ZEN SR7 Rumoured January 17th Release

[Threepwood]

What are AMD trying to do, head for bankruptcy deliberately. I thought they wanted to no longer be known as the cheap alternative, not be here's our competing chips but they are half the price.


Yes I know we would all like for prices to be cheaper, but come on be sensible, you don't introduce a product that competes with the opposition at half the price. I mean If they are any good they will sell all they can make anyway, so why only charge $500 on the top model when you could charge $850, sell them all and still be cheaper

They tried that with bulldozer, lol.

 

[This never ends well]

It needs to be cheaper than intel for it to sell and gain some market share, as if they go with intel prices people will still pick intel as they know it should be quicker.

All amd has to do is make it abit cheaper than intel, if its completes with the i7 6700k.

Also it depends on how much the new am4 motherboads cost to buy.

 

[AllBodies]

However,I think more like £200 to £250 for the 4C/8T versions makes more sense,but what is filling the gap under £200 though??

Presumably the APUs which will come a bit later, and will be a different manufacturing line (i.e. there won't be 8c/16t parts with 50% of the die turned off).

And the AM4 Excavator based APUs will be AMD's 'cheap' offering till the Zen APUs arrive.

 

[r7slayer]

I would be very surprised if they are only making one Zen die and using the 8C16T die for all models, with the appropriate parts disabled of course. I would think it more likely that they have at least two dies, one 8C16T and one 4C8T and then make all the necessary chip from those two.

Don't know it would be more profitable for them to use the 8c/16t. Any chips that don't quite make the 8c16th grade then any parts of the chip that are bad they disable and see how it goes as the 4c/8th part and weather if it makes the grade or not. Instead of fabricating two different chips altogether. AMD need to make money lol so salvaging is the way to go. Wouldn't be the first time they have done it. I remember trying to get hold of the phenom chips that they did this to. But i went intel so never did try lol.

 

[bru]

Don't know it would be more profitable for them to use the 8c/16t. Any chips that don't quite make the 8c16th grade then any parts of the chip that are bad they disable and see how it goes as the 4c/8th part and weather if it makes the grade or not. Instead of fabricating two different chips altogether. AMD need to make money lol so salvaging is the way to go. Wouldn't be the first time they have done it. I remember trying to get hold of the phenom chips that they did this to. But i went intel so never did try lol.

That sounds great, right up until they find the process matured enough to not give that many defective parts and then realise that they will sell an awful lot more 4C8T parts than 6C12T or 8C16T parts. So they end up having to use larger full good parts with bits lasered off rather than cheaper smaller parts.

 

[Besty]

If we are going to get 4, 6 and 8 core variants maybe SR4/6/8 would be a better call. More consumer friendly.

SR7 has historical connotations with speed and setting world records.

It also has a connection with black.

I think its a pretty awesome name for a CPU, its worth buying just to get the code name!

The Zen 8C CPU only really needs to hit 4.2GHZ with max volts, anything else is a bonus although the thermals look far better than the 6900k on paper albeit with less cache.

The Zen 4C CPU does not seem to be targeting the 7700k instead it looks like the Zen 6C CPU is going to go head to head with the 4C 7700k in terms of speed and thermals.

I think WCCFTECH are right on the pricing, I would expect the 6C Zen chip to cost around $350 and the 8C $499.

 

[bru]

SR7 has historical connotations with speed and setting world records.

It also has a connection with black.

I think its a pretty awesome name for a CPU, its worth buying just to get the code name!

The Zen 8C CPU only really needs to hit 4.2GHZ with max volts, anything else is a bonus although the thermals look far better than the 6900k on paper albeit with less cache.

The Zen 4C CPU does not seem to be targeting the 7700k instead it looks like the Zen 6C CPU is going to go head to head with the 4C 7700k in terms of speed and thermals.

I think WCCFTECH are right on the pricing, I would expect the 6C Zen chip to cost around $350 and the 8C $499.

One thing to remember is that the name whatever they end up with, it wont just be SR7, it would be SR7 6950 (or some other numbers) and next generation it would be RR7 7950, So it would be confusing for the customer.

A plain and simple Z7 6950 followed by Z7 7950 would be much less confusing.

On your second point, the 6C12T going up against the 4C8T Intel 7700k part. Well if that is the case, we would expect comparable performance, but then if that is the case how is the 8C16T part comparable with the Intel 8C16T part.

Surely Zen either has comparable performance core for core or it doesn't.

 

[bru]

More interesting info in the other thread, with new supposedly leaked slides.

Maybe time for this thread to be closed and just have one Zen thread, rather than the two current ones, as I'm sure there will be loads of threads once they actually arrive.

 

[Besty]

One thing to remember is that the name whatever they end up with, it wont just be SR7, it would be SR7 6950 (or some other numbers) and next generation it would be RR7 7950, So it would be confusing for the customer.

A plain and simple Z7 6950 followed by Z7 7950 would be much less confusing.

On your second point, the 6C12T going up against the 4C8T Intel 7700k part. Well if that is the case, we would expect comparable performance, but then if that is the case how is the 8C16T part comparable with the Intel 8C16T part.

