AMD Bulldozer Finally!

[Firegod]

AMD are really good at talk thats what conclusion Ive drawn to after hearing so much hype about bulldozer.

How long have we been hearing about this fantastic new processor and leaks and reviews etc, when it seems so effortless for intel yet Bulldozer it seems will not compete properly with the equivalent intel processor. With them delaying the release of their product so much they are also chasing faster processors that intel brings out with their new generations each time.

Maybe if they put as much effort into CPU development as they did with GPU's there wouldn't be a problem slight dig)

I don't understand your point. It's always been that way. AMD CPU's are never faster than Intel CPU's, but they are close behind and are cheaper. That's what I always remember about them. Always used to be good "bang for buck" chips. I had the Mobile 2500 Barton, then an A64 and then an A64 X2 and then moved to the Intel Q6600 where I've stayed.

For example, on pricing, if you want a Hex core Intel CPU it will cost you £431.99. If you want a Hex core AMD CPU it will cost you £169.99!

How can you say it won't compete with the equivalent Intel processor; it's not even been released yet....

I think your post and opinion is a little biased!

 

[JF-AMD]

I also think that the opinion is not really based in reality.

One would like to think that it is all about having the fastest processor, but when you look at Intel's product in that scenario it is a $1000 processor that nobody buys.

If you look at what people (including that poster) are probably buying, there is a 95% chance that it is in the <$300USD price range.

People love to rave about performance, but when it comes to actually putting their money where their mouth is, they tend to look at price performance far more than raw performance.

So if you are going to do a comparison of intel vs. amd at least be classy enough to do it in a real "apples to apples" manner like an actual consumer would.

For the price of the $1000 intel processor alone you can get a complete system with the fastest AMD processor, memory, drives, the whole kit.

 

[pooey]

For the price of the $1000 intel processor alone you can get a complete system with the fastest AMD processor, memory, drives, the whole kit.

Will that statement still be true when Bulldozer is released?

 

[RizlaKing]

Also bear in mind that in the past Amd have had faster cpu's then Intel granted was way back in the P4 days but they have shown they can do it. This is the first complete new cpu Amd have done for a long time that is why there is such hype about it and why so many people on so many forums are discussing it. I don't know if it will be any good but i am prepared to wait till it's out and judge it by it's own merits based on what my budget will be at the time. I also won't be judging it out of it's price range comparable cpu from intel not sure why anyone would do that but each to their own i guess.

 

[Liquid]

People love to rave about performance, but when it comes to actually putting their money where their mouth is, they tend to look at price performance far more than raw performance.

It's a good job too or AMD would not be doing much business lol.

"Bulldozer it seems will not compete properly with the equivalent intel processor" - what a load of lol, I really do not understand how people can make comments given the cpu is not even out yet, and there are no desktop benchmarks I would trust around at the moment either.

 

[Gtiracer]

People love to rave about performance, but when it comes to actually putting their money where their mouth is, they tend to look at price performance far more than raw performance.

It's a good job too or AMD would not be doing much business lol.

"Bulldozer it seems will not compete properly with the equivalent intel processor" - what a load of lol, I really do not understand how people can make comments given the cpu is not even out yet, and there are no desktop benchmarks I would trust around at the moment either.

well Ill believe the hype when I see it but this thing has been in development so long its a joke.

Truth is it doesn't matter about cores when intels quad core can outperfom AMDs 6 core.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/288?vs=203

OK the CPU may not be out yet but Sandy bridge, even the lower end models have looked really promising especially when the i5 2500k competes with the previous gen 980x in most tasks except for extremely demanding stuff which most users wont even be doing, the i5 2500k is now in the mainstream for most users in not in the elite higher priced bracket now

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/288?vs=142

So we will see what bulldozer compares with, but betting on how long its been in production its not going to be a cheap chip and intels current processors will outgun it.

Yes its my own opinion and I will eat my straw hat if Im wrong and probably cry like a baby

 

[zoomee]

Truth is it doesn't matter about cores when intels quad core can outperfom AMDs 6 core.

