag MS/Apple into a courtroom to explain their love affair with X86, but legally, thats not Intel's problem.
November 26, 2012 4:23:27 AM

mayankleoboy1 said:
could be that AMD tried to do too many things with Tahiti : Graphics and compute.


DING DING DING DING DING

BINGO

Compute performance that no one cares about, or asked for in a mainstream consumer GPU.

ROFL. :pt1cable: 

someone will undoubtedly say "DURR, I am a super crazy developer / animator who does a lot of rendering, and needs compute"

Ok, you have a big ****, no one else cares. You alone are not responsible for driving GPU revenues. Its the kid who wants 90fps on BF3 that drives GPU revenues.
November 26, 2012 5:12:41 AM

AMD fanboys and those with a myopic viewpoint are propagating a myth that AMDs survival is necessary to keep Intel/NVidia in check. This myth is at odds with reality.

1. The HPC era is winding down, from a mainstream consumer perspective. Nobody cares about gigabertz, and cores anymore, its not 2005 (coincidentally the year AMD stopped being relevant). Dwindling PC sales, and virtually every market forecast indicates that the desktop PC will be highly irrelevant to the average consumer.

2. The future is mobile. The future is SoC. "IF AMD NOT THERE, WHO WILL STOP INTEL/NVIDIA 111!!". AMD is just the first casualty. NVidia will also go the way of the DoDo. The future is SoC. No one needs to "stop" NVidia. If they don't adapt they will also die.

3. You don't NEED a GTX 670 to game at playable framerates on most games. http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey
A small minority of users have the latest and greatest in their machines. Intel HD Graphics 3000 tops out at 4.25%. The only reason GTX 670s/Radeon 7990s sell is because nerds want e-peen, and frames they'll never see....Almost every PC game is optimized to run on cards from two generations ago.

The industry is changing in a big way. The future is SoC. AMD is just the first casualty, and them dying does not mean you are forced to buy NVidia cards for $700....NVidia will also go the way of the Dodo because dGPUs are legacy, and not the future.

4. DX9 is still the standard. Windows 8 only brings DX11.1. Nothing significant.

Basically I'm making the point that you don't need the latest and greatest ***, to play a video game. The bulk of the market spends less than $200 on dGPus. http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/display/nvidi... Just because AMD doesn't exist, doesn't mean NVidia can magically start charging $$$ for GPUs.....people will just stop buying them if the price is too much to bear.

So...AMD can burn in hell and nobody will notice.
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November 26, 2012 5:24:00 AM

^Nope.

There is a reason everyone is getting mobile solutions out.
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November 26, 2012 5:43:42 AM

hansmoleman1981 said:
AMD fanboys and those with a myopic viewpoint are propagating a myth that AMDs survival is necessary to keep Intel/NVidia in check. This myth is at odds with reality.

1. The HPC era is winding down, from a mainstream consumer perspective. Nobody cares about gigabertz, and cores anymore, its not 2005 (coincidentally the year AMD stopped being relevant). Dwindling PC sales, and virtually every market forecast indicates that the desktop PC will be highly irrelevant to the average consumer.

2. The future is mobile. The future is SoC. "IF AMD NOT THERE, WHO WILL STOP INTEL/NVIDIA 111!!". AMD is just the first casualty. NVidia will also go the way of the DoDo. The future is SoC. No one needs to "stop" NVidia. If they don't adapt they will also die.

3. You don't NEED a GTX 670 to game at playable framerates on most games. http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey
A small minority of users have the latest and greatest in their machines. Intel HD Graphics 3000 tops out at 4.25%. The only reason GTX 670s/Radeon 7990s sell is because nerds want e-peen, and frames they'll never see....Almost every PC game is optimized to run on cards from two generations ago.

The industry is changing in a big way. The future is SoC. AMD is just the first casualty, and them dying does not mean you are forced to buy NVidia cards for $700....NVidia will also go the way of the Dodo because dGPUs are legacy, and not the future.

4. DX9 is still the standard. Windows 8 only brings DX11.1. Nothing significant.

Basically I'm making the point that you don't need the latest and greatest ***, to play a video game. The bulk of the market spends less than $200 on dGPus. http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/display/nvidi... Just because AMD doesn't exist, doesn't mean NVidia can magically start charging $$$ for GPUs.....people will just stop buying them if the price is too much to bear.

So...AMD can burn in hell and nobody will notice.