Surely Zen either has comparable performance core for core or it doesn't.

the power reqs on the 4c zen parts are rated too low which means the clocks won't boost high enough for the initial launch parts to compete with a 6700k. single core perf won't show this. regarding 8c perf zen does not appear to have enough cache so while single core perf will be fine multicore perf will suffer in some scenarios.

lower cache may actually improve overclocking perf so it's not all lose on the cache front.

i am in the market for a 8c zen which does 4.2ghz or a 6c zen which does 4.7ghz and a sr7 mobo with at least two m2 slots.

not really wanting to go down the intel/nvidia route for my rig refresh next year even if it means sacrificing some perf.

 

[DragonQ]

That sounds great, right up until they find the process matured enough to not give that many defective parts and then realise that they will sell an awful lot more 4C8T parts than 6C12T or 8C16T parts. So they end up having to use larger full good parts with bits lasered off rather than cheaper smaller parts.

Nah, the 6 and 8 core parts will sell like hotcakes in the server market, as long as their marketing is good enough to get people to realise there is some competition to Intel.

 

[Bluntwrapped]

I'm going to call this another Bulldozer. Lots of hype, when in reality it's going to suck ****'s compared to the current line of Intel CPU's.

I really hope I'm wrong but I'm 98% sure I won't be.

 

[~>Dg<~]

i hope it is but in reality cant see it.

 

[humbug]

I'm going to call this another Bulldozer. Lots of hype, when in reality it's going to suck ****'s compared to the current line of Intel CPU's.

I really hope I'm wrong but I'm 98% sure I won't be.

What makes you so sure?

 

[jigger]

I'm going to call this another Bulldozer. Lots of hype, when in reality it's going to suck ****'s compared to the current line of Intel CPU's.

I really hope I'm wrong but I'm 98% sure I won't be.

8 cores 16 threads over 40% IPC or maybe a little more. You don't think AMD will deliver that?

 

[DragonQ]

8 cores 16 threads over 40% IPC or maybe a little more. You don't think AMD will deliver that?

Persoanlly I'm sure they will deliver on the 40% IPC improvement and 8 core CPUs, I think that's nailed on by now. But that's not the whole story. You also have to factor in:

• Cache sizes
• Standard clock speed
• Overclock headroom
• SMT implementation
• Price

etc. In theory they could sell 8 core chips with Skylake level IPC and it could still be crap if the above metrics aren't favourable.

 

[Besty]

we already know from the leaked benches that it's fast and there is no risk of a bulldozer rerun. the design decisions which led to bulldozer having poor single core ipc have been reversed. the key question is clock speed and specifically boost clock speed.

 

[jigger]

As long as AMD get 8c 16t chips out with 40% over the last gen I think they're golden. Assuming the price is fair of course.

What I'm just as interested in is what AM4 along with Zen and Bristol Ridge offers.

 

[Pants]

Persoanlly I'm sure they will deliver on the 40% IPC improvement and 8 core CPUs, I think that's nailed on by now. But that's not the whole story. You also have to factor in:

• Cache sizes
• Standard clock speed
• Overclock headroom
• SMT implementation
• Price

etc. In theory they could sell 8 core chips with Skylake level IPC and it could still be crap if the above metrics aren't favourable.

Also assuming all that is well, on the non-enthusiast mobile side (when it comes) i'd want something like Intel's Speed Shift v2. Should go a long way to making the system feel snappy.

I expect i'm going to end up with a 8C/16T Zen for desktop (assuming multi-threaded performance is above a 4/8 i7 and the price isn't hideous) and 2C/4T KabyLake for something mobile (hurry up Surface 5).

 

[mmj_uk]

Persoanlly I'm sure they will deliver on the 40% IPC improvement and 8 core CPUs, I think that's nailed on by now. But that's not the whole story. You also have to factor in:

• Cache sizes
• Standard clock speed
• Overclock headroom
• SMT implementation
• Price

etc. In theory they could sell 8 core chips with Skylake level IPC and it could still be crap if the above metrics aren't favourable.

What worries me is they've apparently seen fit to take overclocking out of the hands of motherboard vendors and the 'Turbo' is linked to TDP, so if it's anything like their graphics cards then you may well be able to overclock to 5ghz stable in CPU-Z and rubbish like Superpi but as soon as you run anything remotely stressful that uses all cores the TDP limit will kick in and throttle the CPU. Not to mention chip variance becomes a much bigger factor and we might see cherry picked review samples that are much better than retail samples, or you'll just get two people buying the same chips that are vastly different.

I think that's why they plan to sell the 'special edition' version, these will probably have the lowest TDP and throttle the least. I'd rather it not be linked to TDP and allow vendors like Asus to sell insanely overspecced (in terms of power delivery) motherboards.

 

[AllBodies]

What worries me is they've apparently seen fit to take overclocking out of the hands of motherboard vendors and the 'Turbo' is linked to TDP, so if it's anything like their graphics cards then you may well be able to overclock to 5ghz stable in CPU-Z and rubbish like Superpi but as soon as you run anything remotely stressful that uses all cores the TDP limit will kick in and throttle the CPU. Not to mention chip variance becomes a much bigger factor and we might see cherry picked review samples that are much better than retail samples, or you'll just get two people buying the same chips that are vastly different.

I think that's why they plan to sell the 'special edition' version, these will probably have the lowest TDP and throttle the least. I'd rather it not be linked to TDP and allow vendors like Asus to sell insanely overspecced (in terms of power delivery) motherboards.

I hadn't thought about the other side of the coin of having TDP linked to boost, in that it'll throttle like you said.

They did also mention user configurable TDPs though. So hopefully at least on the unlocked models, you'll be able to effectively set the TDP to unlimited.