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Where is Zen?

Relentless81

Relentless81

Relentless81

Soldato
Joined
18 May 2010
Posts
12,832
Hello,

How far off is Zen in terms of performance desktop CPUs?

There doesn't seem to be much posted about it recently, I'm on an 8350 and still waiting for Zen, every time an offer comes up for an Intel motherboard and/or CPU setup its very hard to sway temptation. I'm constantly messing with my 8350 trying to find the balance of noise/heat/performance and I'm looking forward to a new gaming setup that I can leave on default settings and game rather than constantly tinkering

The new AMD Wraith standard cooler looks OK too http://www.silentpcreview.com/AMD_Wraith

Is Zen going to be a new socket (AM4) needing new aftermarket cooling support? If so the standard cooler looks decent enough to tide everyone over for a while.

Does anyone know how much cooler Zen will be and what kind of performance increase we'll be looking at? I read 40% but that seems quite high?

Cheers
 
40% probably at least, it seems high but isn't. This would be the culmination of a completely new chip from the ground up designed by maybe the industries best chip designer who was brought in for this project specifically.

Zen appears to be coming first as a CPU only, probably octo core at the end of this year, not exactly sure when, probably around November at a guess. Next year server versions and APU versions are due, presumably the APUs will start off quad core with a fairly hefty gpu but maybe we'll get a 6 core apu.

While a new platform and new motherboards, it's quite likely companies will release new hold downs for existing coolers or that the cooling bracket for the new motherboard will already be compatible with AM3 mounting brackets. Though yeah, stock cooler would probably be fine till companies get some new coolers out if they are required. Honestly these days for gaming you don't gain all that much for cpu clocking these days so pushing it heavy on heat/noise on a smaller cooler isn't really required, nice option but easy to live without.
 
Thanks for the informative reply, its good to hear that there will be such an increase and it seems it will be worth waiting for, end of the year though :(

I only just bought a new cooler but by the time its released I'll more than likely fancy a change anyway so I'll sell it on and see what the Wraith cooler is like for a bit and what after market stuff follows.

You're right about OC and games, used to run my 8350 at 5GHZ with a Corsair H110 its now at 4.2GHZ on a Scythe air cooler and I cant tell any difference in BF4 which I play pretty much daily

I'll keep running my 8350 until Zen hits and look to replace my 290X first with one of the new GPUs when they appear, exciting times.
 
No one know how Zen desktop CPUs will performed like. AMD confirmed back in December 2015 that Zen still not taped out yet, expect tape out in the next few months but it now nearly end of March Zen still not tape out yet so April 2016 target to sent Zen engineering samples to partners will be missed.

AMD Zen expect 40% increase IPC compared to excavator, Zen CPU performance probably around Sandy Bridge 2600K level but after read DirectX 12 games performance which saw AMD CPUs suffered around 50% slower compared to DirectX 11. Zen will proabably as fast as 2600K in DirectX 11 but could be far behind 2600K and not much faster than FX 8350 in DirectX 12 games. Intel CPUs peformance run much better far ahead in DirectX 12 than AMD CPUs for now.
 
Relentless81 said:
Hello,

How far off is Zen in terms of performance desktop CPUs?

There doesn't seem to be much posted about it recently, I'm on an 8350 and still waiting for Zen, every time an offer comes up for an Intel motherboard and/or CPU setup its very hard to sway temptation. I'm constantly messing with my 8350 trying to find the balance of noise/heat/performance and I'm looking forward to a new gaming setup that I can leave on default settings and game rather than constantly tinkering

The new AMD Wraith standard cooler looks OK too http://www.silentpcreview.com/AMD_Wraith

Is Zen going to be a new socket (AM4) needing new aftermarket cooling support? If so the standard cooler looks decent enough to tide everyone over for a while.

Does anyone know how much cooler Zen will be and what kind of performance increase we'll be looking at? I read 40% but that seems quite high?

Cheers
Click to expand...