You're forgetting about the Enthusiasts... If FPS and MAXing out games wasn't an issue, then why the Hell is Intel leading the CPU market?

Nvidia should buy out AMD to compete with Intel... Intel is creating GPUs here soon... should be interesting to see if they get in the Gamer's market.

Okay, To max GAMES out, ALL eyecandy to still get a good framerate, you need a decent GPU. Hence, the GTX 670 is a great value.

DX11.1 Has a noticeable Graphic difference compared to DX11. DX11.1 WILL be used in the next Gen consoles. And Windows 7 Will be (or is already) DX11.1 compatable... Look it up.

Games are getting more demanding... they're not reaching their full potential on consoles, how ever, PC's are a different scenario.
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November 26, 2012 6:04:27 AM

fazers_on_stun said:
Yeah, read that yesterday and pretty decent analysis of what went wrong with AMD. In particular paying twice as much for ATI as they should have, then shortsightedly selling off the handheld graphics unit which now is a big part of ARM-based tablets & smartphones..

Unfortunately for AMD's management, nobody could ever fix stupid..

It cracks me up when people think AMD overpaid by 2.5B on ATI when it was AMD that put the 2.5B loan against ATI assets and not AMD assets. One company or the other was going to drop by 2.5B, and only one did.

5B company with a 2.5B loan has a value of 2.5B. ATI DIDN'T TAKE OUT THE LOAN TO BUY ITSELF, AMD DID.
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November 26, 2012 1:06:00 PM

hansmoleman1981 said:
DING DING DING DING DING

BINGO

Compute performance that no one cares about, or asked for in a mainstream consumer GPU.

ROFL. :pt1cable: 

someone will undoubtedly say "DURR, I am a super crazy developer / animator who does a lot of rendering, and needs compute"

Ok, you have a big ****, no one else cares. You alone are not responsible for driving GPU revenues. Its the kid who wants 90fps on BF3 that drives GPU revenues.


You really think AMD or nVidia design their GPUs just for consumers? You do have a point in that regard though; the people that actually want/needs compute on a video card is little to say the least, but it is a market and you have choice. OTOH, rendering farms (or HPC) do use these GPUs and nVidia has been very successful there, that's why AMD had to come up with a solution to compete in that market, since it pays really well. Not volume, but pure profit.

hansmoleman1981 said:
AMD fanboys and those with a myopic viewpoint are propagating a myth that AMDs survival is necessary to keep Intel/NVidia in check. This myth is at odds with reality.

1. The HPC era is winding down, from a mainstream consumer perspective. Nobody cares about gigabertz, and cores anymore, its not 2005 (coincidentally the year AMD stopped being relevant). Dwindling PC sales, and virtually every market forecast indicates that the desktop PC will be highly irrelevant to the average consumer.

2. The future is mobile. The future is SoC. "IF AMD NOT THERE, WHO WILL STOP INTEL/NVIDIA 111!!". AMD is just the first casualty. NVidia will also go the way of the DoDo. The future is SoC. No one needs to "stop" NVidia. If they don't adapt they will also die.

3. You don't NEED a GTX 670 to game at playable framerates on most games. http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey
A small minority of users have the latest and greatest in their machines. Intel HD Graphics 3000 tops out at 4.25%. The only reason GTX 670s/Radeon 7990s sell is because nerds want e-peen, and frames they'll never see....Almost every PC game is optimized to run on cards from two generations ago.

The industry is changing in a big way. The future is SoC. AMD is just the first casualty, and them dying does not mean you are forced to buy NVidia cards for $700....NVidia will also go the way of the Dodo because dGPUs are legacy, and not the future.

4. DX9 is still the standard. Windows 8 only brings DX11.1. Nothing significant.

Basically I'm making the point that you don't need the latest and greatest ***, to play a video game. The bulk of the market spends less than $200 on dGPus. http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/graphics/display/nvidi... Just because AMD doesn't exist, doesn't mean NVidia can magically start charging $$$ for GPUs.....people will just stop buying them if the price is too much to bear.

So...AMD can burn in hell and nobody will notice.


AMD is relevant for the market, not because will keep in check prices alone, but because makes nVidia and Intel try harder in each gen. You think Intel would have come up with Conroe without AMD's pressure? We'd be stuck with Pentium 4's design to this day, I'm sure.

This is economic theory, not fanboism.

griptwister said:
You're forgetting about the Enthusiasts... If FPS and MAXing out games wasn't an issue, then why the Hell is Intel leading the CPU market?