Actually it does - whats stifling AMD here is the fact that Intel are using they're good old tactics of encouraging software developers to stick with 4 cores tops. Lazy gits them software developers

Most 'power' users here are gamers - Most games are crappy console ports hence why Intel quads can compete with AMD hex cores (Simply a case of Intel milking the 'high Ghz' cow). What is interesting is in those games that require more than 4 cores - the AMD cpu's make a difference (taking BFBC2 for example).

with regards to other power users - the more cores the better - encoding and things like VM's can take advantage of more than four cores and you won't hear much banded about these in terms of benchmark figures.

I for example - have a tendency to run 4 or more VM's at a time - I paid £200 for my 1090T which ONLY the 980x could keep up with (in terms of VM performance) - thats a saving of £800 just for the CPU!.

The sooner people realise theres more to computing than just games the better - maybe we can then force intel to tow the line and follow AMD's lead in providing more cores for more value. I also note Intel has dropped hardware virtualisation from the sandybridges so for businesses and the likes of myself - AMD will have our business

AMD has always been the innovator in the CPU market - take 64bit mainstream computing for example - They marketed the first consumer 64bit CPU's but no OS took advantage of it. Windows XP x64 was purposely delayed until Intel had their 64bit offerings available - showing how intel's lack of progress affects all users

 

[dustofnations]

Actually it does - whats stifling AMD here is the fact that Intel are using they're good old tactics of encouraging software developers to stick with 4 cores tops. Lazy gits them software developers

Do you have any evidence for that assertion?

 

[rypt]

Most 'power' users here are gamers - Most games are crappy console ports hence why Intel quads can compete with AMD hex cores (Simply a case of Intel milking the 'high Ghz' cow).

The 360 has 6 threads ...

 

[zoomee]

Evidenced by my statement regarding 64bit OS's for a start.
Also look at Crysis 2 - Four cores fully utilised - no more. Whys this?
We all know about intel and they're dodgy practices - Do I need to say more?

the Xbox 360 actually uses the triple-core IBM designed Xenon as its CPU

 

[silversurfer]

Power pc cpu wasnt it

Apparently used in 360 the ps3 and the wii as well as F-35

never realised they were all related

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PowerPC


Seems its not an Intel conspiracy but an industry bias set in motion 20 years ago

Therefore it is not necessary to run a fully 64-bit operating system on a 64-bit PowerPC system; you obtain virtually all of the advantages of the 64-bit architecture by using a 64-bit kernel with 32-bit system software. A tiny minority of software requires a 64-bit build, typically those dealing with >3 GB of virtual memory or 64-bit integer math.

 

[zoomee]

agree silversurfer - industry bias.
Guess its just intels dodgy practices that are making me think that way lol

 

[njm106]

Actually it does - whats stifling AMD here is the fact that Intel are using they're good old tactics of encouraging software developers to stick with 4 cores tops. Lazy gits them software developers

If you look at the benchmark link provided by Gtiracer you can see that the i5 2500K beats a Phenom II X6 at the same Ghz in nearly every benchmark that anandtech does including the 3D and encoding tasks which scale very well with the number of cores. The other noticeable thing is the power consumption that matters a lot these days for both businesses and consumers.

Your correct about VMs though I have no idea why intel made the decision to not include VT extensions on the K series SBs when its switched on for all the non overclockable SBs.

 

[rypt]

the Xbox 360 actually uses the triple-core IBM designed Xenon as its CPU

Yes, but each core can do 2 threads due to SMT

 

[pinki104]

have they released a price for the bd yet

 

[Liquid]

Actually it does - whats stifling AMD here is the fact that Intel are using they're good old tactics of encouraging software developers to stick with 4 cores tops. Lazy gits them software developers

Most 'power' users here are gamers - Most games are crappy console ports hence why Intel quads can compete with AMD hex cores (Simply a case of Intel milking the 'high Ghz' cow). What is interesting is in those games that require more than 4 cores - the AMD cpu's make a difference (taking BFBC2 for example).

with regards to other power users - the more cores the better - encoding and things like VM's can take advantage of more than four cores and you won't hear much banded about these in terms of benchmark figures.

I for example - have a tendency to run 4 or more VM's at a time - I paid £200 for my 1090T which ONLY the 980x could keep up with (in terms of VM performance) - thats a saving of £800 just for the CPU!.

