Zen news 'Going forward'

Orangey · 23 Dec 2015 at 04:42

Don't link something behind a paywall.

Most likely out of context or misworded, always happens "conveniently" to AMD, especially on investor sites where the authors make money shorting AMD.

humbug · 23 Dec 2015 at 04:44

Orangey said:
Don't link something behind a paywall.

Most likely out of context or misworded, always happens "conveniently" to AMD, especially on investor sites where the authors make money shorting AMD.

Seekingalpha are notorious for bigging up and down to short.

Anything they same should be filed as junk.

P4Clock · 23 Dec 2015 at 04:50

spoffle said:
OH GOD MY BRAIN

i lol'ed so hard

Zapp3012 · 24 Dec 2015 at 16:50

Interesting to read that AMD have signed up Samsung to fab chips for them.
Article says 'greenland' and 'Zen' will be made by Samsung on the new 14 nanometer process.

http://www.engadget.com/2015/12/22/samsung-building-chips-for-amd/

Sumanji · 24 Dec 2015 at 18:00

The tidbit about 10nm at the end of article is kinda intriguing... with assistance from Samsung, is it possible that we may see AMD rapidly shift down to 10nm? Or is that too optimistic?

Orangey · 24 Dec 2015 at 21:48

Don't know about Samsung but IIRC TSMC said that their 10nm will be more like a tweaked 16. In this article Xilinx are claimed to be skipping 10, which would sorta confirm that.

http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1327725

Samsung bringing up 10nm so fast likely means they're doing the same thing.

Sumanji · 25 Dec 2015 at 00:44

Hmm, but if it is not so different from the 16nm, then AMD will have an easier job transferring the chip over to the new process, right? Could be a good thing...

Orangey · 25 Dec 2015 at 13:01

Only if it justifies the cost. If the node is trash and only worthwhile for someone making massive volumes of mobile chips, then no.

Dave2150 · 25 Dec 2015 at 13:18

Sumanji said:
Hmm, but if it is not so different from the 16nm, then AMD will have an easier job transferring the chip over to the new process, right? Could be a good thing...

Either way, Samsung 10nm or GF 10nm will be a much worse process compared to Intel's 10nm.

Remember, only Intel have an 'actual' 14nm process - the other fabs so called '14nm' is more like an Intel 20nm process, in terms of gate size etc.

Intel will always have the advantage over AMD when it comes to process.

Sumanji · 25 Dec 2015 at 15:28

Dave2150 said:
Intel will always have the advantage over AMD when it comes to process.

Afaik Samsung have come on leaps and bounds with the fab technology in the last few years. Given their size and financial klout, could they catch up with Intel in the next few years?

I remember seeing a chart showing consolidation in the fab industry, and how there are only a handful of major players left, so I wonder if Sammy has been picking up a bunch of talent and tech during this period...

Again, could be good for AMD if so!

[edit] Slightly old, but it was a chart like this:

P.S. Merry Xmas all

Panos · 25 Dec 2015 at 22:28

So another discussion ended up on Intel vs AMD?

All in all, I will support Zen, if the IPC has at least the same performance of my 4820K.
(however looks like 15-20% more than the Haswell-E)

Full stop. DX12 games, don't need that much power, and the single core MMOs I play are handled by the 4820K perfectly.

And I will ditch the Intel because the market is stagnant and needs competition, and only fools upgrade from a 2600K to a 4790K either way. And for those who upgrade on every "refurbishment" to gain a meager 5% <no comment>

Orangey · 25 Dec 2015 at 23:24

Where has smaller gates got Intel.... a new arch that isn't any faster than the last.

Skylake and Haswell didn't exactly bring the ruckus. AMD lucked out and only really have to catch Sandy to be competitive for the next few years.

Dave2150 · 26 Dec 2015 at 00:19

Orangey said:
Where has smaller gates got Intel.... a new arch that isn't any faster than the last.

Skylake and Haswell didn't exactly bring the ruckus. AMD lucked out and only really have to catch Sandy to be competitive for the next few years.

Intel had no competition - all they had to do was a small upgrade over Haswell, which Skylake accomplishes.

Intel already knew Haswell owners wouldn't upgrade to Skylake. Skylake is meant for those upgrading from older hardware, such as Sandy, Nehalem and older.

Troezar · 26 Dec 2015 at 09:04

I would be surprised if Intel have been sitting on their hands all this time. Look at the type of people running the company and the resources they have. They won't push the envelope any more than they have to to stay number one. Big companies with shareholders are in it for the money not the glory of large jumps in performance.

My bet is they could pull a 50% increase out if they needed to, whether that be architecture or more cores. Our best hope is AMD can get close enough to make them nervous or Samsung buys out AMD

mmj_uk · 26 Dec 2015 at 09:16

Well you can already get a 50% improvement by buying 5820K system instead of Skylake, it's just not that obvious in games where anything more than 4 fast cores shows no benefit.

Troezar · 26 Dec 2015 at 09:47

mmj_uk said:
Well you can already get a 50% improvement by buying 5820K system instead of Skylake, it's just not that obvious in games where anything more than 4 fast cores shows no benefit.

Exactly which begs the question would +50% IPC make much difference even if we had it for gaming? I still think Intel are sandbagging, it's going to be fun to see what the truth is next year

humbug · 26 Dec 2015 at 22:34

Troezar said:
I would be surprised if Intel have been sitting on their hands all this time. Look at the type of people running the company and the resources they have. They won't push the envelope any more than they have to to stay number one. Big companies with shareholders are in it for the money not the glory of large jumps in performance.

My bet is they could pull a 50% increase out if they needed to, whether that be architecture or more cores. Our best hope is AMD can get close enough to make them nervous or Samsung buys out AMD

I expect Intel to magic up a 50% IPC jump up in performance after Zen then. Not.
We will see the same marginal jumps if anything the same as the last 4 generations

Troezar · 26 Dec 2015 at 22:41

humbug said:
I expect Intel to magic up a 50% IPC jump up in performance after Zen then. Not.
We will see the same marginal jumps if anything the same as the last 4 generations

Is that because you think Intel have pulled out all the stops the last four generations and can't do any better or because AMD aren't offering enough incentive by way of competition?

humbug · 26 Dec 2015 at 22:50

Troezar said:
Is that because you think Intel have pulled out all the stops the last four generations and can't do any better or because AMD aren't offering enough incentive by way of competition?

Intel are not in the business of sitting on their hands. They have been trying to break into the mobile market for years and haven't managed it yet with smaller versions of the desktop chips we buy.
Intel are doing all they can

Troezar · 26 Dec 2015 at 23:02

humbug said:
Intel are not in the business of sitting on their hands. They have been trying to break into the mobile market for years and haven't managed it yet with smaller versions of the desktop chips we buy.
Intel are doing all they can

That's very interesting. Do you work for Intel? Looks like there may be a chance for AMD then, that is good news.

I am surprised Intel haven't brought out anything more than a quad core for the mainstream desktops and was even more surprised to see most of the mobile i5 cpu's seem to be dual core (+2 hyper threads). I presume they must think that's all laptops require atm or is it a power saving exercise?