Nvidia should buy out AMD to compete with Intel... Intel is creating GPUs here soon... should be interesting to see if they get in the Gamer's market.

Okay, To max GAMES out, ALL eyecandy to still get a good framerate, you need a decent GPU. Hence, the GTX 670 is a great value.

DX11.1 Has a noticeable Graphic difference compared to DX11. DX11.1 WILL be used in the next Gen consoles. And Windows 7 Will be (or is already) DX11.1 compatable... Look it up.

Games are getting more demanding... they're not reaching their full potential on consoles, how ever, PC's are a different scenario.


Ugh, "gamers" don't drive markets; or at least, not "PC gamers". Big publishers just target profitable platforms that are wide spread and in control (consoles), so they turn a profit in the short/medium range (quarter by quarter mentality). I do agree that PCs now drive innovation, but I don't really see profit for developers making big innovations in the PC sector; just incremental refinements of proven mechanics. I've talked about this with a friend of mine and I always tell him that Nintendo is the only innovative company left for gamers. They try to appeal new ways of making interaction with games putting their neck when they can. MS and Sony just used proven tech and do "leaking" innovation (not big improvements, but incremental or copies).

Anyway, big and expensive video cards are some-what justifiable because of bad porting or bad coding from consoles. People with regular computers can't max out most games not because of hardware limitations, but problems with some settings across the board. Too much hardware makes it a coding hell for devs. Even more when publishers don't give money to polish games down the road (bug fixing, basically) and just want to turn a quick buck.

Cheers!
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November 26, 2012 1:08:07 PM

noob2222 said:
It cracks me up when people think AMD overpaid by 2.5B on ATI when it was AMD that put the 2.5B loan against ATI assets and not AMD assets. One company or the other was going to drop by 2.5B, and only one did.

5B company with a 2.5B loan has a value of 2.5B. ATI DIDN'T TAKE OUT THE LOAN TO BUY ITSELF, AMD DID.


?? When you buy a company like ATI, you buy its assets and outstanding liabilities. If you don't have enough cash to pay for it, you take out a loan against the merged assets (which is what the senior notes are - IIRC they are "senior" or take precedence over other AMD debt such as outstanding stock that they sold to the stockholders). Immaterial whether it was "ATI assets" used to float the loan, as those became AMD assets once the buyout occurred.

If you read the article, or at all knowledgeable about the deal, you should remember that AMD wrote down the book value of ATI (i.e., the so-called "goodwill" tax writeoff) by over half the $5.4BN, which is basically an admission by AMD that the current value of ATI is lower than what AMD paid for it.

Think of it as buying a house for say $500K, using both cash and a loan, and then finding out 2 years later the house is only worth $200K. Your net worth decreased by $300K, and it doesn't matter if you took out a mortgage loan against the house or hocked the family jewels at a pawn shop :kaola:  .
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November 26, 2012 1:12:30 PM

On a positive note for AMD: http://seekingalpha.com/article/1027391-amd-s-sleeper-a...

Quote:
What Is Temash?

Simply put, "Temash" is the codename for AMD's next generation low power X86-64 APU based on the next-generation low power "Jaguar" core. The following slide from the company's presentation at "Hot Chips" reveals a number of key details about the product:

Basically, this new chip is a very serious improvement over its already successful "Bobcat" APU. It will run at higher clock speeds, do more work per clock, come packed with more cores, have an enhanced instruction set, and sport a wider floating point unit. Part of this is due to a new design, and part of it is due to a shrink from TSMC's (TSM) 40nm process to its 28nm process.

In terms of performance and performance-per-watt, the chip should be a significant improvement over the last gen "Hondo" tablet part, which has seen very few design wins due to the fact that it is power hungry and not a fully integrated SoC. "Temash" changes that by being a full SoC (meaning lower platform power).

Simply put, this chip could be what AMD needs to try to revive itself. With a ground-up, resdesigned low-power X86 core, AMD has a real chance of threatening Intel (INTC) and the various ARM (ARMH) licensees such as Qualcomm (QCOM) at Nvidia (NVDA) at the low end of the market (tablets, netbooks, cheap notebooks). A power-efficient, low-power, cheap-to-make X86 SoC that combines AMD's graphics expertise and X86 license could work out well for the company, especially as the firm restructures itself.

This could be the kind of focused product that AMD needs to swing back to profitability.
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November 26, 2012 1:23:29 PM

Ah, sounds like good news indeed. Now... The things is "when"?