Zen is a 2017 product. AMD have been known to over-hype their products in the past, so I'd take the claimed 40% performance increase with large grains of salt, until it can be independently reviewed.

I'd buy a Skylake or Haswell-E if you want a guranteed good performing, quiet CPU, which will last many years. Why suffer for 1 year+ until Zen is out, then it turns out to be mediocre?
 
Dave2150 said:
I'd buy a Skylake or Haswell-E if you want a guranteed good performing, quiet CPU, which will last many years. Why suffer for 1 year+ until Zen is out, then it turns out to be mediocre?
Click to expand...

Its a good point but they are expensive arent they? I remember when I built my 8350 originally the cost vs the Intel equivalent at the time was significant and I believe that margin has increased even more so since.

Then what if it comes out and its cheaper performs just as well or better as current Intel offerings, I would be kicking myself for not being patient

Still though, temptation is there as I'm mainly interested in increased FPS at the moment, how much would a current gaming Intel setup cost me with the following in mind -

Paired with a 290X for now, most played game is BF4 which is a CPU intensive game, I average between 70/80FPS on most maps with current setup

Cool
Quiet
Gigabyte motherboard
 
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AthlonXP1800 said:
No one know how Zen desktop CPUs will performed like. AMD confirmed back in December 2015 that Zen still not taped out yet, expect tape out in the next few months but it now nearly end of March Zen still not tape out yet so April 2016 target to sent Zen engineering samples to partners will be missed.

AMD Zen expect 40% increase IPC compared to excavator, Zen CPU performance probably around Sandy Bridge 2600K level but after read DirectX 12 games performance which saw AMD CPUs suffered around 50% slower compared to DirectX 11. Zen will proabably as fast as 2600K in DirectX 11 but could be far behind 2600K and not much faster than FX 8350 in DirectX 12 games. Intel CPUs peformance run much better far ahead in DirectX 12 than AMD CPUs for now.
Click to expand...

AMD didn't confirm that, you can't 'tape out' an architecture. You tape out chips, there are MULTIPLE Zen products and multiple sources saying stuff has taped out. Which probably means they expect the full portfolio of Zen products(first gen, everything beyond that is Zen+. Desktop cpu was due end of this year, server early next year, APU mid next year... meaning you would absolutely expect various tape outs at various times. There is no way they will tape out all at the exact same time and if so there would be no reason all three wouldn't be planned for the same release date.

If someone is saying 'Zen' will tape out, the logical conclusion to draw from given time frames and when products are supposed to come out is that he's saying the final Zen chips will be taped out soon, IE the APU, then those engineers move on to Zen + projects considering the context in which he's saying it.

When Keller left is a very good idea of when probably the first chip taped out came back and worked or needed very minor revisions(incredibly common) or just microcode fixes(all chips have loads of them). He left in September, he came in to start and finish Zen... Zen was finished in September which is a sensible time for a time due end of this year, also around 6 months before the final Zen chips(APU) would be due to tape out which are due around 6 months after Zen CPUs.

If they came back from tape out with major problems Keller would be required to work on fixes. He had a contract, make this architecture, the architecture isn't finished till a chip comes back without major fault.
 
AthlonXP1800 said:
Yes AMD Chief Financial Officer Devinder Kumar did confirmed that.

http://techfrag.com/2015/12/09/conf...aped-out-yet-reveals-chief-financial-officer/
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Well done for being completely unable to read beyond that. No, he didn't, read the reasoning above if you want to have a discussion, if you want to continue trolling, don't bother.

The tl:dr version being, people involved in the industry wouldn't say Zen(an architecture) taped out till every chip planned for that architecture was done, the timing of his statement about when the last Zen(before Zen +) chip would tape out would correspond to Zen APUs which are due 6+ months after Zen CPUs. So in the context he said it and lining up with the roadmap for ALL Zen products his statement makes most sense when talking about when the final Zen product tapes out, not the first.
 
