AMD Cuts APU & FX CPU Prices; Up-to 18.9% Cheaper
AMD has cut the prices of ten of its chips.
| Model | Old Price | New Price | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| A6-3600 | $95 | $77 | 18.9% |
| A8-3800 | $105 | $91 | 13.3% |
| A8-3820 | $115 | $101 | 12.2% |
| A6-5400K | $67 | $57 | 14.9% |
| A8-5500 | $101 | $91 | 9.9% |
| A8-5600K | $101 | $91 | 9.9% |
| FX-4300 | $122 | $108 | 11.5% |
| FX-6300 | $132 | $112 | 15.2% |
| FX-8320 | $169 | $153 | 9.5% |
| Phenom II X4 965 BE | $91 | $81 | 11.0% |
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Also why would anyone buy the fx-4300 over the fx-6300 if it only costs $4 more?
Also why would anyone buy the fx-4300 over the fx-6300 if it only costs $4 more?
Because Intel has no incentive thanks to high demand.
Otherwise, looks like they're lowering the prices to be more comptetive with their FX processors and to clear old APU stocks before Richland releases.
Maybe Intel feels that its brand deserves better pricing? Most people would consider Intel for their PCs and that makes them happy. Majority of people who would be building PCs with budget in mind would settle with AMD.
What would lower priced Intel chips achieve? Would people who have AMD setups switch to Intel, meaning more money spent on new hardware platform? Or would this help with sales going up?
Take a look at share prices of Intel and AMD. Rarely mentioned here, the fact is that AMD has been steadily growing over past year. Intel is still keeping share price similar to three years ago. This fact tells me that Intel has barely anything to keep its company alive, apart from all the hype we can read about performance of CPUs. Would lower cost help selling more CPUs? It would certainly be a short term trend and would cause lower return on investment numbers later on. Hence, hold the price as long as possible. Meanwhile, AMD is surprisingly thriving and putting more chips for desktops, mobile platforms/APU and graphic cards (consoles as well, current and future alike).
I think cmi86's point is that Intel should consider lowering prices across the board. Yes, they may believe they have a very good product and don't want to undercut it, but if as you say they don't have a sustainable model, they need to try something different. There are a tone of people outside of the brand-name wars who are simply looking for value. AMD's success has been in appealing to these people - offering great performance similar or close to Intel but at a lower price point. It makes better sense to take a bit of lighter revenue now if it will benefit the company in the long term. Maybe not deep slashes to prices, but at least trim them to make them more attractive. This applies not just to Intel's CPUs, but the accompanying motherboards too - though I realize that is probably more of an OEM decision than Intel's.