According to that article, it should be out by Q4-2013, and that means a lot of wait. Intel will have the next gen Atom by then on market. It better be one hell of a product, because at that time, ARM will also have a lot of designs out the door competing. Samsung should be playing with the next Exynos at 28nm as well. Maybe a quad core or something, since Exynos 5 is 32nm and dual A15's.

Cheers!
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November 26, 2012 1:35:11 PM

Heres the problem with X86 in mobile: How many apps are written for Android/iOS for the ARM architecture? Its going to be REALLY hard for X86 to break in now. X86 in mobile is now basically reliant on Windows 8 for its success.

EDIT

Basically, its the same exact situation with ARM on the desktop: With so many apps written against X86, what are the chances it can make inroads? Not very good.
November 26, 2012 2:02:24 PM

^

IIRC, Medfield had a sorta compatibility layer that made using android ARM apps easy. At the time of launch, from the AT review, quite a large percent of the apps he tested worked.
November 26, 2012 2:26:59 PM

Yuka said:
You really think AMD or nVidia design their GPUs just for consumers? You do have a point in that regard though; the people that actually want/needs compute on a video card is little to say the least, but it is a market and you have choice. OTOH, rendering farms (or HPC) do use these GPUs and nVidia has been very successful there, that's why AMD had to come up with a solution to compete in that market, since it pays really well. Not volume, but pure profit.



you have no idea what you're talking about. Either provide proof of these phantom "rendering farms", and millions and millions of HPC clients that need the all this GPU compute power (The titan super computer doesn't count, provide proof of mainstream GPU compute needs) or shut up. Also, if you do use Titan as an example, you'd be wrong because Titan uses Tesla GPUs, not GTX 670s. Specialized products for specialized markets.

Quote:
AMD is relevant for the market, not because will keep in check prices alone, but because makes nVidia and Intel try harder in each gen. You think Intel would have come up with Conroe without AMD's pressure? We'd be stuck with Pentium 4's design to this day, I'm sure.

This is economic theory, not fanboism.


--------------------------------------------

This is like saying Fiat keeps Ferrari in check because both of them make cars based on internal combustion engines.

You're ignorant of market forces, and the relevance of AMD to the new market.

Get lost
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November 26, 2012 2:40:06 PM

gamerk316 said:
Heres the problem with X86 in mobile: How many apps are written for Android/iOS for the ARM architecture? Its going to be REALLY hard for X86 to break in now. X86 in mobile is now basically reliant on Windows 8 for its success.

EDIT

Basically, its the same exact situation with ARM on the desktop: With so many apps written against X86, what are the chances it can make inroads? Not very good.


There will be people like me who will buy into AMD's Jaguar-based APU on the simple premise that I can buy a $400 ultra-portable that runs Windows 7 for Photoshop, Illustrator and Libreoffice (I hate change, and as a consequence tablets because I'm an old grump :p  )

Here's a guaranteed sale for AMD :3.

All they need to do is to make the Lenovo x120e (Brazos) I had right now about 300g lighter and I will buy a new one next year with this chip in it :) .
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November 26, 2012 2:45:15 PM

hansmoleman1981 said:
you have no idea what you're talking about. Either provide proof of these phantom "rendering farms", and millions and millions of HPC clients that need the all this GPU compute power (The titan super computer doesn't count, provide proof of mainstream GPU compute needs) or shut up.


The broader HPC market is nearly $19B.

http://www.hpcwire.com/hpcwire/2011-06-21/idc_shares_hp...

If you really think Intel is getting in there for penny change, you need to think things a little harder.

hansmoleman1981 said:
This is like saying Fiat keeps Ferrari in check because both of them make cars based on internal combustion engines.

You're ignorant of market forces, and the relevance of AMD to the new market.

Get lost


Good thing you brought up that particular example, because is interesting to actually see how FIAT manages Ferrari as a brand. Although, Ferrari doesn't compete with FIAT directly, they do share technology. So, in that, it would be saying that Atom is fighting the I7 market share... Which it actually is; that's why Intel is going to lower power envelopes going forward, haha.

You should have used Lambo and Ferrari, or Porche and Ferrari. Now, AMD is not into extreme or enthusiast markets, so you can say FIAT and Volkswagen or FIAT and Toyota. If you take a look, Toyota gets out something, then everyone notices then starts doing so in a similar fashion. Audi, Toyota, Volvo and BMW are developing really interesting engines tech that make all other vehicles old.

