The AMD Execution Thread [2007 - 2017]
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Microsoft does not use Intel as a supplier, so there is no direct cost being passed onto Microsoft as a result of a lack of competition.
Even if there were, AMD's dwindling market presence and Intel's actions show that it no longer presents that much of a competitive pressure across a vast range of products.
Intel's competition with the older versions of its products users already own is a stiffer problem, and a more notable downward pressure on prices in the consumer space.
Workstation and server parts also have this, although a lot of workloads there have not stagnated as much as the PC realm.
AMD has no appreciable presence there, per its own admission since Zen is meant to be its re-entry. If Microsoft were concerned about that, it's years too late.
Even if there were, AMD's dwindling market presence and Intel's actions show that it no longer presents that much of a competitive pressure across a vast range of products.
Intel's competition with the older versions of its products users already own is a stiffer problem, and a more notable downward pressure on prices in the consumer space.
Workstation and server parts also have this, although a lot of workloads there have not stagnated as much as the PC realm.
AMD has no appreciable presence there, per its own admission since Zen is meant to be its re-entry. If Microsoft were concerned about that, it's years too late.
Sure, but despite its size if it wasn't for AMD we would be all using Itanium today.
I've always thought that the upper hand in the Wintel duopoly belonged to Microsoft, not Intel. And a world without AMD increases Intel's power relative to Microsoft. Even if Bulldozer sucks today, I think AMD should get the chance to release Zen. If Zen also suck then it's over.
It seems that it doesn't really matter that new Intel CPUs aren't much faster or better than their older CPUs. Intel will price its new CPUs just as high and because of that we still have things like overpriced dual-cores in this day and age.
I've always thought that the upper hand in the Wintel duopoly belonged to Microsoft, not Intel. And a world without AMD increases Intel's power relative to Microsoft. Even if Bulldozer sucks today, I think AMD should get the chance to release Zen. If Zen also suck then it's over.
It seems that it doesn't really matter that new Intel CPUs aren't much faster or better than their older CPUs. Intel will price its new CPUs just as high and because of that we still have things like overpriced dual-cores in this day and age.
That might have been some kind of argument for a thank-you fruit basket a decade ago, but that doesn't make a case now.
AMD has very little power today, perhaps less than the power Microsoft has with an extra 3-5 billion dollars not spent.
Intel's manufacturing prowess and tight integration mean it can produce its chips at a cost level that AMD cannot match, since it must pay the margins of foundry partners, so it's not a clear case that an AMD with a larger market share would actually lead to significantly lower prices. Intel's troubles trying to clear its own inventory have had more of an effect than AMD. AMD's numbers for IPC improvements for Zen and its high-end 8-only core offering for 2016, show that while it may clear the low bar of Bulldozer's architecture, it doesn't look likely to be much faster than Intel's older CPUs nor play in the markets that really have the high prices.
In multi-threaded applications, Vishera (FX-8350) is within 10% of Haswell (i7-4770) so it's a reasonable assumption. Games and other somewhat serial applications are a very different story, although DX12 may help with that.
Sorry - I read "high-end" to mean server class. Still, I'm not sure how AMD can gain an advantage this way, considering that you can buy an 8 core Broadwell Xeon D 1540 today for ~ $600. Yeah, it's a server part with base clock of only 2GHz (and just a 45W TDP), but it's hard for me to believe that it would be difficult to turn it into a high end desktop SKU by simple TDP adjustment.
I can't really share where I got my info from, but
http://bgr.com/2013/11/26/xbox-one-teardown-bom/
this is very close to the actual cost of the xbox.
UniversalTruth
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True that. The problem with Bulldozer is not so much that it is a bad architecture. It is not bad.
The problem with Bulldozer is Microsoft and the other software it's running on.
D
Deleted member 13524
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And slow L2 cache.. and low floating-point performance because of having 1 FP unit for every module with 2 integer units, and low memory bandwidth, and not very effective branch-prediction units...
From the top of my head.
Regardless, any 3/4 module bulldozer should be sufficient for games, if DX12 and Vulkan are everything we've been promised so far.
UniversalTruth
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Remember also that Bulldozer has never received any manufacturing process improvements.
Imagine Excavator on Intel's 14 nm!
Can you imagine that it could be a different story?!
D
Deleted member 13524
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Yes, I imagine it'd be a smaller chip, giving AMD better profits, and it'd probably consume less power.
I don't think it'd help absolute performance that much, because the maximum frequencies for CPUs have stagnated with newer processes.
Another fun rumour for y'all
ms interested in buying amd
http://www.kitguru.net/components/a...erested-to-buy-advanced-micro-devices-source/
ms interested in buying amd
http://www.kitguru.net/components/a...erested-to-buy-advanced-micro-devices-source/
It kinda uses it, they have their Surface Pro line.
D
Deleted member 13524
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And the Surface non-Pro is the first to use Intel's Cherry Trail.
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