Oh,looks here is AthlonXP who twists every post he makes in the GPU section into something nasty for AMD,has appeared in the CPU section doing the same. This is the same bloke was happy with an NV FX graphics card which had zero problems but had problems with the only ATI card he had. Don't believe me OP,look at his posting history.

Also,OP we have a rumours thread for Zen too:

https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18665505

Beware of the posters here who have a vested interest in Zen being crap BTW and desperately want you to change over immediately like they are getting some commission to do so.The rest of us are quite happy to see how it pans out and it is not likely the Intel options will suddenly be gone anyway,so you can get an Intel system then if it does not pan out.
 
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I'm going to keep it to see what Zen brings for sure, happy with it now I've removed the OC and re-cased it its much cooler and loads quieter and I'm can live with 70/80fps on bf4 ultra settings 1080p for now
 
This is the only Zen I know?? am I showing my age

Zen.jpeg
 
drunkenmaster said:
Well done for being completely unable to read beyond that. No, he didn't, read the reasoning above if you want to have a discussion, if you want to continue trolling, don't bother.

The tl:dr version being, people involved in the industry wouldn't say Zen(an architecture) taped out till every chip planned for that architecture was done, the timing of his statement about when the last Zen(before Zen +) chip would tape out would correspond to Zen APUs which are due 6+ months after Zen CPUs. So in the context he said it and lining up with the roadmap for ALL Zen products his statement makes most sense when talking about when the final Zen product tapes out, not the first.
Click to expand...

No I am not trolling! AMD transcript did not lie!

If Zen chip Summit Ridge had been taped out since last Oct then people involved in the industry would had found it in databases such as SiSoft, Zambu and others but it didn't happened and there were no engineering samples yet so both Bristol Ridge and Stoney Ridge chips had been taped out back in October 2015 and AMD shipped out Bristol Ridge and Stoney Ridge engineering samples a month later in November 2015.

If you still believed Summit Ridge was taped out last year then I dare you to show me Summit Ridge CPU engineering samples. Nope?
 
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Yes,we can see all the ES Kaby Lake samples out in the wild when it is meant to be released towards the end of the year. Oh wait....!

Some of the posters on forums like Anandtech have already managed to get some basic details about Zen from patches released to the Linux kernel too.
 
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AthlonXP1800 said:
It turned out I am right.

http://wccftech.com/amd-zen-summit-ridge-cpus-intel-kaby-lake-cpus-spotted-aida64-changelog/

Zen Summit Ridge spotted in AIDA64 changelog.

AIDA64 developers have Zen Summit Ridge stepping A0 engineering samples which is the first version since taped out. Zen was probably taped out in Feb or early March 2016.
Click to expand...

Nothing about this posts confirms anything you said whatsoever.

Aida can have support added months before hardware tapes out, it's only a software revision to interpret what some codes are. As in before a update the chip will be like "wtf does microcode 782028shkshpodshihds" mean, after the update, "oh right, that means Summit Ridge".

As well as being able to add support months before hardware is available, adding support is zero indication hardware hasn't been available for months before they get given details with which to update their information.

One application adding support means precisely nothing about when a chip taped out, nothing at all. On top of that the article doesn't at all say that chips were spotted and absolutely nothing to do with A0 samples being out in the wild, you're just making stuff up.

Developers of hardware testing tools are among the first to receive early documentation and A0 engineering samples of upcoming processors
Click to expand...

This is not specific, it does not in any way state "hey, we saw a A0 Summit Ridge" it's saying developers of hardware testing tools are amongst the first to receive documentation and (then) A0 engineering samples. Though in this case I think they are dramatically overstating Aida's status as a hardware testing tools provider. This will most likely be as a result of a fairly public and normal release of basic identification documentation that any chip maker provides in the run up to the launch of a new product(anything from a month to 2 years before something launches). It makes zero claims about when these chips will be seen, if they will be seen, if they've been around for months.
 
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Strange to dedicate your forum name to a brand that I take was once the apple in your eye...?

People should leave the bitter pills alone. AMD are struggling and they made a hash of recent processor attempts, but without them the PC component market segment would be futile.
 
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