Well, long story short, the "market" is driven by the variety of the companies populating the different needs. If you take out companies so that 1 or 2 remain, it only deteriorates innovation and competition as a whole. Unless, you want to try a Communist POV in that regard, I'd say it doesn't work with few driving the industry.

Also, why so raging? Did anything bad happen to you today?

Cheers!
November 26, 2012 3:00:36 PM

Yuka said:

Also, why so raging? Did anything bad happen to you today?

Cheers!


+1

@ hansmoleman1981 : Calm down, big lad.
November 26, 2012 3:07:33 PM

Quote:
2698983,292,86651 said:
The broader HPC market is nearly $19B.

http://www.hpcwire.com/hpcwire/2011-06-21/idc_shares_hp...

If you really think Intel is getting in there for penny change, you need to think things a little harder
said:


GTX 670 is not used in HPC. Go learn about Quadro/Tesla and why one of those cost 100x a GTX 680.

Try a little harder please. Don't give me useless links. Specialized products for specialized markets. Show me Tahiti 7970 being used in HPC/GPGPU compute. No one would buy a FirePro if 7970 was so awesome in GPGPU.

Prove that any significant % of 7970 buyers, buy it for its compute needs. Yea you can't, you're just blowing hot air.

You missed the point entirely. AMD is not relevant to Intel. Intel doesn't care what AMD does. AMD is to computing, what Saab was to automotive.

Quote:
If you take out companies so that 1 or 2 remain, it only deteriorates innovation and competition as a whole.


Intel owns 81% of x86. What competition?
a b à CPUs
November 26, 2012 3:31:51 PM

hansmoleman1981 said:
Quote:
2698983,292,86651 said:
The broader HPC market is nearly $19B.

http://www.hpcwire.com/hpcwire/2011-06-21/idc_shares_hp...

If you really think Intel is getting in there for penny change, you need to think things a little harder
said:


GTX 670 is not used in HPC. Go learn about Quadro/Tesla and why one of those cost 100x a GTX 680.

Try a little harder please. Don't give me useless links. Specialized products for specialized markets. Show me Tahiti 7970 being used in HPC/GPGPU compute. No one would buy a FirePro if 7970 was so awesome in GPGPU.

Prove that any significant % of 7970 buyers, buy it for its compute needs. Yea you can't, you're just blowing hot air.



You missed the point entirely. AMD is not relevant to Intel. Intel doesn't care what AMD does. AMD is to computing, what Saab was to automotive.
said:


Uhm... I actually agreed with you regarding about the market of regular video cards and heavy computing. K104 was not meant for GPGPU, nVidia already said that a long time ago; they had big Kepler for that (Quadros based on K100). That's why they slapped 256bit GDDR5 in there for the little Kepler.

Also, I think you got confused. I told you AMD didn't design GCN with regular people in mind, they needed something to counter nVidia in the HPC market. That's why they went and got the GCN arch; too bad they have to use that for both consumer and enterprise level cards, but nVidia did the same with Fermi. And I don't know why HPC folks are not buying (AFAIK) GCN based FirePros, but they do compete with nVidia now; you can go check the benchmarks from Anand and Toms for the new FirePros and Quadros. Maybe it's a porting from CUDA issue or inmmature support for OpenCL or something, who knows really; I don't attend to HPC conferences that touch the GPGPU part (or HPC conferences at all, for that matter, hahaha).

Regarding AMD not being relevant to Intel, yes I agree to some extent. That doesn't mean however that AMD going poof is not going to affect us. You could name me another company that will force Intel to innovate if AMD disappears. Do you think Intel will license x86 to another company out there? I really don't think VIA will step up to the game either, haha. Point is, AMD disappearing will affect how the market evolves and moves. If AMD declares chapter 11, I'm sure Intel shares will skyrocket; maybe nVidias too.

And it's funny you mention SAAB, because they actually had the best of the best security for cars (at least until the 90's IIRC). Too bad they were over-engineered for the time. Go see Top Gears take on SAABs history. Quite informative.

Cheers!
a b à CPUs
November 26, 2012 6:12:13 PM

^^ CUDA came out first. Now its on OpenCL to displace it. And people like me do NOT like having to change our S/W every few years. Thats part of the problem.