The sooner people realise theres more to computing than just games the better - maybe we can then force intel to tow the line and follow AMD's lead in providing more cores for more value. I also note Intel has dropped hardware virtualisation from the sandybridges so for businesses and the likes of myself - AMD will have our business

AMD has always been the innovator in the CPU market - take 64bit mainstream computing for example - They marketed the first consumer 64bit CPU's but no OS took advantage of it. Windows XP x64 was purposely delayed until Intel had their 64bit offerings available - showing how intel's lack of progress affects all users

Intel quad's cores perform better than the six cores amd's because they are faster ipc wise and amd are playing to their only strength, price. As for intel forcing the market to go quad core software wise, that's complete rubbish. Even now full quad core usage in software is not as high as it should be.

Gaming wise nothing is using 6-core properly, just a token effort really when you look at usage in-game, for the very few games that can take advantage of it. Lets look at your bad company 2, the six cores may make a difference but they are still slower than competing intel quad core cpu's.

In terms of dedicated 6 core usage, are you seriously trying to say that the 1090t is anywhere near the 980x because it isn't. I know it's a lot more money and shouldn't be close anyway.

More cores for less money means absolutely nothing if the software is not following suit, as more cores for less money means lower performing cores individually, and if a program can't fully utilise all cores, where is the benefit. You end up with a six core running mostly on 4 core usage and slower to boot.

The only time I considered amd to be innovative was when they released the Athlon64 as you say. tbh this is the only example I can think of, and it came out in 2003, doesn't say a lot for innovation at amd now does it, given that was 8 years ago.

 

[zoomee]

Exactly my point - Software still needs to catch up with hardware. As and when it does - you'll see more performance advantage for having more cores. So whats stopping software catching up? As I agreed above with silversurfer - its an industry bias. Throw in a couple of bad practices, and some dodgy compiler code and it all fits together (what I'm alluding to).

VM performance - Cores are all that matters to me (and anyone running a data centre / virtualised environment, barr perf per watt) - now let me see £200 six core AMD chip or £1000 intel 6 core chip - bit of a no-brainer really dude

 

[Gtiracer]

Exactly my point - Software still needs to catch up with hardware. As and when it does - you'll see more performance advantage for having more cores. So whats stopping software catching up? As I agreed above with silversurfer - its an industry bias. Throw in a couple of bad practices, and some dodgy compiler code and it all fits together (what I'm alluding to).

VM performance - Cores are all that matters to me (and anyone running a data centre / virtualised environment, barr perf per watt) - now let me see £200 six core AMD chip or £1000 intel 6 core chip - bit of a no-brainer really dude

I know you say that about virtualisation and AMD leading, I didn't actually realise this, are there any kind of benchmarks or articles that you know of that I can have a read up on?

 

[Liquid]

VM performance - Cores are all that matters to me (and anyone running a data centre / virtualised environment, barr perf per watt) - now let me see £200 six core AMD chip or £1000 intel 6 core chip - bit of a no-brainer really dude

I wasn't comparing on cost obviously as stated, and tbh it's more than just physical cores for vm and you know it, the speed of those cores is just as important.

 

[JF-AMD]

While intel has done a lot of stuff in the past, I don't think that they are paying people to stay at 4 threads.

And I find it really funny that today people say "nobody uses more than 4 threads." That is like saying (in 2005) "why would you want a dual core, all the games are single threaded."

And in a year you will be saying "nobody uses more than 6 threads...."

Or, you could grasp the future, where applications are going to continue to be influenced by core count far more than by clock speed.

Ask yourself today, would you rather have a 4GHz quad or a 5GHz single core?

The world is going to get more threaded, and the software developers will continue to take advantage of it. Why is everything supposedly optimized for quad core today? Because that happens to be the most popular processor. Apps that were developed a few years ago, targeting a market life in 2010/2011 were assuming that quad core would be the predominant processor in the market. Why do all the work to make a game scale to 10 or 12 cores when nobody will have those?

Software developers today who are writing games for 2012 release are thinking that 6-8 cores will be the sweet spot. For 2014 they are probably thinking 10-12 cores.

If you don't believe that core counts are going to continue to climb, go look at intel's roadmaps.

We live in a core world from now on. You can fight it all you want, telling the world that "single threaded performance will be the most important thing" but in reality, you'll be like the guys that said vinyl sounded better than CDs. Maybe they were right, but they sure are alone these days.

Technology marches on.