Eagle' was replaced by 'Swift' as the Notebook Platform for 2009. The former's CPU was a Bulldozer derivative; the latter's is a Barcelona derivative. The GPU was also downgraded to certainly being a MCM (it was unclear previously) and being based on the 'current high-end discrete'. All this in... 2H09.
Bulldozer is not anywhere else on the roadmap either. Sandbridge (the 8-core server chip) is gone, with Montreal apparently being the primary focus in 2009. Montreal is completely retarded, with even more cache (1MiB/core L2!) - thus getting rid of potential cost advantages against Intel.
The delay from the tentative Sandtiger introduction is at least 6 months, since it should have been 2H 09 and is either gone or in 2010.
This isn't the first "delay" of this magnitude AMD has experienced with a new design. It is at a minimum of the same order as the last ~6 month setback, when AMD failed to create a clean-sheet design to replace K8, and we all know what AMD got instead.
My guess is nothing more than numerology at this point, since the only real possible parallel is the length of the delay, but I do find this worrisome.
Barcelona and Shanghai represent a more involved attempt at revamping the uncore part of the chip.
Bulldozer should have been an extension of the changes to system infrastructure already present since Barcelona. It makes me wonder whether there is another layer of complexity in the uncore or if it is once again a core redesign failure.
To top it off, the slides on AMD's 45nm process indicate to me that it at least initially won't have metal gates or high-K gate dielectrics.
I don't expect AMD's 45nm chips to match Intel's thermals or clocks, and without serious tweaking, is potentially not much better in chip speed than AMD's 65nm.
Montreal's die size isn't necessarily a problem due to costs, or at least wouldn't be if AMD hasn't confirmed repeatedly that it can't produce big dies very successfully.
The target market for a big chip like that would be one that isn't as CPU price sensitive, but unfortunately for AMD will look for better performance.
It is possible an 8-core MCM of Shanghai cores might compete in some respects with a Nehalem quad-core with SMT. It would be completely obliterated by the native 8-core monster Intel is promising in '09.
At least with the MCM, AMD can attempt to nip at Intel's heels. Since the big costs of software licensing are often tied to the socket count, AMD needs to have some product that keeps Intel from having free reign in socket consolidation.
Regardless, after Nehalem it is likely that there will be no measure by which AMD's chips are not demonstrably inferior to Intel's.
I'm not even sure if AM3 supplies enough bandwidth for 8 cores, and if does, it is only possible if each core performs about as well as Barcelona does(n't).
Intel's 2H 08 sockets have room to grow, and apparently the top SKUs are tripl-channel or have multiple FB-DIMM links.
Going by socket bandwidth alone, we'd have to conclude that Intels solutions will best AMD's by ~50% when bandwidth is a concern.
(edit: I'm going to back off on this last theory. I've read incomplete data on the pin count for the new socket that Montreal should use. edit edit (and some shenanigans with a new extender?) AMD didn't state the number of channels Montreal might get, hopefully more than 2. Chips on AM3 will still have this shortfall.)
So, in the last week, 2009 turned from 'very interesting' to 'completely boring and retarded', and 2008 turned into a gigantic 'who the hell knows' thing as AMD doesn't even have Shangai samples back yet. Ugh. This new roadmap better be horribly wrong and Rivas better be completely nuts and clueless, because otherwise I don't know what to think here...
Perhaps, if I were being snarky, I'd insinuate that AMD took the big write-down so that the prospect of delaying or cancelling its third attempt at replacing K8 (fifth or sixth at replacing K7)--the product that was to save the company's bacon--wouldn't look so bad.
I am really pissed with this news. It means the tech scene is going to be half as interesting for several years.
I know high-level chip design at deep submicron geometries is incredibly difficult, but damn, this is getting ridiculous.
The length of time AMD has tried to wring performance out of the K7 core is almost Via-esque.
I am pretty disgusted by this continued retreat from even a mediocre showing.
I'm so incensed, I'm hoping for an AMD apologist to post here so I can debunk any remaining excuses point by point.