Secondly, in those markets, you have VERY limited chances to upgrade. And lets face it, Intel/NVIDIA are the more known brands, so they always get first look. NVIDIA also tends to have much more corporate support (EG: your desktop PC has a NVIDIA card, you need to upgrade, which brand are you going to? Exactly)
November 26, 2012 11:09:06 PM

http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/industry-and-econom...

I found that very interesting. Apparently in India, APU sales for desktop systems are going incredibly well.

Everyone is saying the desktop market is dying, but you know what? It is just dying in America and possibly Europe. China and India are still huge, developing markets for desktop PCs. These people dont' have good gaming computers or anything remotely powerful. They're not going to want some crappy tablet for consuming content. They're going to want something far more powerful to get into games. We can see that very, very clearly in that article in regards to APUs doing so well.

You want my opinion? AMD dropped Steamroller in 2013 to save cash and then fling APUs and AMD FX into developing markets like India and China and to reap massive profits from those markets. That's 2 billion people in those markets, much much larger than the American market.

If AMD India has a chip that's selling like hot cakes, and they have virtually no competition when it comes to a cheap integrated solution with a powerful GPU, they have no reason to spend money half assing something and trying to half-fix something that's majorly broken. AMD's main goal right now isn't to beat Intel, it's to actually make a profit. The best way to do that is to leverage existing intellectual property and make the most profit you can out of that property. That's exactly what AMD is doing in India.

Reap the rewards of developing markets, have Jim Keller takes the reigns on a new architecture for 20nm TSMC process when the company is profitable, and then bam, AMD is in good shape.

AMD has a big chance to turn profitable by leveraging India and China and the other developing markets. They can then possibly come out with a stronger Steamroller and catch Intel with their pants down as Intel chases ARM. The performance gains from the larger x86 cores then trickle down and improve performance on APUs and smaller cores. If Trinity was still using BDver1 cores, it wouldn't be a good product. It's not bad at all with PD, and with better x86 cores it could be an extremely good product.

If anything, I would say big x86 core R&D at AMD is on hiatus, not cancelled. Charlie @ S|A is saying Intel is going to give up on the enthusiast market as well. AMD would have the enthusiast market by the balls if they released unlocked CPUs on an enthusiast platform while Intel shovels out chips soldered onto motherboards.

Just give it time, Intel is going to shoot itself in the foot by chasing things like Medfield. Even if Medfield CPU performance is good, their GPU is god-awful. It's about 40% slower than Adreno 225 and Adreno 320 humiliates it. So do all the PowerVRs. And as we've seen with Larabee, Intel can't make a good GPU to save its life. There's a huge reason why all those articles and reviews that say "OMG MEDFIELD" are usually always lacking in GPU benchmarks.

This is like pre-K8 era. Intel is off chasing something irrelevant (pre-K8 it was chasing clock speed instead of performance) while neglecting the thing they do best (kick ass x86 high end CPUs).

People are blinded by their "Intel makes awesome x86 CPUs so everything they do is magical and perfect" goggles. Itanium, their motherboards, Larrabee, Atom, etc have all been commercial or complete failures. The only thing Intel has going for itself right now is its fabrication process and good x86 CPUs, and they seem pretty content with getting out of the high performance x86 CPU market and trying to cram an architecture that's not designed for low power into a low power form factor to compete with an architecture that's specifically designed for low power form factors.

I don't see AMD dying at all. 2013 will be very rough for them, but beyond that they have a huge future ahead of them. They could turn the company around by leveraging existing IP in emerging markets and then filling the void Intel left in the enthusiast market, hopefully by creating a platform that shares a common socket between server and desktop CPUs as opposed to enthusiast desktop and APU sharing the same socket. Hell, just put all of them on the same socket. Who the hell wouldn't want a platform where you could choose between ARM APU, x86 APU, enthusiast CPU, or 16 core/20core server CPU? All the while your competition is selling a motherboard with a soldered on CPU.

I just hope Rory Read and company are smart enough to at least see what I'm seeing, even if they have a different or better solution than I do.
November 27, 2012 3:51:22 AM

gamerk316 said:
Secondly, in those markets, you have VERY limited chances to upgrade. And lets face it, Intel/NVIDIA are the more known brands, so they always get first look. NVIDIA also tends to have much more corporate support (EG: your desktop PC has a NVIDIA card, you need to upgrade, which brand are you going to? Exactly)


What AMD really needs is exceptional marketing. They dont really need engineers...... hence the lay-offs. :pt1cable: 
a b à CPUs
November 27, 2012 5:38:02 AM

Moar money in marketing, I agree. Some subtle teasing trailers akin to the original droid commercials for their Radeon products or APU line.



