AMD Reportedly Scraps 28 nm APUs at GlobalFoundries
The announcements made at the recent "worldcast" held by AMD's new CEO Rory Read have been kept a good secret with very little information trickling out to the public.
What we did hear is that the changes that were announced by Read would be explained to analysts and the press at the 2011 analyst day, which will be held in February of 2012. The only reliable information we received was that Read is cracking down on AMD's ability to execute much more efficiently and cure its manufacturing pains that put a lid on its recent growth opportunities.
A new report published by ExtremeTech could fit this scenario as the company claims that AMD has scrapped its 28 nm manufacturing plans at GlobalFoundries and is now intending to start with TSMC "from scratch". It has been no secret that AMD is slowly separating its ties from GlobalFoundries and that it has been extremely unhappy about the capabilities of its former manufacturing unit to reliably and effectively ramp the production of semiconductors.
There is no definite information in the ExtremeTech article and we could not receive any confirmation from AMD on this topic. If it is true, then AMD is making a major bet here. If TSMC has to integrate the 28 nm process and scale it to volume, AMD may be at least one year away from introducing such processors, while Intel will be ramping its 22 nm parts into volume in Q1 2012.
The good news may be that Rory Read's efforts to travel around the world and calm customers could be showing some results. According to Fudzilla, Read is leaving a good impression and is injecting confidence that he can bring AMD's CPU business back on track.
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Douglas Perry was a freelance writer for Tom's Hardware covering semiconductors, storage technology, quantum computing, and processor power delivery. He has authored several books and is currently an editor for The Oregonian/OregonLive.
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He needs to bring the CPU business back on track by throwing ending Bulldozer quickly and developing a new CPU architecture. Steal from Intel!Reply
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fazers_on_stun Well I guess this puts the AMD community reporter's statement that everything between AMD and GF is hunkey-dorey to rest..Reply -
freggo AMD will ALWAYS be behind; as Intel effectively controls the technology and the market. Naturally, AMD can just play 'follow the leader'. So if Intel comes out with something new, surprise... AMD will be behind and catching up; again. Frustrating position to be in.Reply
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joytech22 Pity..Reply
AMD is in some strife, I really REALLY hope they make a comeback. There needs to be competition in the market in the high-end segment.
I'm planning on getting a FX8120/FX8150 for a small home VM server and just to generally play around with to find it's strong and weak spots. Oh and to help out team Green. :p -
jdamon113 amd should do the maunfacturing itself. if it goes to tsmc, I will never suggest one and in my network we will never attempt a amd cpu.Reply
This dushbag needs to get a clue. Do the work youself. stop relying on others to do it for you.
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AMD should be thinking more along the line of 22nm if they are thinking starting from scratch, though i do not know if TMSC could provide them with a solution.Reply
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kyuuketsuki freggoAMD will ALWAYS be behind; as Intel effectively controls the technology and the market. Naturally, AMD can just play 'follow the leader'. So if Intel comes out with something new, surprise... AMD will be behind and catching up; again. Frustrating position to be in.AMD may be stuck playing catch-up as far as CPU performance is concerned, but Intel will likely be stuck playing catch-up to AMD's APUs. I'd still take a Llano laptop/ultrabook over any Intel solution any day. People don't seem to get that CPU performance is at a "good enough" level nowadays and most consumers won't notice much, if any, difference between going with an expensive Intel Core-whatever or a cheaper AMD solution unless they are gamers that must play on the highest quality settings or actually use their computers for computationally intensive tasks fairly often. The vast majority of the market does not fit into those categories.Reply -
supall I'm sorry, but I don't just hop on the "AMD Hate" bandwagon that seems to have swept everyone else's feet. Its great that AMD is buckling down and is trying to make changes to regain its composure. I don't understand why you have people wanting to see the downfall of a company that gives us something other than "Intel". If AMD focuses more on its APUs we can see them overtaking the low-end/mid-range market, which has the larger and more profitable base. Yeah, their Bulldozer didn't sweep Intel, but it doesn't mean they are failing. If I recall correctly, their APUs are selling like hotcakes and Bulldozer is decent enough to be considered in a build.Reply
Just like I enjoy Android but don't want to see Apple fail, I don't want to see AMD fail. I want them to succeed and force innovation. AMD brings something different and that's what we need in today's world. -
TeraMedia IIRC, TSMC had something like a 4% success rate with early high-end GPUs from AMD/ATi and NVidia. 96% went to the bin.Reply
If AMD thinks that this is better than what GF can do, then GF is in a very scary place right now.
FWIW, I honestly believe that chip designers and manufacturers should be different. While there may not be a higher-margin device than an Intel chip right now, what if there were? And what if a third party wanted to use Intel's fab to make it, because that fab was the only one capable of doing so? If the price is right, and the capacity is there, why should Intel be the only one allowed to use it?