I find this approach intriguing myself. It even uses AMD colors.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UW-i68xDhGY
a b À AMD
a b à CPUs
November 27, 2012 7:05:17 AM

AMD's cheesy marketing always get them the wrong kind of press tho. Some people say any publicity is good publicity but then you look at bulldozer and people realize that publicity like that will kill AMD in the long run.
a b à CPUs
November 27, 2012 12:35:42 PM

mayankleoboy1 said:
http://www.fudzilla.com/home/item/29610-amd-llano-f1-to...

from the article :

Quote:
As of Q1 2013 AMD won’t offer Llano chips to the channel


So what are they gonna do with all the unsold Llano chips ?


Scrap them is my best guess.

They could sell them at cost, or they could just give them away to schools and such. Upgrade old systems from their company is also another good idea.

There are things I can think of that can be "good" for AMD using those unsold APUs.

Cheers!
a b À AMD
a b à CPUs
November 27, 2012 6:07:51 PM

mayankleoboy1 said:
http://www.fudzilla.com/home/item/29610-amd-llano-f1-to...

from the article :

Quote:
As of Q1 2013 AMD won’t offer Llano chips to the channel


So what are they gonna do with all the unsold Llano chips ?

They won't be offering any more chips into the channel but the chips already in the channel will just be sold as is.
a b à CPUs
November 27, 2012 9:55:50 PM

mayankleoboy1 said:
What AMD really needs is exceptional marketing. They dont really need engineers...... hence the lay-offs. :pt1cable: 



The lay-offs barely compensate for the 350 mill they spent acquiring SeaMicro.

Like HP's troubles with their purchases, we'll find out later was over valued too.

They could have licensed that tech like they did with ARM and the RCM.
a b à CPUs
November 27, 2012 10:10:56 PM

mayankleoboy1 said:
http://www.fudzilla.com/home/item/29610-amd-llano-f1-to...

from the article :

Quote:
As of Q1 2013 AMD won’t offer Llano chips to the channel


So what are they gonna do with all the unsold Llano chips ?

Hell, if no one wants them, I'll take a shyte load of them then!
November 28, 2012 8:22:37 AM



Just had a thought : Assuming AMD does the impossible. It delivers Steamroller in Q@ 2013, that is 10% default/default faster than intel Haswell. But it is a desktop only part, with 90W TDP

how many units can AMD sell ? Will it be enough to make a profit ? Even if they break into the DT market, is it enough
a b À AMD
a c 84 à CPUs
November 28, 2012 9:08:22 AM

^^ a big part of that would be capability of glofo or any other fab amd chooses. the old roadmaps show that all the current 32nm cpus were supposed to come out in 2010-2011 (possibly compete against 32nm nehalem cpus and pd/trinity vs sandy bridge), not in late 2011-late 2012.
apus will find buyers. amd cpus will have a much harder time. someone commented earlier that emerging markets have good demand for apus. but amd doesn't advertise themselves much in those markets. if they tried to build a brand presence like intel and nvidia, the apus would sell much better.

too lazy to make another post:

AMD to Sell Austin, Texas Campus to Raise Cash
http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/other/display/201211272247...
Chief Exec of AMD Happy with Thanksgiving Weekend Sales, Has Positive Expectations for 2013.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/cpu/display/20121127130811...
a b à CPUs
November 28, 2012 11:59:08 AM

mayankleoboy1 said:


Just had a thought : Assuming AMD does the impossible. It delivers Steamroller in Q@ 2013, that is 10% default/default faster than intel Haswell. But it is a desktop only part, with 90W TDP

how many units can AMD sell ? Will it be enough to make a profit ? Even if they break into the DT market, is it enough


Actually, in this day, I don't think AMD needs another Athlon to stay afloat (after reading vr's article and other comments around), but needs to stay within strike range from what Intel has. If they somehow manage to strike a win with Excavator or even before in ARM territory or low power with Jaguar/Kabini, people will be the ones in charge to spread the word, since it's not like 10 years ago (yeah, that much time has passed xD) when we didn't have Twitter or Face(palm)book. Maybe cutting the marketing department was not such a bad idea after all, since you can outsource that nowadays with social networks :p 

Anyway, point is, for AMD to stay afloat, they don't need to beat Intel, just get their sh!t together and focus their resources on something that gives "value" to buyers. We don't know and don't have any inside info of what they're planning in the mid/long term (just rumor), but we do know they have to sell stuff to stay around.

And to answer the question, probably, a 90W part that can beat a 77W (or 54W) part from Intel is not a bad deal, since as a whole, the system won't break your bank in the process. That will push Intel to get something to compete as well and we all win :p 

Cheers!
a b à CPUs
November 28, 2012 12:05:07 PM

Cazalan said:
The lay-offs barely compensate for the 350 mill they spent acquiring SeaMicro.

Like HP's troubles with their purchases, we'll find out later was over valued too.

They could have licensed that tech like they did with ARM and the RCM.


Wasn't the SeaMicro deal about leveraging the x86 opterons into a fabric of low-power ARM cores? I agree they probably should have licensed the tech instead of outright purchasing it, considering they could ill-afford the $350M then and especially now.
a b à CPUs
November 28, 2012 12:27:41 PM

mayankleoboy1 said:


Just had a thought : Assuming AMD does the impossible. It delivers Steamroller in Q@ 2013, that is 10% default/default faster than intel Haswell. But it is a desktop only part, with 90W TDP


Even AMD's powerpoint charts only show a 15% performance gain over PD, so highly unlikely Steamy would beat Haswell. AMD would have to somehow beat Intel at Intel's major strengths, such as superior OoO processing, plus get TSMC or GF to get to 20nm in 5 months to match Intel's 22nm, with decent yield ramps and clock speeds, etc etc. And all that would take massive amounts of R&D money to have been spent already, to support all the design engineers required. Instead, AMD laid them off.

Personally I suspect that one reason why all the Steamy/Exxy cancellation rumors abound is not only due to the lousy world economy and desktop sales, but also that initial results of the ES samples are not that great. Haven't seen any rumors or even OBR leaks :p  so that is pure speculation of course.

If the rumor about AMD selling their Austin, TX campus is true, to raise maybe $200M or so, that's just sad indeed. Sorta like taking out a mortgage on your house to keep your business afloat. That puts AMD squarely at the mercy of many economic factors outside their control, such as the Dems and Repubs going off the fiscal cliff in 5 weeks, the EU debt crisis worsening, China cutting back on funding the US Gov't :p , China and Japan getting into a shooting and/or economic war over those oil-rich islands in the South China Sea, Iran and Israel going at it this coming spring, etc etc.

Maybe AMD should just sell off everything, and then party like hell while waiting for the world to end in 3 weeks and 2 days from now :p ..
a b À AMD
a c 84 à CPUs
November 28, 2012 3:09:01 PM

i sense another kind of 'amd vs intel' coming up.... :p 
"AMD to launch Radeon-branded SSDs"
http://semiaccurate.com/2012/11/28/amd-to-launch-radeon...
what's next, radeon nic, radeon cpus (rebranded fx cpus)... or may be hsa apus branded as radeon fx something...? :whistle: 
a b à CPUs
November 28, 2012 3:21:17 PM

The SSD move will prolly be like RAM. Just a little more than a gimmick-rebranded piece of junk. They shouldn't be doing that =/

Cheers!
a b À AMD
a b à CPUs
November 28, 2012 6:26:13 PM

Yuka said:
The SSD move will prolly be like RAM. Just a little more than a gimmick-rebranded piece of junk. They shouldn't be doing that =/

Cheers!

the ram were great as far as I know.
a b à CPUs
November 28, 2012 7:19:50 PM

I've only seen the crappy timed ones, so... Are there CL8 or CL7 1600 modules? maybe CL10 2133?

Cheers!
a b à CPUs
November 28, 2012 11:11:24 PM

The timings they got are 8-9-8-24 for 1600, that's hardly on par with CL8 Vengeance series from Corsair, which I have and are 8-8-8-24. Not bad, but not impressive either to make a big deal about them.

Maybe the SSDs are going to be something in those lines... If Corsair serves as comparison, if they are on par with the Crucial line, then they'll be good. It will all come down to price, as usual.

Cheers!
a b À AMD
a b à CPUs
November 28, 2012 11:15:27 PM

I don't think AMD is going to bother with top of the line stuff. They get all their supplies from other companies and will probably just offer this stuff with their servers.
a b à CPUs
November 29, 2012 12:02:04 AM

A cheap marketing ploy that is probably break even at best. Memory is cheap.

It does get their name out there a bit more.
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